Drivers want to keep the hard shoulder
Page 10
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
• Motorists overwhelmingly support the retention of the hard shoulder in the interests of road safety, according to a new report.
The RAC Report on Motoring reveals that 80% of those surveyed—equivalent to 22 million drivers—object to plans to use the hard shoulder as a running lane in order to tackle congestion.
The RAC is now calling on the government to abandon any plans to maximise use of the road network by using the hard shoulder as a crawler lane or conversion at Junctions.
It says: "The RAC wishes the hard shoulder network to be retained as it was provided to ensure the safety of broken down motorists, breakdown
operators and the emergency services."
Around 250 people are killed on the hard shoulder every year—and in a three month period in 1999 RAC and AA operatives reported 33 hard shoulder "near misses".
Phil Renno of trade association Force 5, which represents recovery technicians and drivers, says the hard shoulder must be kept: "There are enough Instances of death among recovery operators anyway, and to do away with the refuge of the hard shoulder is to expose these guys to even more danger."
CM featured the dangers facing recovery operators on hard shoulders in last week's issue (CM25-31January).