Thousands of messages from the public went on display yesterday in an exhibition detailing the fears, anger, and profound tragedy of people when they or their loved ones have found themselves helpless on smart motorways. The messages and stories, laid out on large placards in a line hundreds of yards long, back and forth across Rotherham’s Titans rugby pitch, were collated from Claire Mercer’s campaign group, Smart Motorways Kill.
It’s just over five years since her husband Jason, 44 years old, and Alexandru Murgeanu, 22, were killed on a stretch of the M1 that was supposedly ‘smart’. On 7 June 2019, a minor accident near junction 34 of the M1, close to Sheffield, forced them to stop but, with no hard shoulder, in an active lane. The ‘smart’ system didn’t pick that up that they were on a flyover with only a sheer drop beyond the crash barrier and didn’t close the lane. A lorry ploughed into them. Their bodies lay in the road for hours as backed up traffic – and no hard shoulder – prevented ambulances getting through.
A tragic failure of supposedly smart technology
Smart motorways are based on a simple formula: relieve congestion quickly and cheaply by repurposing the hard shoulder as an active driving lane; use a network of sensors and alert systems to watch for any stopped vehicle blocking a lane; turn on ‘slow’ and ‘lane-closed’ signs on overhead gantries, and dispatch help.
But it needs various IT systems to work flawlessly individually and collectively – which from our everyday experience of any kind of tech, we know will not happen flawlessly. Incredibly, the motorway incident detection and automatic signalling system (Midas) has gaps in its coverage, and, according to Mercer’s report of the incident, the system was not operating on this stretch of the M1.
As all these safety issues and failings became apparent early on in the investigation into Jason’s death, Mercer found herself increasingly aghast and angry, and founded the campaign in the hope of avoiding further unnecessary deaths. “It’s not that we just don’t feel safe on smart motorways, it’s that we aren’t safe on smart motorways”, she says.
A campaign to raise awareness of the perils of smart motorways
People have been injured, people have been killed, but how many isn’t known as there is no singular tally of deaths on smart motorways; figures from the police, government or highways agency cover all motorway deaths, without distinguishing, despite years of reports, investigation, and committee meetings. “How can they know the true picture?” says Mercer. It’s left to journalists to sift through incident reports and extrapolate.
Her campaign’s website and X feed are impressive in their breadth and depth of coverage of the issue, and she speaks passionately, and with practice, as the campaign website shows an ever-growing media interest in the issue. And the messages are coming in ever larger volumes. Although active since 2019, she had to limit messages for the exhibition to the past two years – still in the thousands – sifted by her at her kitchen table, before being printed and mounted by a troop of volunteers onto reams of A0-sized cards. They were sorted into over a dozen categories, from terrifying considerations for parents – “Which kid do I grab first?” – to disabled people asking how they are supposed to get out in time.
An exhibition of messages expressing anger and a demand for retribution
Anger, as well as fear, is increasingly behind the messages she receives, extending to retribution, that “those responsible face charges”, or “let them break down in a live running lane”, while her own demands for a judicial review against Highways England and the Department for Transport have been stalled and frustrated.
One of the largest sections is “The government don’t care”, and while the event had been planned for months, the snap election was timely, with many messages now demanding “using our vote” to get an indifferent government out.
“It’s time to show the government how the public feel at the only time the government will care, election time!” says Mercer.
A frightening breakdown on a smart motorway
Having never thought smart motorways were a good idea, I only realised just how awful they are when, engine dead, I found myself coasting along the slow lane of the M1 late one January evening, knowing I was about to grind to a halt in an active motorway lane.
I’d never trained for this or been told by the DVLA or whoever to ‘read up on what to do’. I saw no blinding headlights soaring towards me in the rear mirror (fortunately, the time of night meant for scant traffic) but knew this could change in seconds, so instead of getting out into the path of whatever vehicle might suddenly scrape past at 60 plus, I clambered over the gearstick and out the passenger door – luckily not jammed against the crash barrier I’d parked up against.
Some terrifying near collisions and a struggle to get help
In a 2021 report for the parliamentary transport select committee, mentioned in The Guardian, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents stated that it took an average of 17 minutes for operators to notice stopped cars and a further 17 minutes for Highways England to arrive at the scene – “often too late to prevent an accident”.
From the grass on this dark rainy night, waiting anxiously for help to arrive, I watched lorries hundreds of yards back up the road roaring towards me, some beginning in good time their measured drift into the middle lane, but some leaving it desperately late to avoid ploughing their 20 tonne trucks into my stuck tonne of metal – luckily devoid of any kids or disabled relatives struggling to get out, but still with a tank of petrol aboard.
I happened to see, in the dark and rain, a small sign saying “Call the Highways Agency” – was I in a gap in coverage, I now wonder? – but the numbers on roadside marker posts were insufficient to fix my location. I therefore had to run, on the phone, hundreds of yards over wet, hummocky grass, to read the next road-sign for the next junction.
Highways Agency vehicles came, closed my lane, closed the middle lane, and towed me away. I was lucky; I’m able bodied, could climb over the gearstick, could climb over the barrier, could run across wet grass. Still, I was terrified, if only from having to watch what might have unfolded.
For Jason and the other driver, a minor accident escalated into the deaths of two men, and a widow forever campaigning.
Exhibition details
The exhibition was held at Clifton Lane, the home of Rotherham Titans, which is the team that Jason Mercer supported. Mercer is planning for further venues to host it in future.
See the campaign website or Facebook and X. The campaign can be contacted here.
