Smart motorway safety: Campaigners react to Shapps' pause13/01/2022 Reaction to the Government’s latest announcement on smart motorways has focused on the need to deliver additional emergency refuge areas (ERAs), while broadly supporting the freeze on new all lane running (ALR) schemes. |
DfT challenged over 'more than halfway' claim13/01/2022 Campaigners have challenged the Government’s decision to continue with work to convert a section of the M6 to all lane running (ALR), despite this week’s announcement of pause on new schemes. |
Shapps agrees to pause smart motorways rollout12/01/2022 Ministers have broadly accepted the recommendations of a report by MPs into smart motorways, including pausing both all-lane running (ALR) schemes that have not started construction and the conversion of dynamic hard shoulder schemes to ALR, and revisiting the case for controlled motorways. |
M3 smart motorway scheme first to be halted23/11/2021 National Highways has halted work on its M3 smart motorway plans following the Transport Select Committee's call for a pause to the roll-out of the controversial road design. |
MPs 'must consider smart motorway revelations'13/10/2021 A woman whose husband was killed on a smart motorway has called for a parliamentary inquiry to consider the findings of a newspaper investigation, which alleged serious failings in safety equipment. |
Mixed signals over motorway repairs08/10/2021 National Highways has said it will fix faults with overhead gantry signals on a smart motorway section of the M62, which occurred more than a month ago, ‘as soon as possible’, but did not give a timescale. |
DfT keeps 'urgent' smart motorway probe findings to itself07/10/2021 National Highways has provided the Department for Transport (DfT) with an ‘initial update’ on its investigation into allegations of serious safety failings on smart motorways but both organisations have refused to disclose the early findings. |
Viewpoint: Assumptions and predictions01/10/2021 Former director at the Department for Transport and current director of the RAC Foundation, Steve Gooding, picks up on a recent Highways investigation into smart motorways to ask important questions about models, predictions and above all what we want. |
Smart motorway probe after paper exposes failings29/09/2021 The Government has ordered another investigation into smart motorways after reports that vital safety equipment was not working on the controversial routes. |
Smart motorway opening delayed for SVD21/09/2021 The second phase of National Highways’ £85m conversion of a stretch of the M56 to all lane running will get underway next month but the opening of the project will be delayed for the installation of stopped vehicle detection (SVD) technology. |
M1 smart motorway 'will ease congestion'14/09/2021 National Highways is continuing work to convert a new section of the M1 to an all lane running smart motorway which will link to a section of smart motorway that has been found to have increased journey times. |
M6 link gets stopped vehicle CCTV monitoring13/09/2021 National Highways is to provide a dedicated team of control centre operatives to monitor a stretch of smart motorway in the Midlands after concerns were raised over live lane breakdowns. |
Injuries increase on smart motorway scheme08/09/2021 A new report on a smart motorway section of the M1 has revealed that the absolute number of personal injury collisions rose during the last two years of the period studied to a level higher than the annual average before the scheme opened. |
Delayed report gives smart motorway negative benefit cost ratio07/09/2021 National Highways has been forced to release two key reports on smart motorways following a Freedom of Information request from Highways. These include a five-year post opening project evaluation that showed that a scheme on the M1 is on track to have negative journey time benefits of nearly a quarter of a billion pounds over 60 years rather than forecast benefits of nearly £1bn. |
Harris corrects evidence to Transport Select Committee22/07/2021 Highways England’s acting chief executive has had to write to the MPs to correct his evidence about the time it takes for a stationary vehicle on a smart motorway to be spotted. |
Harris backtracks on 'unlikely' stopped vehicles15/07/2021 Highways England’s acting chief executive has had to write to the MPs to correct his evidence about the time it takes for a stationary vehicle on a smart motorway to be spotted. |
Baroness Vere admits public trust was undermined on smart motorway safety01/07/2021 Highways England undermined trust in smart motorways when it failed to give an accurate timeline for a 2016 pledge to make technology to detect stopped vehicles ‘part of the standard for all lane running going forward’, a minister has told MPs. |
Smart motorways 'less safe to save costs'21/06/2021 Highways England has been criticised for drawing a ‘false equivalence’ between different types of hazard on motorways in assessing the safety of different smart motorways. |
All lane running smart motorways now more lethal, data shows04/05/2021 Fatality rates on all lane running (ALR) ‘smart motorways’ have exceeded those on conventional motorways for the past two years, with 15 people now confirmed to have died on motorways without a permanent hard shoulder in 2019. |
AA calls for independent inquiry over SVD26/04/2021 The AA has called for an independent investigation into the system used to detect stopped vehicles on smart motorway all lane running (ALR) schemes. |
INSIDE:
'Terrible shock' as Andrew Lupton dies
Contractors line up for £1.2bn Birmingham PFI
Mr Pothole: 'There is no real oversight'
No money to protect river facing 'ecological disaster' after £250m works
