Smart motorway rollout to be stopped?
Discussion
98elise said:
... if someone is stranded in a lane the lane gets shut down so it back to having a hard shoulder.
Hopefully before a lorry ploughs onto the back of you because in the meantime you're stopped in a live lane. A permanent hard shoulder does seem like it must be a better idea, but it would be interesting to quantify the difference.JimSuperSix said:
It's common sense really - if you have no assigned place for broken vehicles to stop , the situation is going to be much more dangerous than when you do, and people get killed even when there's a proper refuge area.
Possibly, except there's far more actively monitored CCTV coverage on ALR sections and overhead signage to warn other vehicles/close lanes/impose speed restrictions (target is to do this within 3 minutes) which must (surely, common sense would tell us) mitigate some risk. At the risk of being boring, MORE RESEARCH NEEDED.JimSuperSix said:
Pothole said:
JimSuperSix said:
I suspect the logic is that if her husband was killed on a road that DID have a hard shoulder, those people driving and working on motorways without one are in even more danger.
So emotive, unresearched extrapolation? OKPGN said:
An easy and cheap way to increase the traffic flow would be to educate all the idiots who drive at their own speed in lane 2 of 3 (or 3 of 4) to move over. Maybe display "Keep left unless overtaking" on the overhead signs instead of the usual crap. We don't need so called smart motorways we just need smarter (ok, slightly less idiotic) driving!
That would be too much like a sensible thing to do.Best save those gantry displays for festive season reminders or inaccurate traffic reports.
I had a particularly scary event on a managed motorway.
I commute every day along the M4 west and M5 south sections of managed motorway around Bristol. Generally speaking the hard shoulder is the least used of the lanes so I'll get in it and stick to 60mph, undertaking quite merrily all of the numpties doing 42mph in the other lanes.
The M4/M5 interchange is a beautiful piece of engineering and would allow all traffic to switch motorways at full speed if the A38 wasn't immediately after it. Due to the inability of people to leave gaps and merge in turn the junction regularly snarls up and the only lane that doesn't snarl up is the hard shoulder.
So there I was, going around the corner at the regulation 60mph on the hard shoulder. All lanes were open, so imagine my surprise when I saw a Nissan Micra stopped close in front of me with the hazards on. Luckily I was able to switch lanes without causing an incident but it was far too close for comfort. I called the police immediately and told them they needed to shut the lane, and a couple of minutes later it was on the traffic report on the radio.
When I got to the office, I checked the camera for that junction using the Traffic England website; it's broken, and hasn't been fixed in the 6+ months since the incident.
I'm generally in favour of managed motorways - it's certainly made my commute a lot smoother - but it does increase risk if it's not managed properly. And at the moment it's not being managed properly.
I commute every day along the M4 west and M5 south sections of managed motorway around Bristol. Generally speaking the hard shoulder is the least used of the lanes so I'll get in it and stick to 60mph, undertaking quite merrily all of the numpties doing 42mph in the other lanes.
The M4/M5 interchange is a beautiful piece of engineering and would allow all traffic to switch motorways at full speed if the A38 wasn't immediately after it. Due to the inability of people to leave gaps and merge in turn the junction regularly snarls up and the only lane that doesn't snarl up is the hard shoulder.
So there I was, going around the corner at the regulation 60mph on the hard shoulder. All lanes were open, so imagine my surprise when I saw a Nissan Micra stopped close in front of me with the hazards on. Luckily I was able to switch lanes without causing an incident but it was far too close for comfort. I called the police immediately and told them they needed to shut the lane, and a couple of minutes later it was on the traffic report on the radio.
When I got to the office, I checked the camera for that junction using the Traffic England website; it's broken, and hasn't been fixed in the 6+ months since the incident.
I'm generally in favour of managed motorways - it's certainly made my commute a lot smoother - but it does increase risk if it's not managed properly. And at the moment it's not being managed properly.
They need to stop them and just paint the lines back. So dangerous it beggars belief that any sane person could sign it off.
I actually hope the dick that thought this would be a good idea gets a blow out on the M6 in the driving rain on a dark night.
I know a few people, including myself, who’ve experienced ‘smart motorway’ lane management stupidity. My heart rate hit stupid levels trying to coax a flat tyred car to a refuge area. Keep far left, hazards. Was stationary but f
k that.. One HGV locking up in your mirrors is enough for me..
I actually hope the dick that thought this would be a good idea gets a blow out on the M6 in the driving rain on a dark night.
I know a few people, including myself, who’ve experienced ‘smart motorway’ lane management stupidity. My heart rate hit stupid levels trying to coax a flat tyred car to a refuge area. Keep far left, hazards. Was stationary but f
k that.. One HGV locking up in your mirrors is enough for me..I drive on the M42 twice a day every day. The smart use of all lanes is a great idea . On occasions where its not operating the traffic can be horrendous.
