Highways Agency ‘ineffective’ at tackling congestion
The Highways Agency has been “timid and ineffective” in tackling congestion, according to a committee of MPs.
The House of Commons Public Accounts Committee says the agency has been too “risk averse” in testing measures to tackle congestion England’s motorways and trunk roads, which is estimated to cost industry £3 billion a year.
Trials of traffic management measures have been “poorly” managed, contributing to “inconclusive results”, the committee adds. Other measures such as hard shoulder running, as used in the Netherlands, have not been tried out at all.
Edward Leigh, the chairman of the committee in the previous Parliament, said the Highways Agency must begin to demonstrate better leadership and more imaginative thinking.
“Faced with the rising tide of traffic which is increasingly choking our motorway and trunk road network, the Highways Agency has been timid and ineffective in testing and adopting a range of ‘quick win’ congestion-reducing measures that have been shown to work abroad,” he said.
The committee criticises the agency for failing to provide motorists with sufficient travel information and urges it to improve intelligence about planned events such as concerts and major sporting events that can cause congestion.
Mr Leigh pointed out that drivers in other countries enjoy sophisticated roadside messaging allowing them to choose alternative routes if necessary. “Drivers in Paris enjoy this technology so it is infuriating that drivers on heavily congested motorways in the South East of England have had to make do with primitive message signs,” he said.
And the agency has also failed to integrate its technology strategy with its road building and road widening strategy.
“Tests of new technologies must be designed so that the measures which work can speedily be introduced across the whole trunk road network,” Mr Leigh added. “The Highways Agency must also open its mind to other ideas for changing driver behaviour.”
Around seven per cent of the UK’s motorway and trunk road network suffers heavy congestion at peak times, and a further 13 per cent suffers heavy congestion on at least half of the days of the year.
