Select committee: Transport Committee
Recommendation 9
Third Report - Rollout and safety of smart motorways
Published 2 Nov 2021
Paragraph 44
Addressed to Department for Transport
Transport Committee The roll-out and safety of smart motorways All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
Dynamic hard shoulder motorways apparently confuse drivers, because the hard shoulder is used unpredictably to tackle congestion. A more consistent approach, where the hard shoulder is used at known times, could clarify the situation for drivers without physically removing the hard shoulder. The Department for Transport and National Highways should pause plans to convert dynamic hard shoulder motorways until the next Road Investment Strategy and use the intervening period to trial alternative ways in which to operate the dynamic hard shoulder to make the rules less confusing for drivers.
From: Transport Committee, Third Report - Rollout and safety of smart motorways (HC 26), paragraph 44, 2 November 2021
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 12 January 2022 (deadline 10 January 2022).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government states it will be "taking forward all the recommendations", including pausing the rollout of future all lane running smart motorway schemes, while disagreeing with the Committee's view that the March 2020 decision was premature.
- It does "not agree" that the March 2020 decision that all new smart motorways would be ALRs was premature, nor that introducing ALR smart motorways was an unsafe change.
- It agrees to "immediately pause" ALR schemes yet to commence construction until five years of safety data is available, but will complete schemes already in construction, which are "all over 50% complete".
- On retrofitting emergency areas, it "agrees in principle" and commits £390m over the second Road Investment Strategy, for over 150 additional emergency areas by 2025. Wider retrofitting will be "considered" for the third Road Investment Strategy.
- On an ORR health and safety assessment, it commits only to "investigating further" the benefits, with recommendations to ministers "later this year", noting this may need legislation and consultation.