Now that the Highways Agency's revolutionary Active Traffic Management system is operational on the M42, I find out what it's like to drive at 40mph on the hard shoulder - legally.
It’s been a long and sometimes frustrating time in coming, but the M42’s revolutionary congestion-busting hard shoulder running scheme is now operational. The doom-mongers have raised all sorts of objections and I have to admit having my own doubts when I saw the size of the emergency refuge bays being built.
Earlier this week though, I had the opportunity to try it for real during the morning rush hour. I was under the impression that the hard shoulder was only meant to be used by vehicles turning off at the next junction, but the signs advising this were only showing as the junctions were getting close. Fortunately, most people got the idea and there was virtually no lane dodging. What was reassuring was the frequency of the video cameras, no more than 100 metres apart, giving the Highways Agency operators a clear view of any incidents. It’s impossible to gauge how bad the congestion would have been without hard-shoulder running at that time, but traffic did keep moving at the 40mph variable speed limit.
My only reservations concern a vehicle breakdown on the hard shoulder and what happens when a repaired vehicle, especially a long, heavy one, tries to leave an emergency refuge bay. In the first case, you’ll have to chance your luck but as you should be doing no more than 40mph when hard shoulder running is in place, it’s probably still safer than stopping in one of the full-time lanes under a 70mph limit. Rejoining should be no problem as I would that hope that with all those cameras available, the HA operators would close the hard shoulder when required to allow a truck to accelerate up to traffic speed in the normal way.
On the return journey in the afternoon, although traffic was light and the hard shoulder wasn’t being used, I did see a truck breakdown scenario in one of the refuge bays, which reassured me that the bays are actually big enough for a stricken truck and recovery vehicle, side-by-side if necessary.
Overall, I reckon that while the system is no substitute for building adequate permanent roads as soon as possible, it is an acceptable short-term solution to the congestion that’s crippling parts of this country.
For more information, including an interactive simulated drive-through, check out the Highways Agency website
Comments (1)
Yes it works, I returned home from London on Friday night and traffic was moving freely at 50mph. This was 17.23 on a Friday night - surely some mistake! They just need to sort out the motorway junctions as you do end up with unnecessary lane changes. There's room aplenty to allow motorists to continue in the hardshoulder through the junctions, they just need re-marking slighly. As it is the congestion is still a pain around the junctions. From the congestion on the southbound side between junctions 6 and 4, there's still some work to to do to encourage people to use the extra lane.
Posted by Andy Salter | October 1, 2006 9:32 AM
Posted on October 1, 2006 09:32