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M62 - Your Local History
A lot of finds were uncovered during the archaeological evaluation carried out for the M62 Junction 6 Improvement scheme so we thought it would be nice to provide an interactive website so you can see what we found.
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Better information for your journey
The National Traffic Control Centre collects real-time information on road conditions
Quick Links
Don't Cross or Walk Along Motorways
The Highways Agency aims to make more people aware of the dangers of walking or crossing our motorway. We have launched a poster and radio campaign aimed at 16-25yr olds. Hopefully with our hard hitting posters, our message will come across.
Educating tomorrow's drivers
See how we are driving through key messages about safety on our network for the drivers of tomorrow.
Meet the Ancestors
Find out about the history of roads and the work the Agency does to preserve archaeological remains.
See when traffic will be lightest
Our traffic forecaster can help get you there quicker
Safer Roads
What are we doing to make our roads safer?
The Highways Agency makes an important contribution to road safety in England. As operator of the major road network, everything we do has safety implications. We are committed to contributing to the Government's targets for reducing road casualties and to providing a safer network for all our customers.
We build, maintain and operate safe roads, in partnership with the Department for Transport's Driver and Vehicle Operator (DVO) agency groups. We play a key role in delivering the Department's target of improving road safety.
Highways Agency motorways have fewer fatalities than comparable roads in Europe despite carrying more heavy traffic. The Agency's network of roads, motorways, dual carriageways and single carriageways (both urban and rural), carries about a third of all traffic but accounts for only about an eighth of all accidents. We have been set Government casualty reduction targets and by 2010, we anticipate:
- A 33% reduction in the number of killed or seriously injured (KSI) casualties
- A 10% reduction in the rate of slight casualties
- A contribution to the national target of a 50% reduction in child casualties
Safety Action Plan
The Highways Agency has a strategic Safety Action Plan in place. This plan sets out how and what we intend to do and achieve in the next five years between 2005 and 2010 to meet the casualty reduction targets.
As we reach the half way mark, the Agency is broadly on course to achieve the reductions in killed and seriously injured. By the end of 2004, we were able to report a 19% reduction from the original baseline. The other targets on reducing slight casualties and children killed and seriously injured have also shown good progress.
In 2006, we will be developing safety campaigns aimed at several core customer groups with the specific intention of raising awareness of safe driving. We will be working with:
- Partners and stakeholders to target young drivers
- Drivers of company cars and commercial vehicles
- Motorcyclists to halt and reduce the growing number of fatal and serious accidents
Download the 2008 Highways Agency Network Performance Report:
Road Worker Safety
Highways Agency road network and construction sites can be extremely hazardous places to work. We continually review our standards and introduce new measures and construction methods that help reduce accidents at major and temporary road work sites. We also work closely with our suppliers to ensure all workers are fully trained in health and safety, and have have introduced strict safety standards for our traffic officers.
Everyone has a role to play to ensure that our roads are safe for drivers and road workers alike. A key challenge will be to influence the behaviour of road users by promoting safer driving in and on the approaches to road works. In addition, we are introducing a Road Worker Safety Action Plan that seeks to deliver a step change in safety for road workers. Changing work practices, better training and making use of new technology are all important parts of the plan.
See our Roadworkers Safety Report for more details.
Research and Development
The Highways Agency undertakes a wide-ranging programme of research and development activities to support the delivery of our key operational objectives. Past research has been instrumental in enabling us to implement measures such as quiet road surfacing, automatic incident detection to improve safety, active traffic management, remote/high speed monitoring of road conditions, and our Biodiversity Action Plan. Current and proposed research includes studies into the effectiveness of high occupancy vehicle or car sharing lanes, lane departure warning systems, fatigue-related accidents, and a range of new Intelligent Transport Systems applications. Underpinning our safety improvements is a programme of safety research targeted on specific user groups and vehicle types, such as large goods vehicles, as well as specific road accident types such as shunt accidents.
Research, strategies, and programmes - Learn more
This area of the web site will provide information about the research, strategies, and programmes the Highways Agency are working on to help improve road safety for all the users of our network.
Links to information about our road safety initiatives are available from the right hand navigation menu.
