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Published:
9:06 AM March 17, 2021
Updated:
11:50 AM March 18, 2021
Plans to turn a section of the A1(M) - Junction 6 for Welwyn to Junction 8 for Stevenage - into a smart motorway were shelved until 2025 to allow Highways England to address safety issues
- Credit: Danny Loo
A coroner has raised fresh concerns over the safety of smart motorways after a teenager died when the broken-down vehicle he was in was hit by a lorry.
Smart motorways often mean hard shoulders are used as running lanes to increase capacity and reduce congestion.
Highways England had to shelve plans to turn a section of the A1(M) - junction 6 for Welwyn to Junction 8 for Stevenage - into a smart motorway by 2022 until 2025 to concentrate on making existing smart motorways safer, after a government review last year led to an 18-point safety improvement plan.
A coroner has issued yet another warning against smart motorways after a teenager who died in a crash on the M1 became the fifth fatality in two years.
The assistant coroner for Bedfordshire and Luton, Tom Stoate, has written to Highways England after a teenager died and two others ended up in comas when they broke down on a smart motorway without a hard shoulder.
Mr Stoate has called for urgent action after a detective said the teenagers would not have come to such harm if there had been a hard shoulder.
Zahid Ahmed, 19, was killed when the people carrier he was in stopped before an emergency refuse area on the smart motorway and was hit by a lorry at 56mph.
Four coroners have now written reports warning smart motorways pose risk to lives of motorists
Highways England has been asked to respond to yet another fear of future deaths report from a coroner concerned about smart motorways
6 March 2021 • 3:00pm
Four coroners have now issued prevention of future deaths reports over fears removing the hard shoulders on smart motorways can result in stranded drivers being killed
Credit: LIVEPIX
A coroner has warned how more people will die on smart motorways after issuing the fourth ‘prevention of future deaths’ report about five fatalities in just two years, the Telegraph can reveal.
Tom Stoate, the assistant coroner for Bedfordshire and Luton, has written to Highways England calling for urgent action after a detective declared a teenager would not have died and two others end up in comas if the hard shoulder had not been scrapped on the M1.