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Transport Select Committee publishes report calling for no more smart motorways

20 November 2021

A report published by the Transport Select Committee on November 2nd suggests that implementation of new smart motorways should be halted and alternative options explored whilst safety data is collected and analysed. 

In 2020, BBC Panorama found that 38 people were killed on smart motorways between 2014 and 2019.

The report says, "The government and National Highways should pause the rollout of new all-lane running schemes until five years of safety and economic data is available for every all-lane running scheme introduced before 2020 and the implementation of the safety improvements in the government's action plan has been independently evaluated."

There are currently around 375 miles of smart motorway in England, including 235 miles without a hard shoulder. Yet, five-year safety data is only available for 29 miles of all-lane running motorways. 

The Transport Select Committee says that new smart motorway plans should be paused until the same amount of data is available for the other 112 miles of all-lane running motorways, which were introduced before 2020. It also called for the Department for Transport and National Highways to commission an independent evaluation of stopped vehicle technology.

“The low number of incidents that occur on individual roads means that casualty data are often volatile, with rates fluctuating considerably from year to year.

“Such fluctuations make it difficult to establish whether differences in casualty rates between types of motorway are statistically significant”, reads the report. 

It concludes that, “We are not convinced that the benefits of all-lane running motorways are sufficient to justify the risks to safety associated with permanently removing the hard shoulder.”

Another recommendation detailed in the report is that the distance between emergency refuge areas on existing all-lane running motorways is reduced to a minimum of 1 mile apart, and to every 0.75 miles where possible. It says that an emergency corridor manoeuvre could also be added to the Highway Code, to help emergency services vehicles access incidents more easily. 

Chair of the Transport Committee Huw Merriman MP said, “The Minister for Roads described England’s all-lane-running Smart Motorways as ‘the most scrutinised 141 miles of road in the world’. It is right we do so because lives have been lost and many motorists feel unsafe using them.

“Some 40% of breakdowns on all-lane-running motorways take place in live lanes. This is too high.

“[Only] when enough time has been afforded to assess the safety of smart motorways over a longer period and when the Office of Rail and Road, as the independent road safety regulator, have been given powers to evaluate it, should we move to roll-out more miles of smart motorway.”

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