M25 "Smart Motorway"
Discussion
So, the Kent/Surrey section is complete:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-27217264
Does it really aid traffic flow? As the picture in the article shows, hardly anyone uses lane 1 of a 4 section road, the only reason I can think of is that they think it's going to be for the next junction exit.
What about safety issues? The article says:
"Drivers who need to stop should use an emergency refuge area, motorway services, or leave at the next junction."
Well that's handy if you break down isn't it. We often discuss the length of time to open a motorway after an incident, but once there are 4 lanes solid with stationary traffic due to an accident how are the emergency services and recovery vehicles going to get through with no hard shoulder?
As soon as there is a broken down vehicle, the gantry signs will bring the whole motorway down to 30/40mph instead of keeping the hard shoulder and the vehicle sitting out of the way and letting the road run as normal. Are more people going to die because of this?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-27217264
Does it really aid traffic flow? As the picture in the article shows, hardly anyone uses lane 1 of a 4 section road, the only reason I can think of is that they think it's going to be for the next junction exit.
What about safety issues? The article says:
"Drivers who need to stop should use an emergency refuge area, motorway services, or leave at the next junction."
Well that's handy if you break down isn't it. We often discuss the length of time to open a motorway after an incident, but once there are 4 lanes solid with stationary traffic due to an accident how are the emergency services and recovery vehicles going to get through with no hard shoulder?
As soon as there is a broken down vehicle, the gantry signs will bring the whole motorway down to 30/40mph instead of keeping the hard shoulder and the vehicle sitting out of the way and letting the road run as normal. Are more people going to die because of this?
Lane discipline is one of the biggest issues for traffic flow i think.
3 lane motorway, people sit in lanes 2 & 3. 4 lane motorway, people sit in lanes 3 & 4
and these idiots who can't read the road further than the end of their bonnet suddenly realise they are coming up too fast on someone so pull out, keeping to exactly the same speed and overtake at 1mph extra. allowing a nice conga line behind of people going JUST faster than the car in lane 1
and the idiots that get pulled out on themselves - rather than using their own brakes they would rather swing out wildly into your path, f
k it eh, you use ya brakes cos i can't be bothered (if they had no alternative fair enough, but mostly its only a 80-60mph tap on the brakes that is required)
If people used their mirrors more, read the road better, got overtaking moves over and done with quicker and moved back to the left when they are done i think it would be the same as adding another 2 lanes to every motorway.
3 lane motorway, people sit in lanes 2 & 3. 4 lane motorway, people sit in lanes 3 & 4
and these idiots who can't read the road further than the end of their bonnet suddenly realise they are coming up too fast on someone so pull out, keeping to exactly the same speed and overtake at 1mph extra. allowing a nice conga line behind of people going JUST faster than the car in lane 1
and the idiots that get pulled out on themselves - rather than using their own brakes they would rather swing out wildly into your path, f
k it eh, you use ya brakes cos i can't be bothered (if they had no alternative fair enough, but mostly its only a 80-60mph tap on the brakes that is required)If people used their mirrors more, read the road better, got overtaking moves over and done with quicker and moved back to the left when they are done i think it would be the same as adding another 2 lanes to every motorway.
mgtony said:
As the picture in the article shows, hardly anyone uses lane 1 of a 4 section road, the only reason I can think of is that they think it's going to be for the next junction exit.
No, it's because they think the "slow lane" is for lorries. I used to commute around that stretch when it was 3 lanes and there'd usually be heavy traffic in lane 2 and 3 and virtually nothing in lane 1, so increasing it from 3 to 4 lanes has actually added nearly 50% more capacity thanks to the stupidity of drivers.3black said:
so does this mean its finally back to 70mph? or does variable mean it will most likely stick to 50? i used to have to drive through that every week and it was so painful
From the BBC.. "The 50mph limit remained in place until Wednesday, when traffic management was cleared and the whole section opened."3black said:
so does this mean its finally back to 70mph? or does variable mean it will most likely stick to 50? i used to have to drive through that every week and it was so painful
Which part of the following did you not understand?BBC article said:
The 50mph limit remained in place until Wednesday, when traffic management was cleared and the whole section opened.
mgtony said:
So, the Kent/Surrey section is complete:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-27217264
Does it really aid traffic flow? As the picture in the article shows, hardly anyone uses lane 1 of a 4 section road, the only reason I can think of is that they think it's going to be for the next junction exit.
What about safety issues? The article says:
"Drivers who need to stop should use an emergency refuge area, motorway services, or leave at the next junction."
Well that's handy if you break down isn't it. We often discuss the length of time to open a motorway after an incident, but once there are 4 lanes solid with stationary traffic due to an accident how are the emergency services and recovery vehicles going to get through with no hard shoulder?
As soon as there is a broken down vehicle, the gantry signs will bring the whole motorway down to 30/40mph instead of keeping the hard shoulder and the vehicle sitting out of the way and letting the road run as normal. Are more people going to die because of this?
This system has been in place on the M42 for years. Serious collisions fell significantly after it was introduced. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-27217264
Does it really aid traffic flow? As the picture in the article shows, hardly anyone uses lane 1 of a 4 section road, the only reason I can think of is that they think it's going to be for the next junction exit.
What about safety issues? The article says:
"Drivers who need to stop should use an emergency refuge area, motorway services, or leave at the next junction."
Well that's handy if you break down isn't it. We often discuss the length of time to open a motorway after an incident, but once there are 4 lanes solid with stationary traffic due to an accident how are the emergency services and recovery vehicles going to get through with no hard shoulder?
