The future of smart motorways

[ais523]

It's somewhat astonishing that the Highway Code didn't previously list instructions for using smart motorways / understanding the signs on them. At least this is one "smart motorway fix" that's fairly easy/cheap to implement and has a chance of saving lives.

[Big L]

I wonder what the proportional split is between Highway Code sales for provisional license holders rather than full license holders.

I’d be shocked if anywhere near 10% are for full license holders.

[KeithW]

I wonder what the proportional split is between Highway Code sales for provisional license holders rather than full license holders.

I’d be shocked if anywhere near 10% are for full license holders.

I rarely buy books I have read before especially when its all online, for the record I passed my test in 1972 and in all that time I have had zero points on my license and one endorsement for doing 45 mph in a 40 zone in 1976 no ACPO rules back then.

[SouthWest Philip]

I wonder what the proportional split is between Highway Code sales for provisional license holders rather than full license holders.

I’d be shocked if anywhere near 10% are for full license holders.

You're probably right. I wonder if there might be a greater public interest in getting the Royal Mail to deliver a copy to every private address?

[KeithW]

You're probably right. I wonder if there might be a greater public interest in getting the Royal Mail to deliver a copy to every private address?

There is an old saying, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink. Make it a an app free to download and you might get more attention, paper is so 19th century

[SouthWest Philip]

You're probably right. I wonder if there might be a greater public interest in getting the Royal Mail to deliver a copy to every private address?

There is an old saying, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink. Make it a an app free to download and you might get more attention, paper is so 19th century

Fair point!

[Bryn666]

A much smaller example is the Rakewood Viaduct on the M62, which drops the hard shoulder to allow for the eastbound climbing lane into Mordor Yorkshire. If you break down here, you're stuffed. https://goo.gl/maps/53X5Lpw9MLHP8pgy8

This does go a little off-topic, but does it not make sense to operate this junction further down as a lane drop?

It makes more sense than having a deceleration lane and simultaneously a lane lost on the offside.

If it was a lane drop, HGVs would stick to Lane 2 to avoid having to move right on the hill, negating the point of having the climbing lane. The 4 lanes should have continued a bit further beyond J22 though, because the right lane ends right on the crest and in low winter sunlight there is a lot of dodgy panic braking caused as a result.

[Stevie D]

This does go a little off-topic, but does it not make sense to operate this junction further down as a lane drop?

It makes more sense than having a deceleration lane and simultaneously a lane lost on the offside.

Lane drops are appropriate where a significant proportion (about one lane's worth) of traffic leaves at the junction. That isn't the case here, it's a fairly minor exit that isn't heavily used and certainly doesn't take a quarter of the traffic off the motorway, so if you made it a lane-drop then what you would effectively be doing is closing climbing lane on the left well before the top of the hill, which is a really bad idea – where additional lanes are provided uphill they should always be closed (and ideally opened) on the right.

[Conekicker]

It's somewhat astonishing that the Highway Code didn't previously list instructions for using smart motorways / understanding the signs on them. At least this is one "smart motorway fix" that's fairly easy/cheap to implement and has a chance of saving lives.

And when was the last time 99.99999% of drivers looked at the Highway Code?

[Bryn666]

It's somewhat astonishing that the Highway Code didn't previously list instructions for using smart motorways / understanding the signs on them. At least this is one "smart motorway fix" that's fairly easy/cheap to implement and has a chance of saving lives.

And when was the last time 99.99999% of drivers looked at the Highway Code?

Keep saying it, but mandatory retests every 10 years when you renew your photocard... maybe the money we keep spaffing on HE innovation could be used to pay for it.

[Herned]

Keep saying it, but mandatory retests every 10 years when you renew your photocard... maybe the money we keep spaffing on HE innovation could be used to pay for it.

That should definitely happen, even if just a theory one online or something. Letting people drive for 50+ years since they took a test is madness

[Barkstar]

This sort of penny pinching is why SM has problems in the public's eye if not in reality. We go about our daily 21st century lives assuming we are being watched and we aren't. We may be being recorded, if the camera is pointing our way but clearly some of the time should we require assistance we won't get it - though the authorities will have video evidence should needs be. We can't expect one operative per camera but two for three hundred even without a lot of other systems in place to alert them is unacceptable and to the layman seems like they figured 2 per 300 when the kit was installed and having handed out the redundancies forgot to put in the kit.....

Hiring people to monitor cameras is not cheap. Just how many people would have to hired to monitor every Emergency Refuge ? The reality is that outside city centres most CCTV is recorded with a date/time stamp so that evidence can be retrieved after the fact, at best ANPR cameras will automatically send out an alert if a vehicle flagged in the system goes past.

