Is new Smart Freeway on Mitchell Freeway too confusing or are Perth drivers’ poor merging abilities to blame?

The new smart system on Mitchell Freeway is causing chaos for peak-hour northern suburbs drivers — sparking debate about whether the problem is actually Perth motorists’ lack of nous when merging. Main Roads says the Smart Freeway system has cut the average travel time on the freeway by an impressive seven minutes. It says it now takes an average 25 minutes to travel from Hester Avenue in Butler to Vincent Steet in Perth instead of the 32 minutes it took in the same two-week period between 7.30am and 8.30am in January 2024. But many drivers have taken to social media to argue that they are waiting too long at the on-ramps to get on the freeway and that the lights change colour too quickly and are confusing. There are also concerns that the situation will only get worse when children return to school in early February. Northern suburbs Liberal MP Tjorn Sibma said drivers had, ironically, told him that their daily commute times at peak hour had increased. “Whatever traffic efficiency gains have been measured on the flow of freeway traffic may have been undermined by traffic banking up on arterial roads and freeway on-ramps,” he said. “I am concerned that we are seeing the displacement of congestion across the road system in the northern suburbs rather than gaining genuine efficiency improvements. “The driving experience should be unequivocally better after years of disruption and the expenditure of more than $200 million.” However, some point to West Australians’ poor reputation for merging as the main reason for problems with the Smart Freeway system. Mr Sibma said some blame could be put down to the budget spent on educating motorists about the system. When the smart system was introduced to Kwinana Freeway on August 2020, Main Roads spent $1 million on educating drivers on how to use it. But when the system on Mitchell Freeway started in December — just days before Christmas — it had a budget of just $375,000, with Main Roads believing drivers had already used the technology on the Kwinana Freeway. “The advertising spend on the Kwinana Freeway northbound Smart Freeway campaign was approximately $1 million and was used to educate all motorists across the metropolitan area on the new concept of a Smart Freeway,” a Main Roads spokeswoman said. Mr Sibma said the decision not to roll out a similar education campaign for northern suburbs drivers had contributed to the confusion over the technology. “The rollout of the Smart Freeway system on the southbound lanes of the Mitchell Freeway has been poor with an absence of a quality education package,” he said. “Communications need to be effective rather than expensive. “The Government should cease spending money on political propaganda such as the Paint The Town Red campaign and instead allocate the funds to explain the Smart Freeway changes to road users. That would be really smart.” The more than $200 million project on the Mitchell Freeway resulted in 1400 pieces of technology installed along the length of the freeway including gantries, traffic lights, cameras and sensors. The installation gives central control over traffic flow from Main Roads’ headquarters, allowing them to respond to accidents and heavy traffic. A key part of it is “ramp metering” — reducing an on-ramp to a trickle when merging onto the freeway, creating a faster flowing road and reducing pinch points. It is a model adopted from other jurisdictions, with Britain and US cities including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Philadelphia and Seattle using ramp metering. Some US cities — Dallas, San Antonio and Austin — have deactivated their systems after driver complaints. When The West Australian observed the ramp metering in action at the Hepburn Avenue overpass this week, Mitchell Freeway was flowing but cars were banked up for up to five minutes on the on-ramp. As part of the Smart Freeway model, cars are queued on the on-ramp to the freeway across two lanes before expanding to three just before the lights. Red lights at the Hepburn Avenue overpass ranged from as short as three seconds to longer than 20 seconds. Quick-change traffic lights allow for one car per lane to enter the freeway. But due to driver reaction speeds or inattention, the cars pull away slowly, requiring three cars to immediately merge into two lanes before again merging into one and finally finding a safe space to pull onto the freeway. By 8.30am on Thursday, the on-ramp had cleared but further south the Warwick Road and Reid Highway entrances were backed up. At Powis Street, drivers were ignoring line markings around a small third slip lane during peak traffic with multiple cars going through green lights. The Main Roads spokeswoman said the agency had anticipated similar driver response to the Kwinana Freeway switch on. “Before the introduction of coordinated ramp signals and other smart technologies on the freeway, heavy uncontrolled traffic demand from on-ramps impacted the freeway lanes leading to stop-start conditions and significant congestion,” she said. “The changes are designed to improve safety and stop-start conditions on the freeway. “Congestion on on-ramps is being actively monitored with a dedicated team making changes to the system to manage the conditions as best as possible. “The technology is adaptive, flexible and allows for fine-tuning whilst traffic patterns are also changing due to removal of roadworks and as people return from holidays. “Over time, motorists will become more familiar, whilst the system continues to adapt to traffic conditions and commuters will benefit from safer and smoother journeys, similar to those being experienced on the Smart Freeway on Kwinana northbound.” Transport Minister Rita Saffioti said on Tuesday that changed traffic systems meant drivers had to adapt. “I understand it’s a change. The lights change very quickly. You have to have really quick reaction times. It is different,” she said. “I can’t remember how many people failed to get off at the right exit on the new Tonkin Highway, in particular the one at the airport when that was built. “Change always takes a while to get used to.”