National Highways official says stranded vehicles are safer on conventional, rather than smart, motorways
National Highways’ Director of Road Safety has reportedly written a letter admitting that the risk to broken-down drivers on conventional motorways is lower than on smart motorways. The Daily Telegraph reports that, in response to comments from a coroner about the death of a man on a smart motorway, Sheena Hague, has written saying: “The […]
Porsche creates new vehicle software division
Carmaker Porsche has announced it’s opening a new division focused on software development for intelligent and connected vehicles. It says that, with the new division, the Nardò Technical Center proving ground in Salento, Southern Italy, which is owned by Porsche and operated by Porsche Engineering, “further underlines its positioning as technology partner for the integrated […]
San Francisco Police chief backs fire counterpart’s driverless warning
The Chief of Police in the Californian City of San Francisco has backed the city’s fire chief in questioning the roll-out of driverless vehicles there. Last week Fire Officer Jeanine Nicholson called for the “pause button to be pushed” on driverless use because of evidence they were getting in the way of fire trucks by […]
National Highways plans more A12 closures for road rebuilding
National Highways has announced it is continuing work to break the old concrete road foundations between junction 25 and junction 26 of the A12 near Colchester in Essex. It says it’ll also be digging out the old concrete road foundations and surfacing the A12 northbound carriageway between the junction 25 exit and entry slip roads. […]
Active Travel grants made available in Greater Manchester
Businesses, community groups and other organisations in Greater Manchester can now apply for active travel grants of up to £15,000. A new £535,000 programme, funded through the Department for Transport and Active Travel England Capability and Ambition Fund, has been launched to support Greater Manchester’s active travel mission. The funding’s aim is to get more […]
San Francisco fire chief calls for “pause button” to be pushed on driverless cars
San Francisco’s fire chief has spoken of safety concerns around the growing number of driverless cars being trialled in the city, which have been delaying emergency vehicles. “I’m not anti-technology. What I am anti is getting in the way of public safety when we’re trying to do our jobs,” San Francisco Fire Department Chief Jeanine […]
A47 project manager shares her near-death inspiration for wanting to make roads safer
Helping to provide an A road to success, and mark International Women in Engineering Day, one of National Highways’ female Project Managers visited a school to share the death-defying story of why she became involved in the construction and engineering sector. Nikki Rowley-Todd, the Project Manager leading the £100 million A47 Blofield – North Burlingham […]
RAC describes unease over parking machine removal
Nearly one-in-five drivers (19%) say their local authority has either scrapped parking payment machines or is consulting on doing so, forcing them to use mobile phones to pay instead, new RAC research reveals. The survey of 1,900 UK drivers found that one-in-nine (11%) reported some or all parking payment machines had already been removed by […]
M42 shut this weekend for HS2 works
The M42 will have a series of closures this weekend for HS2 works. The northbound carriageway will be fully closed between junctions 6 (Bickenhill Interchange) and 8 (Coleshill) from 9pm this Friday, 23 June through to 5am on Monday, 26 June. The southbound carriageway will remain open during the day but will be shut […]
Warning of signs “hiding in the undergrowth”
A motoring assistance company is calling on highways authorities and landowners to tackle what it calls the recurring menace of road signs obscured by foliage. GEM Motoring Assist says obscured road signs are at best a nuisance for drivers, and at worst can be misleading and dangerous.. The Highways Act 1980 (Section 154) says landowners […]