Image: Highways England via Flickr
The AA has written to road safety minister Jesse Norman MP proposing three ‘potentially life-saving changes’ to the Highway Code in an effort to improve safety on motorways.
The first change centres around what to do in the event of a breakdown on a smart motorway where there is no hard shoulder.
The AA points out that at present the Highway Code only considers breakdowns on motorways with a continuous hard shoulder, but with more than 500 miles of smart motorway currently in use, the motoring organisation says the Highway Code ‘clearly needs to advise drivers what to do in the event of a breakdown where stopping on the hard shoulder isn’t an option’.
The second proposed rule change is designed to improve response times for emergency services, by requiring drivers to create an ‘emergency corridor’ in stationary traffic to allow emergency services access to incidents where there is no continuous hard shoulder.
This is already a legal requirement in some European countries and was supported by more than two thirds (71%) of AA members in a recent AA-Populus poll.
The third proposed change would see the introduction of a ‘slow down and move over’ rule when passing broken down vehicles on motorways, to help protect breakdown, recovery and emergency services operatives working on the hard shoulder.
The motoring organisation says these changes ‘reflect progress in vehicle and road design’.
Edmund King, AA president said: “Eight out of 10 drivers (79%) say that motorways are more dangerous now compared to four years ago simply because of the removal of the hard shoulder.
“More than a decade on since the introduction of smart motorways, we see these changes to the Highway Code as a necessary step to try help save lives and improve safety and driver confidence when people use motorways.
“From next year, new drivers will be allowed to take lessons on motorways. We believe these changes would help them understand the different types of motorway they could come across before they even drive on them.
“Safety is of paramount importance on all of our roads, and we look forward to the minister taking these important points on board to enhance road safety.”
The AA says its letter was sent to Mr Norman on 1 November, but as yet it has not had a reply from his office.
Category: General news.
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