Case Study

Driving enhanced motorway safety for road users through the SMP Alliance as Primary Strategic Partner

The Smart Motorways Programme (SMP) Alliance was established in 2020 as an innovative delivery model to deliver National Highways’ Smart Motorways Programme. The Alliance brought together National Highways, Fluor, Jacobs, WSP, Balfour Beatty, bmJV and Costain within a single collaborative framework to improve capacity, reliability and safety across England’s strategic road network.

Originally focused on delivering All Lane Running (ALR) smart motorways, the programme underwent a significant change following a Government review in 2021. As priorities shifted towards improving safety on the existing network, the Alliance adapted to deliver major enhancement programmes including the nationwide rollout of Stopped Vehicle Detection (SVD) technology, the National Emergency Area Retrofit (NEAR) programme, and a range of additional safety improvements, including central reservation barrier upgrades.

Working across all three On-Site Assembly Partners – Balfour Beatty, bmJV and Costain – McCann delivered 40 contracts across 25 projects over the five-year programme. McCann was awarded the Alliance’s only Primary Strategic Partner status for Roadside Technology Lots 1, 4, 5 and 7, alongside Secondary Strategic Partner status for drainage and earthworks lots. The company’s scope encompassed motorway communications, road lighting, directional drilling, traffic signs, permanent CCTV systems, radar masts, MIDAS outstations, side fire radar, ramp metering, traffic counting infrastructure, drainage/earthworks and general civils including kerbing and footpaths.

£55.5

million
40

contracts over 25 projects
118

emergency areas installed
500+

stopped vehicle detection sites delivered

Operating within the Alliance environment required exceptional collaboration, flexibility and a commitment to shared objectives. As the only Primary Strategic Partner supporting all three On-Site Assembly Partners, McCann occupied a unique position within the programme, enabling the transfer of knowledge, resources and best practice across multiple schemes and delivery teams. This collaborative approach helped drive consistency, efficiency and innovation throughout the programme, while allowing McCann to respond quickly to evolving priorities and support the Alliance’s successful transition from motorway expansion to the delivery of nationally significant safety improvements.

Despite this significant shift in scope, the SMP Alliance successfully delivered four major programmes; M6 J21a-26 All Lane Running (ALR), National Emergency Area Retrofit (NEAR) scheme, Stopped Vehicle Detection (SVD) and Dynamic Hard Shoulder (DHS) upgrades.

M6 J21a-26 All Lane Running

Between 2021 and 2024, SMP Alliance added an extra lane in both directions to the M6 J21a- 26 (Warrington to Wigan) to create an all-lane running (ALR) configuration by converting the hard shoulder.

This section of the M6 is a key strategic route carrying around 120,000 vehicles daily between Lancashire, Merseyside, Cheshire and Greater Manchester.

The smart motorway upgrades were a technology-drive approach to tackling the most congested parts of the motorway network, improving journey reliability by controlling the flow and speed of traffic.

Working for Costain, McCann delivered all Technology and Motorway Communications, Electrical Work for Road Lighting and Traffic Signs, Road Lighting Columns and Brackets, CCRV masts and cantilever masts, Traffic Signs, Gantry Signs, Slab on Edge, Footways, Pathways & handrail and SVD works for this project.

Stop Vehicle Detection (SVD) Retrofit

The Stopped Vehicle Detection (SVD) Retrofit programme was a key commitment of the Government’s smart motorway evidence stocktake and action plan published in March 2020. It covered the installation of radar-based SVD technology across every all-lane running (ALR) smart motorway.

SVD technology aims to automatically detect stopped vehicles to further improve safety by quickly alerting Regional Control Centres to initiate safety measures like red X signals, adjusting speed limits and deploying traffic officers. The programme was part of a broader effort to enhance safety on smart motorways.

Under the SMP Alliance, working for both bmJV and Balfour Beatty, McCann delivered SVD retrofits across 6 different areas, M6 J2-4, J10a-13 and J16-19, M62 J10-11, M5 J4a-6 and M3 J2-4a and installed SVD sites under the NEAR and ALR Schemes. McCann has installed over 500 SVD sites covering all aspects, including:

Civils – Installation of precast SVD pole bases, ducting, chambers and cabinet sites. Connections to the existing ducted network,
Cable Installation – From both new and existing infrastructure to SVD sites. Including power, communications and lightning protection cables.
Electrical / Technology – Installation of SVD equipment on masts, gantry structures and in roadside cabinets. Including full BS7671 testing and SAT commissioning.