Its not possible to educate people away from being MLMs , ive talked to a few at work , they know its now illegal but insist its safer to be in the middle lane and wont change. One woman could not be convinced that her idea of always staying as far right as possible was wrong!
Quite often i can sail down the relatively empty hard shoulder lane knocking quite a bit of time off my journey home in rush hour.
Ive seen 2 accidents on the open hard shoulder lane , both were nothing to do with breakdowns , just idiots not noticing the traffic in front was in a stationary queue and running into the car in front
There are regular refuge areas and i quite often see cars in them , anything short of a total failure means most breakdowns seem able to limp along to one of those areas .
The big issue is that people dont look ahead and its even more important when using the hard shoulder lane.
Its not possible to educate people away from being MLMs , ive talked to a few at work , they know its now illegal but insist its safer to be in the middle lane and wont change. One woman could not be convinced that her idea of always staying as far right as possible was wrong!
Quite often i can sail down the relatively empty hard shoulder lane knocking quite a bit of time off my journey home in rush hour.
Ive seen 2 accidents on the open hard shoulder lane , both were nothing to do with breakdowns , just idiots not noticing the traffic in front was in a stationary queue and running into the car in front
There are regular refuge areas and i quite often see cars in them , anything short of a total failure means most breakdowns seem able to limp along to one of those areas .
The big issue is that people dont look ahead and its even more important when using the hard shoulder lane.
Edited by Dodsy on Sunday 16th December 20:03
Pothole said:
JimSuperSix said:
It's common sense really - if you have no assigned place for broken vehicles to stop , the situation is going to be much more dangerous than when you do, and people get killed even when there's a proper refuge area.
Possibly, except there's far more actively monitored CCTV coverage on ALR sections and overhead signage to warn other vehicles/close lanes/impose speed restrictions (target is to do this within 3 minutes) which must (surely, common sense would tell us) mitigate some risk. At the risk of being boring, MORE RESEARCH NEEDED.Motorways are sufficiently dangerous as is without additional f
kwittery. I'm ex-plod & motorway trained.I've never considered this 'smart motorway' nonsense a good idea.
FWIW a neighbour's oldest son was killed a few months ago when the car he was in broke down on the M6 which at the time was in 'Smart motorway' mode with 4 live lanes. They'd managed to get it to what would normally have been the hard shoulder before it stopped but no time to get out before it was hit. AIUI 3 lorries managed to swerve round it but the 4th went into the offside back of it & as he was in the offside back of the car that was it. Driver of the car seriously injured but survived, both nearside passengers injured but not seriously.
Came back from Worcestershire on the M6 this evening. Dark. Heavy rain. Visibility poor due to spray. Heavy traffic. 'Smart' motorway in operation & 60 limit. Anyone breaking down wouldn't have had a snowflake in hell's chance. Lunacy.
Edited by paintman on Sunday 16th December 20:03
davepoth said:
I had a particularly scary event on a managed motorway.
I commute every day along the M4 west and M5 south sections of managed motorway around Bristol. Generally speaking the hard shoulder is the least used of the lanes so I'll get in it and stick to 60mph, undertaking quite merrily all of the numpties doing 42mph in the other lanes.
The M4/M5 interchange is a beautiful piece of engineering and would allow all traffic to switch motorways at full speed if the A38 wasn't immediately after it. Due to the inability of people to leave gaps and merge in turn the junction regularly snarls up and the only lane that doesn't snarl up is the hard shoulder.
So there I was, going around the corner at the regulation 60mph on the hard shoulder. All lanes were open, so imagine my surprise when I saw a Nissan Micra stopped close in front of me with the hazards on. Luckily I was able to switch lanes without causing an incident but it was far too close for comfort. I called the police immediately and told them they needed to shut the lane, and a couple of minutes later it was on the traffic report on the radio.
When I got to the office, I checked the camera for that junction using the Traffic England website; it's broken, and hasn't been fixed in the 6+ months since the incident.
I'm generally in favour of managed motorways - it's certainly made my commute a lot smoother - but it does increase risk if it's not managed properly. And at the moment it's not being managed properly.
Had you hIt the stopped vehicle, you would have been the main cause of the incident. I commute every day along the M4 west and M5 south sections of managed motorway around Bristol. Generally speaking the hard shoulder is the least used of the lanes so I'll get in it and stick to 60mph, undertaking quite merrily all of the numpties doing 42mph in the other lanes.