The other side of the coin is that many people object to being under surveillance at all times. Communication is possible via the SOS phone, If you believe a high vis vest and emergency blanket are good to have then buy them and stash them in your car, as I did many years ago. You can get an emergency kit consisting of foil blankets, first aid box and flashlight for under £20. Lets face it if you break down in winter such things can save your life. Assuming that someone will find you quickly and provide such items is the worst sort of penny pinching in my opinion.

So you think 2 operators watching 300 cameras is sufficient? I don't unless, and I did say this*, there are systems in place to assist and alert them promptly. And you may be happy to have the incident you were involved in merely date/time stamped but as we are discussing stationary vehicles on smart motorways I'd prefer the time between a vehicle becoming stationary and them being protected be done in a couple of minutes maximum - not get a copy of the video sent to my next of kin or legal representative long after the fact.

Oh yes I haven't mentioned the emergency refuges, much less suggested each one needs monitor- Kindly address your comments to those who have.

* My bad, I put 'with' instead of 'without' but I feel my meaning was clear enough.

[measterbrook]

This sort of penny pinching is why SM has problems in the public's eye if not in reality. We go about our daily 21st century lives assuming we are being watched and we aren't. We may be being recorded, if the camera is pointing our way but clearly some of the time should we require assistance we won't get it - though the authorities will have video evidence should needs be. We can't expect one operative per camera but two for three hundred even without a lot of other systems in place to alert them is unacceptable and to the layman seems like they figured 2 per 300 when the kit was installed and having handed out the redundancies forgot to put in the kit.....

Hiring people to monitor cameras is not cheap. Just how many people would have to hired to monitor every Emergency Refuge ? The reality is that outside city centres most CCTV is recorded with a date/time stamp so that evidence can be retrieved after the fact, at best ANPR cameras will automatically send out an alert if a vehicle flagged in the system goes past.

The other side of the coin is that many people object to being under surveillance at all times. Communication is possible via the SOS phone, If you believe a high vis vest and emergency blanket are good to have then buy them and stash them in your car, as I did many years ago. You can get an emergency kit consisting of foil blankets, first aid box and flashlight for under £20. Lets face it if you break down in winter such things can save your life. Assuming that someone will find you quickly and provide such items is the worst sort of penny pinching in my opinion.

So you think 2 operators watching 300 cameras is sufficient? I don't unless, and I did say this*, there are systems in place to assist and alert them promptly. And you may be happy to have the incident you were involved in merely date/time stamped but as we are discussing stationary vehicles on smart motorways I'd prefer the time between a vehicle becoming stationary and them being protected be done in a couple of minutes maximum - not get a copy of the video sent to my next of kin or legal representative long after the fact.

Oh yes I haven't mentioned the emergency refuges, much less suggested each one needs monitor- Kindly address your comments to those who have.

* My bad, I put 'with' instead of 'without' but I feel my meaning was clear enough.

If this article is to be believed:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-56255823
the technology to detect events with vehicles is advanced enough for stopped vehicle detection.

However, I suspect it is not:
With litter detection, speed detection, etc, it does not have to work very well: A driver does not know what speed the cameras are set to above the speed limit (10%+2, or much higher), if they are actually working, or if they get a read on the registration plate - the fact they might causes most drivers to change behaviour as if they are 100%. With the litter detection just issue some tickets and get the press to report on it - most of the cameras can be dummies and it will still work - at least until someone does a freedom of information request after a year or so (M25 speed cameras anyone).
With stopped vehicle detection it has to work accurately all the time every time. This is much more difficult. If it worked well we probably would have seen a roll out with publicity. We haven't.

[Stevie D]

With stopped vehicle detection it has to work accurately all the time every time. This is much more difficult. If it worked well we probably would have seen a roll out with publicity. We haven't.

Stopped vehicle detection doesn't need to work "perfectly", if by that you mean no false positives. It's absolutely fine to set it to a very low sensitivity so that it flags up plenty of false positives, because the suspected incidents can then be referred to actual people to check the CCTV. If they are principally looking at monitors where the system has flagged up a potential problem then they are much more likely to find stopped vehicles than if they are just watching a bank of dozens of screens with no indication of where any incident might be occurring.

[KeithW]

=
If this article is to be believed:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-56255823
the technology to detect events with vehicles is advanced enough for stopped vehicle detection.