National Emergency Area Retrofit (NEAR) Scheme

An agreement was made between National Highways and the government to add over 150 emergency retrofit areas to Smart Motorways to meet the recommendation that they should be no further than 1 mile (1.6km) apart.

It was decided that 13 new emergency areas would be added to ALR schemes still being constructed, while 138 additional emergency areas would be retrofitted to smart motorways that were already up and running. The creation of 138 additional emergency areas became known as the National Emergency Area Retrofit (NEAR) Programme and Open for Traffic was achieved by the 31 March 2025.

McCann was involved in the construction of 118 of the emergency areas in 24 months across the following roads:

M1 J32-35A (South Yorkshire)
M1 J23A-25 (Leicestershire & Nottinghamshire)
M5 J4A-6 (Worcestershire)
M27 J4-11 (Hampshire)
M1 J16-19 (Northamptonshire)
M25 J23-27 (Hertfordshire & Essex)
M25 J6-8 (Surrey)

You can read more about our M25 J23-27 NEAR Scheme here: https://mccann-ltd.co.uk/projects/m25-near-scheme

Aligning to National Highways Imperatives

Throughout the Smart Motorways Programme Alliance, all partners worked collectively towards National Highways’ three core imperatives: Safety, Customer and Delivery. These principles underpinned decision-making across every stage of the programme and became increasingly important as the Alliance’s focus shifted towards enhancing safety on the existing smart motorway network.

Safety was central to the programme. The delivery of all the schemes and safety upgrades directly supported National Highways’ commitment to reducing risk and improving outcomes for road users. McCann’s contribution to the installation of over 500 SVD sites and involvement in the construction of 118 emergency areas helped provide critical infrastructure designed to detect incidents more quickly, increase places of refuge for motorists and improve overall motorway safety.

Customer benefits were delivered through improved journey reliability, better traffic management and reduced disruption. Smart motorway technologies enable faster incident response and more efficient operation of the network, helping to improve the experience of road users. Throughout delivery, the Alliance worked to minimise the impact of construction activities on road users while maintaining access and keeping traffic moving wherever possible.

Delivery was achieved through the Alliance’s collaborative approach, which enabled it to adapt to changing priorities while maintaining programme performance. As the only Primary Strategic Partner working across all three On-Site Assembly Partners, McCann helped drive consistency, knowledge sharing and efficient delivery across multiple projects and regions.

The Smart Motorways Programme Alliance demonstrated how a collaborative delivery model can successfully adapt to changing national priorities while continuing to deliver complex infrastructure improvements at scale. Under the Project 13 model, which aligned National Highways’ ambition to move away from traditional contracting and towards long-term, integrated enterprise relationships, all those operated as a collaborative enterprise with shared risk/reward and a programmatic approach to improving safety, reliability and performance across the strategic road network. As the programme evolved from motorway capacity enhancement to a strong focus on safety, McCann played a pivotal role in supporting this transition, providing specialist technology, communications, electrical and civil engineering expertise across multiple schemes and delivery partners.

Through its unique position as the Alliance’s only Primary Strategic Partner working with all three On-Site Assembly Partners, McCann helped drive consistency, efficiency and knowledge sharing across the programme. Over five years, the company successfully delivered 40 contracts across 25 projects, contributing to some of the most significant smart motorway safety initiatives undertaken on England’s strategic road network.

From the delivery of the M6 J21a–26 All Lane Running scheme, to the nationwide rollout of Stopped Vehicle Detection technology and the construction of 118 emergency areas under the National Emergency Area Retrofit programme, McCann’s work has helped enhance motorway safety, improve operational resilience and support more reliable journeys for millions of road users. The programme stands as a testament to the value of collaboration, adaptability and technical excellence in delivering nationally significant infrastructure outcomes.

Quick Links

Strategic Highways

Case Study

Providing safe refuges for over 120,000 daily southeast commuters across the M25 NEAR Scheme

View post