Brit_in_Japan

There was another fatal accident yesterday where a lorry crossed over the central reservation and collided with oncoming traffic.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/s...re/4286009.stm

Isn't it time for the Department of Transport to reassess these "soft" central reservations and replace them with concrete barriers? If a lorry or bus does go out of control then it will be contained on the same carriageway. Also the disruption to clear up will be reduced as you wouldn't need to repair the barrier, just dust it off.

Views?

pslewis

And, of course, you won't moan when your taxes go up to pay for it??

Pete

Brendan Hughes

Cars maybe, but wouldn't a high lorry hitting low concrete just flip over it?

Must say, I'm concerned when I see this stuff (isn't it armco, or is that summat else?) round road edges when there's a steep drop the other side.

I've always found it to be an odd choice for a protection barrier. Presumably there's shock absorbent physics somewhere in the design. I hope...

SJ_Skyline

Pete,

You surprise me! I would have thought you would have suggested that speed limits be decreased to 10mph so that crashes like these cause much less damage!

Dracoro

We've already paid for it in Road fund licence (not to mention fuel tax!). They don't need MORE money, they just need to address WHERE they spend their (well, our!) money.

speedking

Steel barriers are designed with bolts that will slip and posts that bend to absorb a great deal of the energy of vehicle impact. A lot of accidents you don't hear about involve cars hitting the barrier and staying on the same carriageway being brought to a controlled halt. The only accidents you do hear about are the big vehicle ones that are few and far between but cause most damage/disruption.

A concrete barrier would just demolish a car. A truck hitting a concrete barrier would probably cause lumps to fly off into the opposite carriageway which in itself would be pretty dangerous.

On balance the current set up with steel barriers is safer over all.

Brendan Hughes

Pete would suggest unused nuclear missiles being laid along the centre. People would drive VERY slowly and carefully to avoid a crash, then!

Brit_in_Japan

I've seen the DofT videos showing cars hitting the "soft" barriers (armco and those wire cable barriers) and without doubt they are good at containing the vehicles on the carriageway and not bouncing it back into the traffic lanes. However the same barriers seem incapable of stopping a 20 - 40 tonne lorry from crossing over and causing massive accidents and disruption.

Maybe a concrete barrier between the "soft" barriers????

And if you made the barrier a resonable height lorries would never get over them. It would stop rubber necking too, how many delays and further accidents are caused by rubber necking each year??

Just my 2p.

Drunken Bungle Whore

Properly installed barriers do exactly what they're meant to - unfortunately many of them on our motorways aren't installed correctly so vehicles either bounce right off or plough right through. (Info direct from the accident investigators - pics aren't pretty.)

Unpopular though it is, speed plays a part - the barriers are designed to deal with impacts within a reasonable variation of the national speed limits.

Reducing speed isn't a 'solve all' solution - it needs to be coupled with better education about safe driving. Improved barriers aren't the 'sole' answer either - if we lined all our roads with the best barriers on earth it wouldn't reduce road accidents significantly unless we improved driving skills at the same time.

I totally sympathise with the fact that people feel they are being over pealised for speeding - I drive over 30,000 miles a year - but the fact is that speed does kill - however it's not the only thing that kills on our roads, and many of the other issues are simply not being tackled. At least driving badly at a slower speed is marginally less dangerous than driving badly at high speed.

IMHO improved (ad properly installed) barriers would undoubtably help - but it's coming at the problem from the wrong angle - driving skills are the things that need improving the most.

Jap2Scrap

Is that cut n paste?

Sith

I was going to say the same.

richieh

speed does not kill
it multiplys the effects of the primary cause of the accident
richie

Drunken Bungle Whore

?


That was my point - as I said, speed is one factor and I'm not saying that it shouldn't be tackled - but it shouldn't be tackled in isolation.

My other point was that the barriers are designed to work within a reasonable variation of the speed limit - if you're going above those levels they won't help you much.

To put it into perspective - I spent yesterday visiting one of our sites where 2 weeks ago a driver was killed in a head on crash. We already know that speed was a factor - but there would have been far less chance of either driver loosing control at a lower speed.

I can't influence government policy, and I can't change the central reservaions so it's no good bleating on about it - but what I can do (and am currently doing) is pushing through an initiaitve at work aimed at all our drivers reminding them of the basics of safe driving - not driving tired, highway code/ stopping distances, basic car maintenance for safety (tyre pressures) etc. I don't want to nanny anyone, but it does no harm to remind people of the basics.