Responses to a consultation have been used to update the Highways Agency's proposed changes to The Highway Code and to produce a revised version to lay before both Houses of Parliament for a period of 40 days.
The consultation offered stakeholder organisations, businesses and the public the opportunity to comment on proposed amendments to 33 existing rules, two new rules and six proposed changes to the additional information and annexes within The Highway Code.
A total of 3,210 responses, including 19,849 written comments, were received during the
consultation period. The majority of respondents to the consultation were in favour of the proposed changes to The Highway Code and welcomed the timing of the changes, agreeing that they would improve safety for users of motorways and other high-speed roads.
Overall, the percentages of respondents agreeing with each of the proposed changes to The Highway Code ranged from 70% to 99%. If the responses beyond the scope of the consultation (see paragraph 4 above) are removed from the calculation, this range is 85% to 99%. This strongly suggests that the proposed changes to The Highway Code are supported, says the report.
92% of respondents agreed with the introduction of the new rule about emergency areas and 89% agreed with the introduction of the new rule about places of relative safety. These rules, together with rule 269 – hard shoulder, also attracted additional comments about motorways where the hard shoulder has been converted to a traffic lane. These additional comments have been addressed in Annex B of the full ‘response to the consultation’ report.
Highways England says it is taking forward all of the proposed changes – two new rules, amendments to 33 existing rules and six proposed changes to the additional information and annexes within The Highway Code.
The full response report is available here.
Highways England June 2021