The M4/M5 interchange is a beautiful piece of engineering and would allow all traffic to switch motorways at full speed if the A38 wasn't immediately after it. Due to the inability of people to leave gaps and merge in turn the junction regularly snarls up and the only lane that doesn't snarl up is the hard shoulder.
So there I was, going around the corner at the regulation 60mph on the hard shoulder. All lanes were open, so imagine my surprise when I saw a Nissan Micra stopped close in front of me with the hazards on. Luckily I was able to switch lanes without causing an incident but it was far too close for comfort. I called the police immediately and told them they needed to shut the lane, and a couple of minutes later it was on the traffic report on the radio.
When I got to the office, I checked the camera for that junction using the Traffic England website; it's broken, and hasn't been fixed in the 6+ months since the incident.
I'm generally in favour of managed motorways - it's certainly made my commute a lot smoother - but it does increase risk if it's not managed properly. And at the moment it's not being managed properly.
Edited by Pothole on Sunday 16th December 23:10
Local to me, I've seen a few near misses on this section of the M1 where it is permanent all lane running
You can see the gantry before the bend circled at the bottom of the image. The next gantry is highlighted further down the road.
That area in the middle is where the danger lies. Imagine a truck thundering around there on a dark and rainy night, by the time they spot a stranded car they will have no time to react. Even if the sign is set to close the lane, what happens when a vehicle has already passed that sign - it's a fair distance to the next one.
I've seen stranded cars in that section far more times than i'd like, and been nearly sideswiped by an Artic swerving to avoid one.
You can see the gantry before the bend circled at the bottom of the image. The next gantry is highlighted further down the road.
That area in the middle is where the danger lies. Imagine a truck thundering around there on a dark and rainy night, by the time they spot a stranded car they will have no time to react. Even if the sign is set to close the lane, what happens when a vehicle has already passed that sign - it's a fair distance to the next one.
I've seen stranded cars in that section far more times than i'd like, and been nearly sideswiped by an Artic swerving to avoid one.
Edited by littlebasher on Sunday 16th December 21:01
On the other side of the coin on my last breakdown a smart motorway would have helped .
Cruising along @ 85 in 3rd outside lane , my car cut out and had no power and was coasting down to 0 with no power steering and limited brake assist . Car behind immediately wanted to ram me off the road as I was slightly slowing them down, I couldn't change lanes as traffic was too heavy and fast and wouldn't let me . I coasted to a stop in the outside lane . Thankfully I was on my own so I jumped out , jumped the barrier and stood well back .
My car then caused carnage for an hour until the rac turned up . If that was a smart motorway they would have closed off both lanes making it easier and safer
Cruising along @ 85 in 3rd outside lane , my car cut out and had no power and was coasting down to 0 with no power steering and limited brake assist . Car behind immediately wanted to ram me off the road as I was slightly slowing them down, I couldn't change lanes as traffic was too heavy and fast and wouldn't let me . I coasted to a stop in the outside lane . Thankfully I was on my own so I jumped out , jumped the barrier and stood well back .
My car then caused carnage for an hour until the rac turned up . If that was a smart motorway they would have closed off both lanes making it easier and safer
Is that on the stretch just south of Sheffield?
I've also come across several stranded cars on that section with no warning during the evening when the traffic is fairly light. Whatever is meant to detect the stranded cars (some kind of CCTV I presume) clearly doesn't work. Often there is then a lane closed and warning signs about a mile further on, with no sign of any stranded vehicle, so presumably the warning has been put in for the wrong place. I also got this with some overnight roadworks a few weeks ago, where there were red "X"s in all but one lane causing a huge jam, but no sign of any roadworks. Then about 3 miles later, when the traffic was really storming off because of the previous hold-up, and with no overhead warnings or speed limit at all, it all came to a crashing stop for the actual roadworks - crashing in the literal sense of the word for a few cars which had not been paying attention and gone through the cones....
Whenever I pass a stranded car with no warning now, I will either pull into the next refuge and report it on the roadside phone or if that's occupied phone 999. The refuges are an absolute pig to get out of safely though with no real slip road, and not particularly great sighting either.
I've also come across several stranded cars on that section with no warning during the evening when the traffic is fairly light. Whatever is meant to detect the stranded cars (some kind of CCTV I presume) clearly doesn't work. Often there is then a lane closed and warning signs about a mile further on, with no sign of any stranded vehicle, so presumably the warning has been put in for the wrong place. I also got this with some overnight roadworks a few weeks ago, where there were red "X"s in all but one lane causing a huge jam, but no sign of any roadworks. Then about 3 miles later, when the traffic was really storming off because of the previous hold-up, and with no overhead warnings or speed limit at all, it all came to a crashing stop for the actual roadworks - crashing in the literal sense of the word for a few cars which had not been paying attention and gone through the cones....
