Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether their criteria for the introduction of Smart Motorways on (1) journey time reduction, (2) number of accidents, (3) reduction in emissions, and (4) compliance rate with indicated speed limits, have been achieved on the M42.
In 2006, the M42 J3a-7 section was the first smart motorway in the UK to make use of the hard shoulder as an additional lane at peak times. It was comprehensively monitored and evaluated over its first 3 years of operation.
The results of this evaluation were documented in published reports setting out the performance against all these criteria. As one year is not sufficient to conclusively evaluate safety performance, this was evaluated again after 3 years of operation.
The success of this original pilot scheme on the M42 provided the foundation for the roll out of smart motorways.
Smart motorways provide a more efficient way of increasing capacity on the roads than traditional widening and have successfully reduced congestion and improved journey time reliability.