M25 motorway
In 1995 a contract was awarded to widen the section between junctions 8 and 10 from six to eight lanes for a cost of £93.4 million and a 'Motorway Incident Detection and Automatic Signalling' (MIDAS) system was introduced to the M25 from junction 10 to junction 15 at a cost of £13.5m in 1995 and then extended to junction 16 at a cost of £11.7m in 2002. This consists of a distributed network of traffic and weather sensors, speed cameras and variable-speed signs that control traffic speeds with little human supervision. The system has improved traffic flow slightly, and reduced the amount of start-stop driving. The use of variable speed limits makes this a "controlled motorway", and if hard shoulders are used at peak times it becomes a "managed motorway".