Whenever I pass a stranded car with no warning now, I will either pull into the next refuge and report it on the roadside phone or if that's occupied phone 999. The refuges are an absolute pig to get out of safely though with no real slip road, and not particularly great sighting either.
Pothole said:
Had you hot the stopped vehicle, you would have been the main cause of the incident.
Well yes, if I had been traveling in excess of the speed limit and hadn't been aware of what evasive action I could take without endangering myself or other road users then I would have been the cause of the accident. However, I was paying attention to what I was doing and no accident took place.The point was that I had to take evasive action to get out of a lane that the signs had told me was clear, despite the Highways Agency having no way of knowing if the lane was clear at that point because the camera is broken. If they are happy with that sort of risk then there is a problem with the system.
Edited by davepoth on Sunday 16th December 21:31
“Smart” motorways are anything but smart - fundamentally flawed, dangerous and unfit for purpose from the day the normal motorway is closed, the delays and accidents are horrendous and when the works are finished, you are left with a slower moving and more dangerous driving environment.
For example, I use the M20 most working days and have done so for over 9 years. Up until recently it has generally flowed pretty well in both directions, even in peak hours - although there are sections which can become congested, traffic would normally slow down but rarely come to a full halt.
A few months ago, they started to convert a large section to “smart” and the traffic jams are a nightmare and the rate of accidents is astronomical, even though there is a 50mph limit (almost impossible to achieve such speeds, incidentally). Joining or leaving the motorway is also often next to impossible due to the streams of slow moving traffic in all lanes travelling close together and at very similar speeds.
On several occasions, emergency service vehicles with blue lights on have been stuck in the jams, unable to get through and without the hard shoulder to use, they sit there with the rest of us.
Progress has been woefully slow. I often drive for miles and miles without seeing anyone working on the “roadworks” so we have months more of the status quo to look forward to.
This would be (marginally) more acceptable if, at the end of all the hassle, there was some improvement but no, we are then stuck with a “variable speed limit” motorway which switches randomly from 60 to 50 to 40 and back again for no apparent reason than, it seems, to catch you out for speeding; no hard shoulder, should you be unfortunate enough to break down and nowhere for the emergency services to utilise when the inevitable accidents happen.
What utter moron thought this was a good idea? At least somebody is questioning the roll-out of more...
(Copy & paste from the other thread)
Wacky Racer said:
Schmed said:
Smart motorways are one of the dumbest ideas the DoT have ever come up with. Whichever retard signed these off needs shooting quite frankly. Well let’s wait for the accident statistics to change the policy then. Idiotic.
This. Engine blows up/cambelt snaps/tyre blowout, nowhere to go, Artic hits you in the back at 50mph.How many people have to get killed before they give us a hard shoulder back?
And three minutes stuck in a live lane is in no way acceptable.
Edited by Trevor555 on Sunday 16th December 23:08
Pothole said:
Possibly, except there's far more actively monitored CCTV coverage on ALR sections and overhead signage to warn other vehicles/close lanes/impose speed restrictions (target is to do this within 3 minutes) which must (surely, common sense would tell us) mitigate some risk. At the risk of being boring, MORE RESEARCH NEEDED.
I've often wondered how 'smart' they actually the in terms of detecting a failed car and closing down a lane to protect said car. Three minutes sounds like a very long time. Daniel
davepoth said:
Well yes, if I had been traveling in excess of the speed limit and hadn't been aware of what evasive action I could take without endangering myself or other road users then I would have been the cause of the accident. However, I was paying attention to what I was doing and no accident took place.
The point was that I had to take evasive action to get out of a lane that the signs had told me was clear, despite the Highways Agency having no way of knowing if the lane was clear at that point because the camera is broken. If they are happy with that sort of risk then there is a problem with the system.
Unless you have contact with the HE control room which covers that section you have no way of knowing whether the camera is showing them anything or not. The point was that I had to take evasive action to get out of a lane that the signs had told me was clear, despite the Highways Agency having no way of knowing if the lane was clear at that point because the camera is broken. If they are happy with that sort of risk then there is a problem with the system.
Edited by davepoth on Sunday 16th December 21:31
You appear proud of your poor driving which rather devalues your opinion.
SkodaIan said:
I've also come across several stranded cars on that section with no warning during the evening when the traffic is fairly light. Whatever is meant to detect the stranded cars (some kind of CCTV I presume) clearly doesn't work. Often there is then a lane closed and warning signs about a mile further on, with no sign of any stranded vehicle, so presumably the warning has been put in for the wrong place.
Along with the report of a camera broken for six months, sounds absolutely toss. Not good at all.It's a cost effective fix to an increasing level of traffic, but if it starts costing lives that's not good.
Daniel
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