Highways Agency

Accessibility

• Disability Rights Commission
• Web Accessibility Initiative

Removing the Barriers

General Statement

We have made every effort to make this site accessible and easy to use for everyone dependant upon what browser you are using, should you choose to use, or if you suffer from any disabilities.

All pages on this site, except Traffic England*, have been subject to an accessibility audit and should be valid to HTML 4.01 Transitional, use CSS and conform to the WCAG AA standard. Where individual pages fall short of the AA rating we will specify which standard has been achieved. To read more about W3C standards, please choose from one of the links below.

Access Keys

A Set of standard access keys have been used to allow those who can not use a mouse, or just prefer to use the keyboard to navigate between main sections of the site, and through documents, by using the keyboard.

To use these keys hold the Alt key and the desired page key at the same time. In most browsers (Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox) you may then need to press the enter key.

Site Navigation Keys

These keys work site-wide

• S - Will skip the navigation bar. For blind users this means not having to hear the same navigation options read by screen readers.
• 1 - Takes you back to the Home Page of the site.
• 2 - Takes you to the About Us page.
• 3 - Takes you to the Newsroom page.
• 4 - Takes you to the Travel Info page.
• 5 - Takes you to the Road Projects page.
• 6 - Takes you to the Doing Business with Us page.
• 7 - Takes you to the Knowledge Centre page.
• 8 - Takes you to the Careers with Us page.
• 0 - Will always bring you back here.

Browser Issues

It is worth noting that some browsers do not support accessibility keys.

Users who operate the Opera web browser should note that acessibility keys are supported by the Opera browser, but with a different key sequence. Please consult details here on using access keys with the Opera web browser.

Browser Text & Colours

You can specify the font sizes, styles, foreground and background colours of web pages displayed on your computer screen, even if the author of the web page has already specified these. You can also specify the colour used to indicate links in Web pages, or a special colour for links that are used only when the mouse passes over the link. This is useful if you have low vision, need larger fonts, or need high-contrast colours.

Microsoft Internet Explorer for PC
Open your Internet Explorer Web Browser
Select 'Tools' from the menu at the top of your window
From the options which appear, select 'Internet options....'
Click on the 'General' tab
Click on the button marked 'Accessibility'
To change your font size, select the checkbox marked 'Ignore font sizes specified on Web pages'
To remove background and font colours, select the checkbox marked 'Ignore colours specified on web pages'
Click OK (and again if necessary)
Select 'View' from the menu at the top of your window
From the options which appear, select 'Text size'
Select your desired text size 

Microsoft Internet Explorer for Apple Mac
Open your Internet Explorer Web Browser
Select the 'edit' menu at the top of your window
From the options menu which appear, select 'preferences'
Click on 'web content'
Deselect the button marked 'show style sheets'
Return to the list of preferences
Click on 'web browser'
Select 'language/fonts'
Select the font size you require 

Adobe PDF Documents

There are a number of large documents and reports on the Highways Agency website that have been stored as Portable Document Format (PDF). PDF file formats are used for the publication of large and complex documents. To view and print PDF files you must have Adobe Acrobat Reader installed. Please cick on the Get Adobe Reader image to install the freely available Adobe Reader.

If you do not have Adobe Reader installed, all PDF documents can be converted to plain text or html using Adobe's online conversion services .

Accessibility Queries

If you have any difficulties using this site that you believe we could address, please let us know. It would be helpful if your e-mail contained the following:

• the URL(s) (web-address) of the page(s) that you are having difficulties with
• the nature of your disability
• a description of the problem area

If you have a solution to suggest, please feel free to do so.

Contact the Web Editor via the following address: webteam@highways.gsi.gov.uk. A copy will be sent to the Webmaster within the Highways Agency. Your details will not be recorded or shared with any 3rd parties.

*Traffic England is a contracted service. The Highways Agency are not responsible for the accessibility testing of pages falling within www.trafficengland.com. We will forward any questions regarding accessibility on these pages to the webmaster of Traffic England.