A new survey on Britain’s roads has said that many of them are inadequately marked with some so faded they are almost invisible to road users.
The study, from the Road Safety Markings Association (RSMA), looked at 483 miles of road across the length and breadth of the country, including those managed by the Highways Agency and local councils and found that just over half, 50.6% had road markings regarded as barely visible.
It also found that just under a quarter of the roads surveyed were in need of “emergency repair” and only 7% had markings which achieved the highest ranking compared to 23% the previous year. The worst identified areas in England were found on the M1, M16 and M18, while some of the worst roads were found to be in both Scotland and Wales.
George Lee, national director of the RSMA, called the findings “shocking” and added: “We could see a clear, direct correlation between deadly roads and deadly road markings when we examined the 10 most dangerous roads identified by the Road Safety Foundation.”
