BBC probe reveals that smart motorways lost power hundreds of times
TECHNOLOGY FAILURES ‘PLAYING RUSSIAN ROULETTE’ WITH LIVES
TECHNOLOGY that keeps drivers safe on smart motorways has stopped working hundreds of times, it has been claimed.
Smart motorways are in place on over 250 miles of road in the UK, including in Nottinghamshire.
Live information is fed to drivers to try to cut congestion and keep traffic moving but serious safety concerns have been raised around all-lane running smart motorways where the hard shoulder is removed.
A BBC investigation has now discovered hundreds of incidents where safety equipment was not working. But National Highways, which runs the motorways, has denied they are unsafe.
Figures obtained by the BBC’S Panorama show that between June 2022 and February 2024 there were
397 incidents when smart motorways lost power, making it difficult to detect when a vehicle had broken down.
Last year, the Government said it was halting new projects because of cost and safety concerns. The Post also launched a campaign calling for smart motorways to be abolished last year after speaking to families of people who died on parts of the M1 with no hard shoulder.
There have long been fears about the safety of drivers who get into difficulty on the motorway and have no hard shoulder to pull on to and aren’t able to reach an emergency bay.
Technology is supposed to enable smart motorways to quickly alert motorists to stranded vehicles.
The BBC report said the longest single period without power was at junction 14 on the M4, where there were no signals or sensors for 11 days.
Motoring organisation the AA said smart motorways become dangerous without the technology to support them.
AA president Edmund King said: “If you haven’t got that technology, it’s not even a basic motorway because you haven’t got the hard shoulder.
“It means that you’re playing Russian roulette with people’s lives.”
National Highways figures showed that in 2022 there were also 2,331 faults on the radar system, which is designed to spot stationary vehicles. The average length of the fault was more than five days.
National Highways said it would seek to improve its technology systems and added: “Safety is our highest priority and our motorways are statistically some of the safest in the world.”