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It seems that no more smart motorways are to be built/converted unless they are 75% done already, and rumour is those that exist may be converted back, or have stop protection installed.
What do you think to smart motorways good or bad and why?

click me for article.

Good. Dangerous roads

I think it's a great shame that such a good idea was ruined by using it in the worst possible way.

The idea was not thought through properly to start with. People have tunnel vision driving on motorways. They seem less prepared for the unexpected and the temporary lane use often presented a potential hazard. I am pleased they will go, even though I have never been on one. Driving standards are much lower these days.

DWD

The 1st SM that I remember was the M42 and you could only use the inside lane/hard shoulder when the traffic was really heavy - That made sense. But the M3 near me its a freeway of 4 lanes with idiots using each and every lane - and at night in the pitch black I had a scarey close encounter with a broken down car with no lights - since then I won't use the inside lane and have told my kids to do the same.

A few years ago I was on the M1 heading north and was approaching the turnoff towards Bolsolver . I was travelling in what was the hard shoulder as I was towing a trailer. I had , I think , a blowout one the nearside of the trailer . I slowed but kept going having no other choice really and pulled the trailer about half a mile or more to the next refuge. The blowout caused the axle studs to shear and I completely lost both nearside wheels. That's lost in that I had no idea where they had gone. Got safely to the refuge and the trailer was buggered but it could have been nasty.

Bloody hell, that's a story, What a horror, I would have hated to be in that position.

DWD

I wish the M of T or M of Roads or whomever made the decision to spend millions on this faulted idea be held to account, whilst I do see the warning systems are a benefit.
Also the UK main trunk routes lack the frequent rest stops that other countries build in to their auto routes; what few layby's we have, are not fitted with facilities, how truckers manage I hate to imagine !
I drive thousands of miles in Asia a year, aside from the many non commercial rest stops, nearly all of the frequent petrol stations have clean toilets and if that is not enough, mostly all Wat's (Temples) have free facilities for visitors, some on tourist trails charge 5THB, about 10p.
In developed European counties including Switzerland, soon after a crack appears in a road surface it is repaired, they know that if water ingresses it will only get much worse, especially in winter, here, UK ????

What annoyed me was politicians constantly being trotted out to say they are statistically safer than traditional mways. All a decent journo had to do was ask them which road they would prefer to break down on with their family in the car and watch them squirm.

I hate to admit it, but I liked the one near here. If it was in "smart mode" most people did not drive in it, nor did they drive in lane II (was lane 1, but not in SM mode)

dewaltdisney wrote: ↑Wed Apr 19, 2023 7:59 am Bloody hell, that's a story, What a horror, I would have hated to be in that position.

DWD

It was certainly a bit of a butt clenching moment and it seemed a long time I had to drag it on the hubs. The motorway was briefly down a lane to allow the recovery truck to manoeuvre to pull the trailer aboard and I can say I left a groove in the road surface. In the end I had it moved to a friend's brother in law's farm a few miles away as I had stuff my friends wanted in the trailer. A couple of weeks later a friend and myself went back and took the front offside hub off and repaired the shot rear nearside. With the trailer emptied I was able to pull it back home where I cut it up...

For a smart motorway to work you need more frequent laybys/refuge areas and when you are opening the hard shoulder the speed limit needs to be reduced to 30mph otherwise it's just too dangerous. The active management portion of motorways is an excellent idea though, it can really reduce congestion by slowing incoming traffic to a problem, the worst thing that can happen is for traffic to have to stop, even if only for a few seconds, that quickly grows into a huge jam.

Rorschach wrote: ↑Wed Apr 19, 2023 6:54 pm when you are opening the hard shoulder the speed limit needs to be reduced to 30mph otherwise it's just too dangerous.

But you said

Rorschach wrote: ↑Wed Apr 19, 2023 6:54 pm the worst thing that can happen is for traffic to have to stop, even if only for a few seconds, that quickly grows into a huge jam.

So which is it?

If as you suggest the traffic is slowed to 30, everyone will stop, even if it goes down by 10mph at intervals, 90% of the time folk ignore the overhead signs, because 70% of the time the signs are wrong because the information displayed has not been updated. So those bombing along at 70 will come to an abrupt halt as they realise those infront have slowed down, so it goes on till you stop.

There was an "odd thing" on the M25 for quite sometime ago (around jnc 15-20 ish) everyone would bomb along at 60 (signs said so, (I have an odd feeling it was before the advent of the smart motorway) and I mean all 4 lanes going at the same speed no one was fast no one was slow, everyone was 60, then for no what ever reason they stopped it. It really did work, all signs were 60, none at 50 or 40, and as for 30, forget it.

Someone-Else wrote: ↑Thu Apr 20, 2023 4:52 pm

Rorschach wrote: ↑Wed Apr 19, 2023 6:54 pm when you are opening the hard shoulder the speed limit needs to be reduced to 30mph otherwise it's just too dangerous.

But you said

Rorschach wrote: ↑Wed Apr 19, 2023 6:54 pm the worst thing that can happen is for traffic to have to stop, even if only for a few seconds, that quickly grows into a huge jam.

So which is it?

If as you suggest the traffic is slowed to 30, everyone will stop, even if it goes down by 10mph at intervals, 90% of the time folk ignore the overhead signs, because 70% of the time the signs are wrong because the information displayed has not been updated. So those bombing along at 70 will come to an abrupt halt as they realise those infront have slowed down, so it goes on till you stop.

If the speed limit is lowered why will people have to stop? As you say you just need to start the reduction as far back as possible.