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Phil Jones, you must have missed Crossrail, Thameslink and the recently completed West coast mainline rebuild. Combined they cost well over £30billion, much of the funding no doubt coming out of the £60b raised each year from motoring taxes.

One day we will get a decent motorway system, cars are here to stay weather the eco-freaks like it or not.

- James, London

"You could widen the M4 for nothing by using the nearly always empty bus lane that runs into London."

OK, genius, what happens at the Piccadilly Line bridge where it narrows to two lanes along the elevated section? You can't widen the M4 to three lanes from there to Chiswick without a bill with a lot of noughts at the end and a massive amount of demolition and disruption (for instance, that shiny new TVU building opposite GSK has to be got round and you'd have to remove the existing M4 viaduct first).

Unless it's the same width all the way along it's actually better for traffic to shut the bus lane entirely, as that avoids the delays at the merge, but the existence of the M4 bus lane doesn't slow car drivers much while making life much more reliable for the less selfish people in the coach, taxi or on the motorbike. It's actually quite a clever solution.

- Tom, London, UK

"If someone is doing 70 in the middle lane then I fail to see why you would want to overtake unless you are intent on exceeding the speed limit."


But that's just the problem. The middle lane is full of people doing 63mph not realising that the majority of car speedometers underestimate the actual speed by 10%. The law says people should pull over to lane one. But it seems that a large number of people think that the law doesn't apply to them.

They should all be fined, and have their licenses removed. That would free up the congestion far more easily than building more lanes.

For what its worth, I was driving back from Slovakia last August, and the lane discipline of all the countries I passed through was impeccable. After 700 miles on the road, we finally came across a middle lane driver, at 3am, on an empty motorway, in Belgium. And guess what, it was a Brit.

- George, London

Further to Jack Spratt's e-mail. I am a commuter who uses a coach to get to work rather than use my car. Having this bus lane (which is also for taxis) has cut my journey by at least 15 minutes. I wish we had this bus lane coming out of London as well. Sitting in the coach I see that most of the cars or vans have only one person, the driver in them. We have at least 42 people so that is probably at least 42 cars not going on the M4 in the rush hour!!!!

- Pat, London

I wish they would widen the pinch points of the north and south circulars, too, such as the Telford Road section in New Southgate or the Hanger [Country] Lane. Although I understand there are houses along Hanger Lane, I would support compulsorily buying these houses, knocking them down and creating a proper road to reflect the north circular. The misery and cost to everyone, both business and individuals alike, caused by the serious congestion in these sections, must be huge.

- Ross, London, UK

@BJ. If someone is doing 70 in the middle lane then I fail to see why you would want to overtake unless you are intent on exceeding the speed limit. The danger on our motorways is not created by the law abiding drivers doing 70 in the middle lane, but by the reckless, arrogant drivers trying to overtake them.

- S, London

None of the proponents of fines for avoiding lane 1 noticed that it is always fully occupied by lorries driving with speed limiters, at a distance of at most 4 yards one from another. Trying to leave lane 1, when squeezed between two such monsters, is the most dangerous motorway manouevre I know. They also forgot about grooves pressed in the hot tarmac by the lorries in lane 1, which are quite easily negotiated by their large wheels while being death traps for passenger cars.

- Mariusz, London

I'm with George. A feature of Sunday evenings is the amount of cars trevelling at 65-70 in the middle lane when there is little or nothing in lane 1. It actually becomes dangerous to overtake using lane 3.

Where is traffic enforcement?

- Bj, London

This is madness. Everyday there are breakdowns, fires or collisions in the long coned-off section between J16 and J18 - delays of up to two hours are common. Why can't they do it in shorter bits? Then there'd be less risk of a hold-up, and any delay would be for a shorter time.
And now they plan to do the same on the East side! How are people from the south supposed to get north of London? How do I get from Surrey to Cambridgeshire to visit my family?

Whoever planned this didn't really think about it; and I bet most of the time you won't see anybody working at anything, as usual.

- Brian, London

Why do they bother widening motorways? All they need to do is enforce the overtaking rules and prosecute anyone who uses lanes 2 and 3 who isn't actually overtaking.

The majority of British drivers have a 'favourite' lane rather than actually pull back in to the inside lane when done. For most of the M25, its possible to drive in an empty inside lane undertaking the two outer lanes.

Enforce the law, and you'll turn a 2 lane road into a 3 lane road and increase capacity by 50% without any capital expenditure.

- George, London

Always money for highways and airports, but never money for railways.

- Phil Jones, London UK

You could widen the M4 for nothing by using the nearly always empty bus lane that runs into London. Never could so much be done for so little expenditure!

- Jack Spratt, Richmond, Surrey

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