If you break down on a smart motorway, your goal is to reach a safe place: the next exit, a motorway service area, or an orange emergency area. If you can reach one of those, put your hazard lights on, get out on the left, and stand behind the safety barrier. If you cannot get out of the live lanes and reach safety, keep your seatbelts on, switch your hazard lights on, and call 999 straight away.
A smart motorway is more stressful than an ordinary one precisely because the hard shoulder may not exist, that emergency strip on the left is often a running traffic lane. This guide explains the types of smart motorway, the step-by-step actions to take, and what the red X, SOS phones and emergency areas are for.
The three types of smart motorway
Knowing which type you are on changes what counts as a safe place. There are three:
- All Lane Running (ALR): the hard shoulder has been permanently converted into a normal running lane, so there is no hard shoulder at all. Safe stopping is only possible in an emergency area, at services, or off at a junction.
- Dynamic Hard Shoulder (DHS): the hard shoulder is opened as an extra lane only at busy times. When a red X or a speed limit is shown above it, it is a live lane; when it is closed, it works as a normal hard shoulder. These are being phased out and converted.
- Controlled Motorway: there is a permanent hard shoulder, plus variable speed limits and overhead signs. This behaves like a traditional motorway for breakdowns, the hard shoulder is always available.
Step by step: what to do the moment you have a problem
The moment you feel a problem developing, a warning light, a vibration, a loss of power, act early rather than waiting:
- 1. If you can still drive, move to the left and aim for the next exit, the next motorway service area, or the next orange emergency area. Getting completely off the motorway is always the safest outcome.
- 2. If you cannot reach an exit, pull into an emergency area (a marked orange bay with an SOS phone). Put your hazard lights on as you do.
- 3. In an emergency area, get out of the vehicle by the left-hand doors if it is safe, and wait behind the safety barrier, not next to the car.
- 4. Use the orange SOS phone in the emergency area. It connects directly to the National Highways regional control centre, who can see your location and close the lane next to you before you rejoin.
- 5. Then call your recovery provider. When you re-enter the carriageway from an emergency area, build up speed on the slip-style exit and merge when there is a safe gap, control may set signs to help you.
If you cannot get to a safe place
Sometimes the vehicle stops in a live lane and you simply cannot move it. National Highways advice for this situation is clear, and it can feel counter-intuitive:
If you are in the nearside (left) lane and you can get out safely, leave the vehicle by the left-hand door, get behind the safety barrier away from traffic, and call 999. If there is no safe place to go, or you are in one of the middle or outside lanes with traffic passing on both sides and cannot safely get out, then stay in your vehicle, keep your seatbelts on, put your hazard lights on, and call 999 immediately.
It feels wrong to stay in a car in a live lane, but stepping out into fast-moving traffic with nowhere safe to stand is more dangerous. The control centre can set a red X to close your lane and reduce the speed limit around you within moments of your 999 call, which is exactly what protects you while you wait.
What the red X means
A red X on the overhead gantry means the lane below it is closed. You must move out of that lane as soon as it is safe. Lanes are closed for a reason, very often a broken-down vehicle, an incident, or debris ahead, so driving through a red X is both illegal and genuinely dangerous. Cameras enforce red X signals, and penalties apply.
If you have broken down and National Highways have set a red X over your lane, do not assume the danger has passed just because traffic has slowed; stay where the advice above tells you to be until help arrives.
Emergency areas and SOS phones
Emergency areas are the bright orange bays set back from the carriageway, marked with blue signs showing an SOS phone symbol. On older smart motorways the gaps between them can be over a mile, while newer schemes place them more frequently. It is worth glancing for the next emergency area sign as you drive a smart motorway, so you have a mental picture of where the nearest one is if you ever need it.
The SOS phone in each emergency area is the fastest way to get help, because it tells the control centre exactly where you are and lets them protect you by managing the lanes. If you only have your mobile, dialling 999 does the same job, give them the nearest marker post number or emergency area number if you can see one.
Do not attempt roadside repairs
On a smart motorway, never try to change a tyre, top up fluids, or carry out any repair in a live lane, on the verge, or even in an emergency area next to moving traffic. The closing speed of motorway traffic leaves no room for error. Wait for recovery, even for something you would happily fix yourself on a quiet road.
If your vehicle is recoverable, we will get to you, stabilise the situation with the control centre, and either fix the fault in a safe position or load the vehicle and take it somewhere safe. A blown tyre or a flat battery that you might handle yourself elsewhere is simply not worth the risk in live motorway traffic.