DRIVERS are to be allowed to use the hard shoulder on motorways under government plans to be announced this week.

Ruth Kelly, the transport secretary, will say a trial into hard shoulder driving has been a success and that it will be introduced on the busiest stretches of most motorways.

Under the plan, drivers will be able to use lanes traditionally reserved for the emergency services and broken-down vehicles. They will be able to drive at 50mph in areas where jams are most common.

The extra lanes will be open during peak periods. They will be flanked by new emergency lay-bys at regular intervals.

The government believes the plan will cut average journey times on the most congested motorways by up to a quarter.

Hard shoulder driving is well established in some European countries, including Germany and the Netherlands.

Kelly believes a study into the trial, published this week, shows that safety concerns are unfounded. She will argue that introducing the plan to a “very large proportion” of motorways will have many benefits.

The policy has been given a cautious welcome by motoring groups. However, experts raised questions about its sustainability, warning that new lanes were likely to be the only long-term solution in the most congested areas.

The Department for Transport study is expected to conclude most drivers support the use of hard shoulders in the rush hour. It found that 84% who used the hard shoulder during trials on the M42 felt confident doing so.

Contrary to expectations, there was a significant fall in the number of accidents on the route.

There was also a drop of up to 10% in carbon emissions, as vehicles were less likely to be at a standstill.

Kelly said: “If we do nothing, we will be managing road space in the worst way possible - by gridlock. That’s traffic management done in the most blinkered, inefficient way, a way that guarantees the worst outcomes for motorists, for air quality and for our economy.”

Routes to be included in the scheme will be named this week. The plan is substantially cheaper than the most obvious alternative: building new lanes.

The first routes to benefit are expected to be parts of the M6 and M1. The initial speed limit of 50mph may be increased, according to officials. London drivers, however, will be disappointed to learn that the M25 is not expected to be part of the scheme.

Under the plan, technology will measure the weight of traffic on the road. When congestion reaches a certain level, reduced speed limits are triggered, followed by the opening of the hard shoulder. Cameras will be used to detect drivers using the spare lane in periods when it is not open.

Ministers have been particularly impressed by the extent to which the use of the hard shoulder helped drivers judge how long their journey would take, providing benefits to the economy.

Police will be able to “switch off” hard shoulder lane use in seconds in the event of an accident. An earlier proposal, to create an extra lane by using part of the hard shoulder and narrowing existing lanes, has been dropped.

Paul Watters, head of policy for the Automobile Association, said: “The beauty of this is that you can turn it on and off in a second. It can work very well. However, we want to know what our motorway system is going to look like in 20 years. The best solution is to carry on widening motorways but that takes a long time.”

Motoring groups have particular concerns about heavy congestion on the Birmingham and Manchester corridor, which they believe cannot be resolved by hard shoulder use.

During the year-long M42 trial, drivers were allowed to use the hard shoulder on an 11-mile stretch of motorway south of Birmingham.

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