[TV] Smart Motorways - BBC Panorama now

[Lower West Stander]

But how many deaths would there have been if they hadn't been converted to smart motorways? It could have been MORE for all we know?

We can't know. What we do know is the psychological impact of being forced to stop on a live motorway lane with no refuge is massive - and unsurprisingly people don't want to do it. That they have caused deaths is an irrefutable fact.

You can't deal with possibles on this - you have to deal with what's in front of you. And its bloody dangerous.

 

[BUTTERBALL]

I didn't see the programme but i remember reading about them when they were first being rolled out and thought at the time it was a crazy and dangerous idea and nothing has changed my mind.

The death toll is probably seen as collateral for slightly better flowing traffic.

 

[Stat Brother]

The death toll is probably seen as collateral for slightly better flowing traffic.

It is on every other road, so why should motorways be any different?

 

[Lush]

Facetious comment alert: Perhaps it's the governments' contribution to preventing global warming by getting car drivers off the road. Either through fear or death.

 

[Husty]

We can't know. What we do know is the psychological impact of being forced to stop on a live motorway lane with no refuge is massive - and unsurprisingly people don't want to do it. That they have caused deaths is an irrefutable fact.

You can't deal with possibles on this - you have to deal with what's in front of you. And its bloody dangerous.

Yes in the grand scheme of things motorway driving is a pretty dangerous pastime. But you can't have a rational debate about the safety of smart motorways in absolute terms. What have happened to the rate of accidents and deaths in the years before and after implementation of the smart motorways on these same stretches of road, adjusted for the number of journeys being made? Otherwise you can't say whether or not smart motorways are better or worse.

 

[1066familyman]

I’m guessing that when the smart motorway / no hard shoulder option is activated, you are probably statistically safest to be as far away from the left as possible- i.e. drive in the right hand lane.

It's a cunning plan to clog up the overtaking lane, thus slowing everything down.

I'm sure no one undertakes on motorways either. Not EVER.

The plan is genius, never mind smart!

 

[Horses Arse]

When I had a blowout on the M23 I was lucky enough to be at the junction with the M25, so could pull over immediately and was far from the other traffic. I was chatting to the guy who moved the car on from the motorway and he said the smart motorways were so expensive because of the sensors that automatically scanned the lane and ensured that it was closed when there was an obstruction. He reckoned the software designed to work alongside these sensors was never completed/validated and hence is not implemented and so it currently relies on CCTV and people watching.

Bloody ridiculous if true - given that he is employed to clear cars from the motorway works areas I assume he has some knowledge on this

 

[Worthing exile]

The main bit I remember from the programme was the telephone call from the man who had broken down.

It went something like 'I have broken down and there are five of us in the car, oh shit' followed by a loud bang and silence because a lorry had run in to the back of the car.

He had only just broken down so no chance for anyone to close the lane. He had nowhere to go and obviously the lorry driver hadn't seen he was stationary.

 

[Horses Arse]

The main bit I remember from the programme was the telephone call from the man who had broken down.

It went something like 'I have broken down and there are five of us in the car, oh shit' followed by a loud bang and silence because a lorry had run in to the back of the car.

He had only just broken down so no chance for anyone to close the lane. He had nowhere to go and obviously the lorry driver hadn't seen he was stationary.

I heard that recording on a radio program and they interviewed the family about the experience. What saved his kids was that the car was packed for a holiday and they had bikes at the back - all crushed but took some of the force out. Really scary recording. Apparently the lorry driver was travelling behind another vehicle that pulled out at the last minute giving him no chance to avoid the stationary car. No matter what technology is in place that sort of thing will still happen

 

[Notters]

There might be hundreds of cameras but still reliant on a person watching multiple screens. Incidents can be missed, and, as shown on the Ch5 programme I watched last night, warnings ignored.

Sorry, my point was that there are hundreds on the M42, I think there must be one every couple of hundred yards, but far fewer elsewhere.

 

[Arthritic Toe]

Yes in the grand scheme of things motorway driving is a pretty dangerous pastime. But you can't have a rational debate about the safety of smart motorways in absolute terms. What have happened to the rate of accidents and deaths in the years before and after implementation of the smart motorways on these same stretches of road, adjusted for the number of journeys being made? Otherwise you can't say whether or not smart motorways are better or worse.

It is exactly these statistics that have proved that the smart motorways are very much more dangerous. That was the whole basis of last nights programme.

 

[Taybha]

They are a good idea in theory , but they pretty much rely on ALL drivers being careful and vigilant , so a huge pat on the back to whoever thought of this astounding waste of money which could of been invested into something better like treating the hundreds and thousands of potholes all over the country , utter madness , will watch the program at some point but i doubt after watching it i will have changed my view on this obscene waste of money .

 

[Muzzy]

I teach truck and coach drivers on how smart motorways work and how to drive on them. The feedback generally isn’t very positive about these road systems. The M42 has been partly smart motorway for around 20 years and has improved traffic flow and reduced accident levels in the main.
However, it took a long time for the people that drive on this section of motorway frequently, a long time to get used to using the M42. Now that the motorway network in the Uk is going full on to create these new sections of road, I fear many lives will be lost before we see road safety figures improve.
There are pros and cons to smart motorways but until driving standards improve with an understanding of how to use them properly, I don’t have a lot of faith that they are the answer to congestion.
Roads are safe, road users driving ability is the problem. That isn’t wholly blaming the drivers but the standard of training that is given to them/us.
I was taught to drive, these days people are taught to pass a test. There is a big big difference between the two.

