The principle seems obvious: Highway lanes serve as emergency lanes or additional lanes, depending on the volume of traffic. That is why the British government is stopping the conversion.

London – Pretty smart or risky? German drivers also know about the right lanes on motorways, which actually serve as emergency lanes. However, if cameras and sensors on highway bridges detect a high volume of traffic during rush hour, the outer lane is opened for normal traffic using flexible traffic signals. For example, three lanes become four; Trucks in particular like to use the extra lane to make it easier to overtake their faster colleagues. (Orange arrow on the highway: What is the meaning of the strange traffic sign?)

Accidents increase: Great Britain stops this technology on highways

The consequences: relaxed traffic, fewer traffic jams, more safety. So much for the theory. But in Britain people now view the matter with skepticism. There, the Ministry of Transport decided to stop modernizing highway lanes with smart technology for five years.

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As British media report, 600 kilometers of the motorway network have flexible lanes and 375 of them do not have separated shoulders. In reality, the plan was to improve another 480 kilometers with smart technology for traffic measurement and flexible release over the next four years. (Vaccination opponents are drunk on the road, and that too…)

Accidents increase: Bad technology on smart highways?

Nothing will come of this for the moment. The reason is the information according to which supposedly more serious accidents occurred on the runways in question. Between 2014 and 2019, a total of 38 people died, for example, because a car that was changing lanes collided with a disabled vehicle that was parked there. In addition, the Daily Mail newspaper denounces bad technology: 10 percent of surveillance cameras are defective or installed backwards. (Traffic signal failure: Facebook users laugh out loud; authorities react coldly)

Accidents increase: more assistance points should help

British authorities now want to carry out more tests to determine how safe the principle is. The government also wants to invest more in infrastructure, for example in additional emergency stops for disabled vehicles. In principle, he believes that smart highways are fit for the future: they are “the safest roads in the country in terms of the number of fatalities.”