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Please support the fight against Smart Motorways by Claire Mercer, who's husband was tragically killed on a smart motorway, by pledging money for her legal fight against them on the CrowdJustice website. You can find out more about her campaign on her website, smartmotorwayskill.co.uk>. Claire is, in her own words, 'a one woman band', taking on the Government and Highways England to try to get these dangerous roads changed back to proper motorways, with hard shoulders. Oh her site, she lists some of the other people also killed on 'smart motorways'. Lets do what we can to stop this carnage as soon as possible and stop the list of victims and their bereaved and devastated families getting any longer. As Claire says: 'We’re fighting in the names of: Jason Mercer, Alexandru Murgeanu, Nargis Begum, Derek Jacobs, Dev Naran, Jamil Ahmed, Zahir Ahmed, Martin Davies, Sevim Üstün, Ayşe Üstün and unfortunately, many more, so far unnamed'. 'This campaign, with your help, is bringing a judicial review to force a legal stop to smart motorways in the names of everyone killed and hurt on these death traps'. 'We are also bringing class actions and disability discrimination complaints and pushing very hard for South Yorkshire Police to investigate Highways England for corporate manslaughter. (**Update: SYP are now investigating H.E for corporate manslaughter in the deaths in the South Yorkshire area**)'. Please do what you can to help Claire. As she also says, 'together we are stronger'. I couldn't agree more and I personally have donated to this cause. Please, do your bit and donate whatever you can afford - every £ counts, no amount is too little What are we doing? We strongly support Claire's campaign to get so-called 'Smart Motorways' abolished and returned to their former state of having a hard shoulder, i.e., 'standard' or 'proper' motorways - or, as we like to call them; 'Motorways'. See below for why we believe they are particularly dangerous. There is also a petition, started and run by Ryan Ridgway - please sign this petition at: Change.org/Scrap Dangerous Smart Motorways today! (Opens in new window) Of course, no road is perfectly safe. Motorways, however, one of our safest roads - and they still are, as far as normal driving goes. But now, because of the usual three (or more) fast lanes and surrounding armco barriers on motorways and link roads, having no hard shoulder is making them exceptionally dangerous in the case of a breakdown, or coming across an existing breakdown or minor accident, where the vehicles involved would normally (for a breakdown), be on the hard shoulder and mostly out of the way of general traffic. Without a hard shoulder, emergency vehicles are quite likely to have no easy way through traffic that has come to a halt after an accident, epsecially a big one, where their help will be needed the most - and fast! This aspect of removing hard shoulders seems to have been forgotten, or just ignored, in the rush to expand the number of live lanes on the cheap. So, when there is a major pile-up, which is bound to happen from time to time, especially in fog or wintry weather, how are the fire engines, ambulances and police going to reach the people who are seriously or even critically injured? They are likely to have to wait even longer to be rescued and taken to hospital - which is is no doubt going to cost even more lives! Even for a 'simple' break-down though, 'Emergency Areas' on 'Smart Motorways' (instead of a continuous hard shoulder), are simply safe - or smart! You can break down anywhere, as much as half a mile away - and having to rely on technology to slow and stop traffic is simply unrealistic dreaming! The Emergency Area space itself is good - getting is the unsafe part! So, why not extend that to the whole length of the motorway, we could call it a 'Hard Shoulder'! Even the 'Smart' part worked perfectly and instantly (it ), by the time you saw any notice, it would most likely already be too late, unless you're a long way behind and unlikely to be afected anyway! Relying on the same sort of technology as on phones/tablets, computers and the internet - which regularly freeze, crash and suffer from slow running - to keep you safe and alive, is just unbelievable. Forget 'Politically Correct' - this is money-saving, planning, bureaucracy and Government gone mad! We are not saying that hard shoulders are totally safe, of course they are not, and people have unfortunately died after being hit while on the hard shoulder, but they are a safer than no hard shoulder at all, even with the so-called 'Emergency Areas', which can never make up for a continuous hard shoulder. If stopping on a Hard Shoulder is dangerous, think how dangerous it must be having to stop in a 'live' - 70+mph - lane! On a 'Smart (dumb) Motorway', there is absolutely nowhere for a driver and occupants to go in the case of a breakdown or accident, unless lucky enough to come to a stop next to one of the 'Emergency Areas', making them extremely dangerous. Having to stop, for any reason, in a 'live lane', with vehicles travelling at 70mph (or more) behind and to at least one side of you is putting anyone in or around the vehicle in question in a potentialy deadly accident situation - an accident which can happen quickly - in just seconds. Trying to get yourself and possibly small children, or someone disable or in a wheelchair out of your vehicle would be pretty much impossible - and virtually suicidal - not that staying in it would be much better! These things have to be stopped - and changed back! So, let's bring back the hard shoulder, but this time with Safe Areas for breakdown repairs and pick-ups, which would give extra cover from general traffic - and truck drivers and others who may be asleep or looking at their phones! Let's make our motorways than the ever have been! Normal (single carriageway) roads often have grassy or other areas where a vehicle can pull off onto in the case of an accident or breakdown. Plus of course, all of the traffic is following them on that lane, so can see when something has happened, or is slowed by the traffic between them and the incident, whereas with two or more fast lanes, drivers are concentrating on what is immediately in front and to the side of them; they cannot see several vehicles ahead in their own lane and, usually travelling a lot faster, the first thing they might know is when the vehicle in front brakes suddenly and/or swerves to miss (or hits) a stopped vehicle, or vehicles, giving them no time to do the same, or possibly anywhere to swerve to! That doesn't generally happen on normal single carriageway roads. Dual carriageways are also dangerous, especially if they are surrounded by armco, but there are (usually) less lanes and often somewhere to get out of the way. It would be nice to have hard shoulders on dual carriageways as well, but realistically, it's not going to happen, due to lack of space and the immense cost involved. So, motorways need to be made safer, by reinstating the hard shoulder. Let's make this happen - sign the petition at: Change.org/Scrap Dangerous Smart Motorways today! (Opens in new window) Back to Top