Eight police forces travelled the route between Leeds and London in the HGVs on the look-out for unsafe driving in a week of action targeting the motorway.
They stopped a total of 663 vehicles, including 180 HGVs, and uncovered 691 offences. The most common offence was not wearing a seatbelt with 239 people caught without their belt on.
This was followed by 181 people spotted using a mobile phone at the wheel then 44 drivers not in proper control of their vehicle and 43 driving without due care and attention.
Penalties ranged from words of advice and traffic offence reports to 14 court summons and even five arrests.
National Highways provides the unmarked HGV cabs to police forces across the country as part of Operation Tramline. From the elevated position in the HGV, officers can spot unsafe driving behaviour – whatever vehicle the motorist may be in.
National Highways Head of Road Safety, Jeremy Phillips, said: “Hundreds of thousands of motorists travel over 21 million miles on the M1 every day – accounting for one in seven of all motorway journeys – and the vast majority are safe and legal drivers.
“But there is a minority that continue to put themselves and others at risk. It is disappointing that almost 700 offences were spotted in just one week – but thanks to Operation Freeway those drivers were prevented from continuing with their unsafe behaviours.
“Through this week of action we aim to reduce the number of incidents on the M1 and to encourage motorists to think about their driving and to adopt safer behaviours.”
In 2022 there were 73,593 incidents on the M1 – that is over 200 incidents every single day. There were 4,087 traffic collisions on the motorway last year.
More than 33,254 offences have been recorded since the ‘Operation Tramline’ unmarked HGV cabs safety initiative was launched by National Highways in 2015. And some 30,380 vehicles have been stopped by police.
The most common offences are not wearing a seatbelt (9,962) and using a mobile phone (8,368) followed by 2,257 who were not in proper control of their vehicle.