 

[Iggle Piggle]

This!!

I've driven up and down the M42 loads. The impression you get as a driver is that there is a hard shoulder, which is sometimes opened to traffic. I currently live near the M1, and the 'smart' motorway is the opposite - i.e. there is no hard shoulder. People simply ignore the red 'x's, or use the closed lane as a method of overtaking as much traffic as they can before they have to get over to lane 2.

Also, as you say you can pretty much always see the next refuge area on the M42, this is definitely not the case on the M1.

Very much this. I drove down the M42 smart motorway today and made a point of looking about. At the time (lunchtime) the hard shoulder was closed to traffic and was denoted by a solid white line. The refuge areas are plentiful and it only tends to open up at rush hours. There is also a plethora of overheads like the M25.

This was in contrast to the M5. The hard shoulder was open and to all intents and purposes was part of the motorway with no solid line. One of the refuges was small and up against a concrete wall - I'd hate to break down there. It was also pointless having the hard shoulder open at the time being particularly quiet.

They have taken something that works and replaced it with a giant turd.

 

[ac gull]

When M42 was first converted to how it is now there was a lot of scepticism - but over time it worked better and was I believe a key factor in reducing accident levels as it slowed all traffic down to 50 to 60 and was definitely less congestion too

This success was sadly not replicated re the thought that technology re all the extra cameras could mean less refuge areas - I did meet someone once who was involved in the M1 smart motorways who was not exactly complimentary about the designs that were given to work to

 

[whosthedaddy]

How the hell did this dangerous and deadly idea get the green light?

Conservative MP Sir Mike Penning agreed to the expansion in 2010 after a successful pilot on the M42 near Birmingham. Apparently, the pilot worked well due to the fact that safe stopping points for motorists were placed on average every 600 metres. But when the scheme was expanded across the country, the ‘safety refuges’ as they were named were placed further apart, on some motorways around 2.5 miles apart.
Sir Mike apparently now says they are endangering people's lives, there are people that are being killed and seriously injured on these roads, and it should never have happened.

He argues that they've basically stitched him up as what he originally approved is not what is being delivered.

The governments Transport Secretary is Grant Shapps MP, he should STOP the rollout of these Smart Motorways NOW, even he is saying they are 'confusing', too bloody right they are mate.

 

[marlowe]

I had experience of the smart motorway effect but in The Drive in Hove. It was a few years ago shortly after the cycle lane had been created. The way The Drive is laid out since the creation of the cycle lane means that when you park you are parked where the middle of the traffic lane used to be and you feel a bit like you are parked in the middle of the road.

I used to park there quite often out of necessity and I used to think at the time that it just felt wrong and it felt quite vulnerable. One evening I had parked in a designated parking bay next to the cycle lane and I was still sitting in my car when a van crashed into the back of me at full speed. Because I was parked I wasn't wearing a seatbelt and I was sent flying forward by the force of the impact and hit my head on the steering wheel. If I had been standing at the back of my car getting something out of the boot I would certainly have been killed.

The accident occurred purely because of the combination of the unconventional road layout and driver carelessness but on a residential road with a 30mph limit. To put those two contributary factors within a motorway environment where traffic travels at more than twice the speed and is more heavily congested makes me quite apprehensive from personal experience how dangerous it will be.

 

[beorhthelm]

How the hell did this dangerous and deadly idea get the green light?

gave answer your own question, a successful pilot. seems when it went wider the measures changed to make it less safe though, typical government to screw up a working idea. what i cant quite work out is how they become dangerous. if the hard shoulder is in use traffic should be congested and slow already, the big f-ing red X tells anyone to get out of the lane, returning to the default of there being a hard shoulder in effect. sounds like protocol isnt followed, either by people in control or by drivers unable to follow a basic instruction.

 

[mwrpoole]

And the fact that no one takes a blind bit of notice of a red X as people just hammer along in the “ closed lane” and cut in when they feel like it so also pissing everyone off

If this experiment is cancelled how much money has this country spunked on it and how much better would the money have been better spent! If only they designed motorways the french way where you have large lay-bys at very frequent gaps to be able to get out and walk about or have a picknic off the road rather than the horrendously expensive motorways services that we seem to want to build.

Last year I got on the M25 at J5 on a Saturday morning and it was stationary. But the inside lane was clear although the big red X was showing. Being a smart arse I went in the inside lane thinking I’ll cut in when I get to the incident. Well there was no incident or if there was it had been cleared. When I got to clackets red X went off and traffic was fine.

A few days later I got a letter from Highways Agency telling me I’d been caught driving in a lane with red X. It said it was now a criminal offence to do so but as that was a recent change this was a final warning. I’ve not done it again since.

Be interesting to know whether fines are now being handed out to red X drivers.

 

[dejavuatbtn]

It must be the most stupid idea that anyone ever came up with. A fine example of an idea by someone who has never driven or broken down on a motorway. When they first came up with this idea I couldn’t believe it. When they pumped billions into building them I couldn’t believe it. I now find the outcome believable. Relying on technology being smart enough to get the signs up instantly and for drivers having the time to react to the sudden change in use of a lane was always going to be impossible. With the time delays, technical errors and driver error on top of this, it was always going to be, and will always be, a recipe for disaster.