MPs look to halt smart motorways

A group of MPs are looking to stop the roll-out of smart motorways across the UK.

An all party group has raised concerns that the removal of the hard shoulder on motorways, thus creating a fourth lane, could put both motorists and recovery workers lives at risk.

There is over 300 miles of smart motorway in the pipeline across England, with 100 miles of upgrade already in operation.

The three types of smart motorways are: 

controlled smart motorways, which is self explanatory, motorways with a dynamic hard shoulder which is where the hard shoulder is used as an extra lane in busy traffic and ALR, which is where the hard shoulder is permanently used as a fourth lane. 

The BBC have reported that it is the ALR scheme which is causing the most concern with fears that motorists will become "sitting ducks." 

Campaign for Safer Roadside Rescue and Recovery leader Samantha Cockerill has branded the ALR scheme crazy and has called for the project to be halted.

Ms Cockerill has also called for recovery workers to be able to use red warning lights, rather than the current orange ones. 

The campaign was started by Samantha after her partner, Steve Godbold, tragically lost his life after an HGV ploughed into him whilst he was working on a vehicle recovery job on the M25 in September 2017.

Despite an all party parliamentary groups backing for Samantha's campaign, Highways England, which controls Britains motorway network, insists that smart motorways are safe and the technology behind it is reliable.