By Johnny Sharp

The latest figures from National Highways show that there were 1,913 people killed or seriously injured on the strategic road network in 2023, which despite representing a reduction of 39% on the 2005-2009 baseline average, the stated target of 50 percent reduction by 2025 looks unlikely to be reached.

Although motorways account for a small proportion of deaths on the road (five percent of casualties), there is still action being taken. Smart motorways are still not popular with the public, even if National Highways’ data shows that they are safer than their conventional counterparts. They also aim to add more than 150 emergency areas to smart motorways to address widespread concerns over the lack of hard shoulders.

At the time of writing no new smart motorways are planned, yet there’s no shortage of new thinking when it comes to improving safety on our roads. Earlier this year, National Highways announced a competition in partnership with Connected Places Catapult to find new innovations, focusing on reducing potential hazards and safety risks.

In August they announced they’d chosen six projects to receive research funding from more than 50 applications.

“We are delighted with the innovative ideas that we have discovered and very excited about how well they are developing,” said National Highways’ Technology Programme Portfolio Manager James Gibson at the time.

Technology at heart of modern motorways

Among the projects under way is TeCall, developed by Devon-based VESOS Solutions to combine eCall data (automatically sent to emergency services by car electronics after collisions or breakdowns) with other hazard alerts to produce more detailed incident data. 

“We’re not just talking about shaving seconds off response times; we’re talking about saving lives,” said Danny Woolard, VESOS co-founder. “On rural roads, where statistically 63 percent of annual road deaths occur, the automatic sharing of the exact location will assist emergency services to attend within the ‘platinum 15 minutes’ for trauma interventions.”

Another source of improved insights on our roads comes from global intelligent road traffic management solutions (ITS) specialist Valerann, who are currently trialling a real-time road data analytics platform to identify potential incidents before they happen.

A common hazard on our roads, particularly motorways, are broken down vehicles, and that’s why Wiltshire-based firm CrossTech have developed a stopped vehicle detection verification system. Hazardous objects can also be a cause of collisions, particularly in areas where roadworks are taking place, and Chesterfield-based Roadside Technologies is testing an automated hazardous object detection solution.

Road users themselves can be a source of danger to each other, though, and London’s VivaCity is tackling that with sensors providing data on near misses between road users.

CEO Mark Nicholson said, “We aim to use the collated data to improve road safety throughout the West Midlands and, in turn, identify more hotspots that could be vital to reducing traffic incidents.”

Another area where new innovations are being brought to bear is safer, more alert driving practices. Nottingham-based Esitu Solutions is trialling a training tool, aimed particularly at fleet drivers who often use motorways, which immerses them in a 360-degree virtual environment. 

They can look around, check their blind spots and glance at mirrors as they would in a real vehicle. The virtual reality app plays the videos and collects responses, providing a score to help identify where additional safety training may be required.

Esitu co-founder Dr Victoria Kroll explained the science behind it. “Hazard perception is one of the only higher-order cognitive skills that has been consistently linked in research to collision risk on the road. We know that people who perform worse on these tests are more likely to have a collision in the future.”

Roads and motorways can only be as safe as the people using them, so any improvements motorists can make as well as the transport industry has to be welcomed. Watch this space for further news on how these innovations develop.

Read more on CIHT: Data from ‘near misses’ to be analysed in hope to improve road safety.

Image: traffic on the M4 smart motorway; credit: Shutterstock.