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Speed is the culprit on 'killer' highway
Page 57
Page 58
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T IS easy to become emotioial about the A74 CarlisleDasgow road, the so-called 'killer highway" which links he motorway networks of ingland and Central Scotand.
The road has earned itself the 3bel of a killer, due largely to a hain of serious accidents in 975 — one involving a touring oach — but how just is the ccusation? CM set out to find ut how people affected directly y the A74 feel about it and arne up with a concensus view tat the road is safe — if it is eated with respect.
A spokesman for the utomobile Association sumied up the problem. "Drivers .e mentally attuned to motoray driving and are thrust on to 0 miles of dual carriageway mnecting two motorway sys
rns.''
Traffic can travel on motoray from Barnet on the M1 or D m Exeter on the M5 without uching A-class roads and is most pandered to on the norernmost section of the M6 in Jmbria before it is channeled to the two-lane A74 — which is no hard shoulder.
The northbound driver can ll forget that he is no longer on Dtorway for the first few miles d can be as far north as Moffat fore the need to reduce speed becomes urgently apparent.
Repeater warning signs are placed on the A74 reminding heavy goods vehicle and coach drivers of their respective 40mph and 50mph limits, and police patrols set out to enforce the regulations.
Both of the police forces responsible, Strathclyde and Dumfries and Galloway, keep an eye open for vehicles which break the limit, but, in the event of an accident, must attend to that rather than accident prevention.
Both forces depend upon various items of technical hardware to reduce speeding. From simple speedometer checks to radar scanning, this has graduated to VASCAR — Visual Average Speed Computer and Recorder Equipment — an in-car mini computer which can be operated from any roadside within seconds.
Strathclyde has gone one step further with Muni, a handheld radar device which resembles a cine camera. It can be operated either from a car or by a policeman standing outside and allows speed checks to be carried out from any traffic patrol car, and not just from selected vehicles, as with VASCAR.
Muni has only been demonstrated so far, but from this month will be used in support of prosecutions. It can register at up to 600 yards distance and detects speeds of up to 199mph.
Strathclyde's Chief Inspector James Gilmour emphasised to me that the main problem on the A74 is speed. His advice to drivers joining the road from motorways is: -Hold back your distance before squeezing the accelerator."
"There's nothing hidden on the A74. If you find yourself caught out, it is bad observation," he added.
The lack of a hard shoulder poses other problems. Often, when vehicles break down, they are left in the nearside lane and are not driven on to the grass verge. Inspector Gilmour's message to drivers is to check their vehicles before joining the A74 and not to stop on the road for maintenance.
"It does not do any harm for the vehicle to be driven for its own length in order to get it off the road," he said. Of course, any vigilant driver will maintain a safe enough speed in order to avoid such obstacles. As Mr Gilmour added: "Very little cannot be traced back to the driver."
Findlay Carmylie of the Automobile Association shares these views. "Accidents happen to lorries, coaches, and cars on the A74, and on various other roads. There are many rear-end collisions because drivers drive too close together," he said.
-This is a basic fault of any fast road in this country. Drivers should always leave a margin for safety."
He felt that lorry drivers were among the better A74 users. "They know the road and treat it with respect. Some motorists seem to believe they have a right to the outside lane."
A coach driver with Park's of Hamilton, a company based close to the A74, had little to say against the road. "It is not a dangerous road to drive on," he told me.
He felt that regular users behaved properly, but that some foreign drivers who did not appreciate that it is not a motorway drove at high speeds.
He added that police patrols appear to keep heavy vehicle speeds under check "rather than speeding cars" and this governed his own attitude to speed. "Our coaches never go over 50mph," he claimed.
The road has some technical shortcomings which must be taken into account. In particular, there are several flat road junctions which demand that local traffic should cut across oncoming traffic. "This should not happen," said Park's driver.
Until recently, drainage was another problem. Slow moving lorries had cut "tramlines" into the nearside lane and these tended to fill with rainwater. However, considerable engineering work has included the use of a heavier core when resurfacing and this has helped clear that difficulty.
Because of the resurfacing work, the road has tended to be filled to capacity at peak times. CM uses the A74 on its Scottish road tests, and it is not uncommon for our vehicles to lead a stream of traffic through the restricted sections.
My colleague Steve Gray recalls an occasion when he maintained a steady 40 mph through a coned-off single lane stretch and was followed by many vehicles which, otherwise, would have exceeded the limit.
Although they don't believe the A74 is a killer road, and statistics back this up, most of its regular users do support campaigns for it to be upgraded to motorway standard.
Findlay Carmylie said: ''If this country is going to have a motorway system, then it must be a full motorway system."
The AA feels that sections of any extended M74 must be built on a new alignment, because the present route is not the most suitable for a fast trunk road.
A recent report from Transport Action Scotland — a pressure group which represents major road users in Scotland — has submitted a report to the Scottish Development Department demanding an extended motorway. It feels that Government statistics which say a motorway is not needed before 2010 are wrong.
TAS's secretary, Ian Brown, says that contrary to official belief that traffic is growing annually at a rate of 1.79 per cent, the real figure is 7.3 per cent. He believes that oil-related traffic and summer tourist traffic is building up faster than the SDD realises.
On bus and coach traffic, TAS believes the Government has made a fundamental error. It has based estimates on that sector on a general trend of decline, whereas most A74 buses are express and touring coaches — a growth area.
Taking its figures intc account, TAS believes that a motorway will be needed by 1987. It will take 10 to 12 years to plan and build a full-length M74, so capacity problems arE bound to worsen.
Findlay Carmylie is not con vinced either by talk of insuf ficient A74 traffic to justify motorway construction. "TN top end of the M6 is very quiet,' he says.
One of the least satisfacton sections of A74, between Draf fan and Millbank in Lanarkshire is likely to be replaced b, motorway in the next few years
The awkward bend at Park' Corner, Lesmahagow, when two filling stations flank till A74, will go in this £21 mink)] project, and a new bridge will b built over the Clyde to carry th A702 Abington-Biggar road.
All that is in the future Meantime, drivers heading o to the A74 this summer shoul remember one basic rule. YOI ARE NOT ON A MOTORWAY. driving standards take this int account, the A74 will b negotiated as easily as any oth( trunk road in this country.