Strathspey MP to call on A9 safety group to stop average speed camera plan
Badenoch and Strathspey MP Danny Alexander will call for A9 average speed cameras plans to be scrapped at his meeting with the multi-agency A9 Safety Group on Friday.
Tasked with reducing road casualties on the A9, the Safety Group can recommend a halt to SNP plans to install more than 100 average speed cameras along the route.
So far more than 500 people have signed up to his petition calling for the scheme to be cancelled.
Mr Alexander said: "I want to thank the A9 Safety Group for coming to Inverness to speak to me.
"If the SNP’s plans go ahead, we will see greater frustration, queues of traffic stuck behind slow moving HGVs, and an even more pressing need for dual carriageways to allow overtaking.
"The A9 Safety Group have the power to recommend a halt to the SNP’s plans, so I hope to convince them that the scheme will be bad for motorists and bad for the Highlands.
"If the SNP really want to make the A9 safer, they should get on and spend some of the billions made available for infrastructure on dualling the road.
"Everyone wants to see the A9 made safer, but it is the strong view of many people who use the road regularly that this is not the way to do it."
A Transport Scotland spokeswoman said: "Safety has consistently improved where average speed cameras have been installed in Scotland, the UK and across the world on a variety of road types.
"The development of the average speed camera system for the A9 reflects the realities of the route, in particular the excessive speed recorded for many vehicles and the high accident severities recorded."