As soon as there is a broken down vehicle, the gantry signs will bring the whole motorway down to 30/40mph instead of keeping the hard shoulder and the vehicle sitting out of the way and letting the road run as normal. Are more people going to die because of this?
Purity14 said:
mgtony said:
Getting back to the safety issue, anyone a little bit worried about breaking down in a live lane with no hard shoulder?
Got a flat tyre, pulled over onto the hard shoulder, and it went pancake flat.Called Greenflag, waited about 10 minutes - Traffic Wombles turn up and tell me that the hard shoulder is going LIVE soon, and I will need to drive down the hard shoulder until I get to a layby.
I didn't really want to, because although my tyre was flat, It was 500 miles from being brand new 265/35/18s not cheap, and didn't want to ruin it by driving on it.
After 10 minutes of arguing the toss, I just decide to move my car; ended up ruining the tyre after all.
Admittedly the puncture was on the rear, and on the drivers side and the Hard Shoulder was very narrow so there would have been no real safe way of changing it on the side of the road but still. left me with a lovely split on the inside of the tyre.
The biggest problem on motorways is people's inability to use them properly.
I was on the M4 last weekend; lane 3 was full of cars struggling to do 85, lane 2 was full of cars doing 70 and bar the odd lorry lane 1 was EMPTY. This continued for at least 45 minutes and was driving me insane. Not using all the lanes properly can effectively halve the capacity of the motorway.
They do all these bullst 'smart motorways' and clever speed limit gimmicks because they'd rather make a system where they can fine people than actually teach them how to drive.
I was on the M4 last weekend; lane 3 was full of cars struggling to do 85, lane 2 was full of cars doing 70 and bar the odd lorry lane 1 was EMPTY. This continued for at least 45 minutes and was driving me insane. Not using all the lanes properly can effectively halve the capacity of the motorway.
They do all these bulls
t 'smart motorways' and clever speed limit gimmicks because they'd rather make a system where they can fine people than actually teach them how to drive.I love 4 lane sections of motorway. I generally find that it forms into what are effectively 2 separate duel carriage ways. people in lane 3 and 4 fighting among them selves leave lanes 1 and 2 fairly empty. Its often the case than I can wander along in lane 1 at 70 while lanes 3 and 4 are doing ~50.
Dodsy said:
I love 4 lane sections of motorway. I generally find that it forms into what are effectively 2 separate duel carriage ways. people in lane 3 and 4 fighting among them selves leave lanes 1 and 2 fairly empty. Its often the case than I can wander along in lane 1 at 70 while lanes 3 and 4 are doing ~50.
Same. When it all gets silly like that, I just drop into lane 1 or two if there is a load of lorries and carry on my business. Occasionally you get trapped in and have to fight your way into lane 3 or 4 to get round something but generally it is pretty relaxed decent progress while a load of people are getting irate with each other tailgating Cupramax said:
3black said:
so does this mean its finally back to 70mph? or does variable mean it will most likely stick to 50? i used to have to drive through that every week and it was so painful
Which part of the following did you not understand?BBC article said:
The 50mph limit remained in place until Wednesday, when traffic management was cleared and the whole section opened.
Dodsy said:
I love 4 lane sections of motorway. I generally find that it forms into what are effectively 2 separate duel carriage ways. people in lane 3 and 4 fighting among them selves leave lanes 1 and 2 fairly empty. Its often the case than I can wander along in lane 1 at 70 while lanes 3 and 4 are doing ~50.
No lorries over your way then? 
We've got the fancy Smart motorway on the M62 with hard shoulder running and it works brilliantly. I was hugely sceptical but it has totally transformed that section of the motorway - effectively moving traffic that queues to exit the motorway onto the hard shoulder and allows more free-flow for traffic coming onto the motorway.
I was told by someone from Highways Agency a while back that there were some statistics around the use of hard shoulder. I'm making these up but something like 50% of people who stopped, didn't need to stop, 40% could have exited the next juntion and 9% could have coasted to the laybys.
That just left 1% (again, I'm making the figures up but they were similarly dramatic), who genuinely needed use of the hard shoulder. Factor in the amount of time that those 1% would be on that piece of road, and with the control of the cameras and variable limits it takes care of that too. Seems to have worked too, as you sometimes see the hard shoulder closed due to a broken down car - very rare though, suggesting maybe the stats are right.
re: All lane running, I assume is the same type of thing? I've not seen one, but I guess a big mo-fo "X" will appear if someone hasn't been able to make it to safety?
I think it is good that the powers that be are actually now investing into roads to try and make things better for us.
Seems to have helped on the M42, the ones on the M6 J10A to J8 have been a complete waste of time. It seems to be running a bit slower than before due to the issue you pointed out - when the inevitable breakdown or accident happens, there is nowhere for traffic to go, so it all stops behind it, causing bedlam. The only benefit it seems to have brought is there are 4 lanes now, which does help. Until someone breaks down and it's down to 2.....
I'm all for 4 lane motorways. Throw all the wagons into lane 1, leaving 3 lanes clear for cars.
When a wagon overtakes and starts a snail race, traffic still has two lanes to get past, instead of all sitting behind some mekong who will over take the 2 wagons in lane 3 whilst doing 58mph.
However, i think it's a disgrace to remove a hard shoulder and it looks like a fatal waiting to happen.
When a wagon overtakes and starts a snail race, traffic still has two lanes to get past, instead of all sitting behind some mekong who will over take the 2 wagons in lane 3 whilst doing 58mph.
However, i think it's a disgrace to remove a hard shoulder and it looks like a fatal waiting to happen.
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