To this I reply:Chris5156 wrote: ↑Wed Jul 11, 2018 17:30 This is very welcome for the fourth lane it will provide, but the real problems on the M1 between M25 and M6 are not on this stretch - they are between J10 and J13. The hard shoulder is not opened nearly often enough and the way it comes and goes at absurdly frequent intervals around J11, 11a, Toddington and J12 is extremely difficult to understand.
The difference between the experience of driving that section of motorway - which, even as someone who has written articles about Smart Motorways to help other people understand them, I find stressful and bewildering - and the ALR sections further north is astonishing. J16-19 is simple and stress-free (at least for me, with my car's limiter set below the camera threshold) and older Smart Motorways really ought to be brought up to that standard.
Putting words into my mouth. Ecstatic that someone agrees with me. A new junction is all well and good but DHSR (and improperly working DHSR at that) is indeed stressful and maybe it just needs ALRing.
But there are two ways I propose that should be done in:
Option 1: an in-place upgrade for the shortest work period possible. Involves keeping most of the signalling equipment and cameras as they are, fitting a rigid concrete barrier, and just breaking the line on the hard shoulder, and removing hard shoulder cameras and those blue blind style "continue onto hard shoulder/merge into lane 1" signs.
Option 2: a full refurbishment. Will provide a significant traffic quality and aesthetical improvement, but will take longer and be more costly.
Involves:
- Knocking down signal gantries except those "gateway" gantries after junction on-slips and periodically in a long stretch, and replacing all other gantries with MS4 posts. Will improve the view aesthetically as the overhead view looks more peaceful/not cluttered with gantries.
- Changing the ERA signs to pictorial and yellowing the ERA surface. Will provide accessibility improvements.
- Resurfacing.
- Fitting a rigid concrete barrier (RCB) for crash protection.
- Removing the central lighting as it is hardly ever used anyway and is not compatible with an RCB.
I think the full refurbishment is worth it, but I'd like your views. Perhaps if you think there is another approach to upgrading J10-13, or if you have a different approach to the matter, this thread allows us to discuss away without going off-topic.
Now over with the rambling essay, and let the discussion begin!