A new feature providing alerts of smart motorway lane closures is now available on Road Angel’s speed awareness devices.

The new feature provides both visual and verbal warnings of active smart motorway lane closures ahead

The tech provides both visual and verbal warnings of an active lane closure ahead, using data provided under a strategic partnership with National Highways (previously Highways England).

The functionality is available across all Road Angel Pure devices, and follows a year of major investment in R&D and testing by the business.

It’s been introduced as smart motorways continue to cause controversy, after a damning new report from the Transport Select Committee said such motorways should never have been rolled out without work on safety concerns and that the Department for Transport and National Highways have failed to deliver on promises to implement safety improvements.

Road Angel said it had developed the technology on the back of long-running concerns over lane closures.

“Our experience has led us to see this and smart motorways in general terms as a major potential risk and we’ve been designing our products to mitigate it for years now. This is about making the roads as safe as possible and saving lives,” explained Road Angel’s Gary Digva.

The new feature joins Road Angel’s current Smart Motorway subscription, which monitors location, speed and the change of speed of smart motorways, so if the smart motorway speed changes, so too does the Road Angel.

Digva continued: “Any debate around the safety of smart motorways will continue and it is an important debate to have but in the meantime, if we can help make a difference with our technology by making people more aware of the changing circumstances we will. Ultimately this technology, especially the new lane closure feature, can save lives.

“Not all drivers fully understand smart motorways and we want to bridge that gap.”

Road Angel Pure customers who already have a smart motorway subscription will receive the updated software automatically.