However, I suspect it is not:
With litter detection, speed detection, etc, it does not have to work very well: A driver does not know what speed the cameras are set to above the speed limit (10%+2, or much higher), if they are actually working, or if they get a read on the registration plate - the fact they might causes most drivers to change behaviour as if they are 100%. With the litter detection just issue some tickets and get the press to report on it - most of the cameras can be dummies and it will still work - at least until someone does a freedom of information request after a year or so (M25 speed cameras anyone).
With stopped vehicle detection it has to work accurately all the time every time. This is much more difficult. If it worked well we probably would have seen a roll out with publicity. We haven't.

It has been trialled on the M25 and M62 and is now being rolled out across England
https://navtechradar.com/stopped-vehicl ... -highways/
https://highwaysengland.co.uk/our-work/ ... -upgrades/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-s ... e-55935970
https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest ... 4-02-2021/


For the trial evaluation report see
https://s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/asse ... toring.pdf

[thomas417]

=
If this article is to be believed:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-56255823
the technology to detect events with vehicles is advanced enough for stopped vehicle detection.

However, I suspect it is not:
With litter detection, speed detection, etc, it does not have to work very well: A driver does not know what speed the cameras are set to above the speed limit (10%+2, or much higher), if they are actually working, or if they get a read on the registration plate - the fact they might causes most drivers to change behaviour as if they are 100%. With the litter detection just issue some tickets and get the press to report on it - most of the cameras can be dummies and it will still work - at least until someone does a freedom of information request after a year or so (M25 speed cameras anyone).
With stopped vehicle detection it has to work accurately all the time every time. This is much more difficult. If it worked well we probably would have seen a roll out with publicity. We haven't.

It has been trialled on the M25 and M62 and is now being rolled out across England
https://navtechradar.com/stopped-vehicl ... -highways/
https://highwaysengland.co.uk/our-work/ ... -upgrades/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-s ... e-55935970
https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest ... 4-02-2021/


For the trial evaluation report see
https://s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/asse ... toring.pdf

This technology if it does what it says is excellent and should have really have been there at the start. Get it rolled out ASAP.

[KeithW]

This technology if it does what it says is excellent and should have really have been there at the start. Get it rolled out ASAP.

Well oh mighty master I feel constrained to point out that I have no connection with Highways England other than being a road user so cannot obey your command

On a serious note this is an emerging technology made viable by low cost radar transceivers developed for driver assistance systems in cars. If you look at a 2014 Federal Highways Study they ruled out radar as the sets available at the time could not detect stationary vehicles and they were looking at Lidar and FLIR which do not work well when visibility is poor. It was Highways England who went out to tender for suitable units in 2020 and initiated the trials on the M62 and M25. Designing a system that can differentiate between the radar returns off street furniture such as barriers and other fixed installations and transitory effects from breakdowns is not a trivial task.

You can see the tender request here.
https://ted.europa.eu/udl?uri=TED:NOTIC ... XT:EN:HTML

As to the decision to go to smart motorways you would have to ask that question of the DfT who presumably authorised it. This technology has relevance beyond Smart Motorways, there are thousands of miles of non motorway trunk roads without hard shoulders that could benefit from such technologies. Even on conventional motorways it has its uses, I have seen vehicles stranded in live lanes of the A1(M) in North Yorkshire.

[DB617]

I've just had a thought. I wonder how long the RoI on these SVD units is as I assume they will cost a fortune, compared to the cost of hiring dozens/hundreds more CCTV operators? Since CCTV was the originally conceived safe method of monitoring a smart motorway, and has presumably fallen victim to austerity cuts.

[WHBM]

It has been trialled on the M25 and M62 and is now being rolled out across England

It might have been good to have selected a system that was actually available, worked and could be installed before the Smart Motorway programme started, instead of just starting and saying they had it when they didn't.

I seem to recall Midas from a generation ago was meant to do the same thing - and didn't.

I wonder how good the CCTV cameras are at seeing a stopped vehicle at night, even if alerted. A significant number of the accidents reported seem to have been at night. Of course, ripping out the carriageway lighting as part of the works didn't help.

[ManomayLR]

It has been trialled on the M25 and M62 and is now being rolled out across England

It might have been good to have selected a system that was actually available, worked and could be installed before the Smart Motorway programme started, instead of just starting and saying they had it when they didn't.

I seem to recall Midas from a generation ago was meant to do the same thing - and didn't.

I wonder how good the CCTV cameras are at seeing a stopped vehicle at night, even if alerted. A significant number of the accidents reported seem to have been at night. Of course, ripping out the carriageway lighting as part of the works didn't help.

If they care about the environment why not just use LED?