Following today’s report from the Office of Road and Rail (ORR*)
which states that Stationary Vehicle Detection (SVD) “shows that
SVD performance is falling short of the performance requirements
the company set itself”, Edmund King, AA president, said: “The
ORR has confirmed that the radar system is not working
effectively, which is a major concern for drivers.
“For ‘smart’ motorways to be truly smart and safe then the
technology behind them must be fully effective. If there are
doubts about the technology, then the motorways are not smart and
we should revert to tried and tested methods.
“The radar system should be identifying 80% of stopped vehicles
in a live lane and operators checking the alarms within 20
seconds. Neither of these targets have been met and it is simply
unacceptable.
“As a result, vulnerable drivers have been left stranded in the
most dangerous of places – the live lane of a motorway.
“National Highways needs to urgently rectify the situation, but
until such time we call on the Transport Secretary to run a pilot
scheme which re-instates the inside lane as a hard-shoulder with
a Red ‘X’ and runs a national lane discipline campaign – aimed at
the ‘middle lane hogs’ - in conjunction with the police, to get
better use out of the capacity of the motorway and to make the
network safer.
“At the same time, there needs to be a rapid retrofit of
emergency laybys, so no one is too far away from a place of
safety.”
ends
NOTES TO EDITORS
* Safety on the Strategic
Road Network is improving, but National Highways must deliver
better performance from its Smart Motorways technology | Office
of Rail and Road (orr.gov.uk)
