Forum Topic

Smart Motorways

I think most people thought they were not a good idea. Now MP's are wondering. I read somewhere 38 fatalities on them. No hard shoulder! A wet dark evening and you breakdown! Frightening! Run is the best policy.

Nicholas Beard ● 2022d11 Comments

No wonder it can be some time until breakdowns are noticed.

Philippa Bond ● 1981d

We now learn that not all cameras on Smart Motorways are constantly monitored. Fatal.

Nicholas Beard ● 1981d

Exactly.  No disabled access to any tube station in Chiswick.  The mainline Chiswick station is OK for disabled people provided someone drops them off and meets them on the way back.  If I take my car and park by the station, it is then on the wrong side of the tracks when I return!  Also the very large gap between train and platform is a deterrent for the many able able-bodied, short legged amongst us.

Jennifer Selig ● 2006d

Sorry Nicholas but HS2 will not solve the problem of accessibility.
Many older and most disabled people are simply disenfranchised from using public transport at anything other than the level of a shared bus (and even these are not fully accessible).
There is, as an example only one FULLY accessible tube station in the borough of Ealing and only then if you wish to travel northbound from North Ealing.
The approved plans for Ealing Broadway station don't even include a drop-off point for disabled passengers so it's not going to improve any time soon while councils are so ruddy short-sighted.

N V Brooks ● 2006d

This why we need HS2

Nicholas Beard ● 2006d

If it wasn't so stressful to do so many of us would be more inclined to let the train take the strain.  We need better and more accessible public transport with an incentive to use it.

Philippa Bond ● 2006d

I am not saying I support the introduction of Smart Motorways but I understand that, when safety assessment are carried out, they take in to account a reduction of accidents on the inherently more dangerous A & B roads as more vehicles switch to the motorway due to the increased capacity and reduction in congestion attributable to that extra lane.So it is not just a a simple totting up of the accident figures on new smart motorways.

Philip Coe ● 2007d

Thank you Philippa, I have joined the other c. 270.000 signing this

N V Brooks ● 2008d

There's a petition:Here's the link.  http://chng.it/nhsHyCDnqV

Philippa Bond ● 2008d

We started off with a really bad model - build narrow and then widen, so that slip roads, bridges etc need to be re-built at any time we want to add a lane. A far better model would have been to build wide apart with the space between the carriageways separated with enough space to add a couple of lanes each way. In that way, the hard shoulder, on and off ramps/slipways, bridges etc would not have to be re-built. It is this precisely the cost of all these things that led to the promotion of "smart" motorways as a way of avoiding upgrade costs. Short term thinking = long term costs.

Christopher Gillie ● 2022d

I still fail to understand how anyone could think these are a good idea.I believe that there were supposed to be places to pull off the road far more often than they have actually been made.  They are also not quick enough at noticing that a vehicle is stopped and not quick enough at doing anything about it.The fact that they feel they have to advertise on the radio that you should not drive in a lane marked with a red X above it surely also says something about everyone driving. and designing them.It must just be a cost cutting exercise - something created at a desk on a computer terminal.  If you drive on these roads you can see straight away that it is going to be a problem.  I suppose fewer young people drive nowadays and maybe they don't think anybody should and perhaps that life should be a lived at a greater risk.  Are people frightened to speak up when designing them?  Don't they have a voice?

Philippa Bond ● 2022d