of safety. In 2002, a survey by major motoring organisations rated the tunnel's safety record as "very poor", and concluded it was one of the least safe tunnels in Europe. In 2010, the northbound tunnel was refurbished in order to meet current safety standards. Fire detection systems have been installed in response to new European regulations in the light of recent tunnel fires. In 2010, the southbound tunnel was affected by planned closures for maintenance from 10 pm to 5 am, Thursday to Sunday inclusive, and over a number of whole weekends. The tunnel was only closed six full weekends instead of the planned ten. The tunnel also suffers regular problems with strikes from over-height traffic, and vehicles running out of fuel. On 10 December 1996, a man drove a Mercedes truck supporting a crane towards the southbound tunnel, ignored warnings that his vehicle was over-height, and struck a gantry, breaking a steel reinforcement frame in the process. The entire tunnel was immediately closed, not only to retrieve the vehicle, but to perform additional safety checks. Because the Limehouse Link tunnel, which runs near to the north end of the Blackwall Tunnel, and the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge, part of the Dartford Crossing, were also closed on the same day, the accident caused one of the worst traffic jams in the capital. In February 2011, TfL reported that the tunnel had been closed 1,200 times in the previous year for a total of 157 hours, while New Civil Engineer magazine claimed it shut 1,448 times in 2010. To try to prevent closures of this nature, an LED noticeboard was set up in the northbound approach, counting the number of breakdowns and accidents per month occurring inside the tunnel. During the 2010s the tunnel has been closed to motor traffic to provide cyclists access to the RideLondon event, although this arrangement is no longer in place. Future The Blackwall Tunnel is the only major road crossing of the Thames in East London, and consequently has very high traffic volumes. Furthermore, the limitations of the western bore of the tunnel (not accessible to vehicles taller than ), means that larger HGV and double decker buses cannot pass through the tunnel in both directions. Given this, an expansion of the crossing has been proposed for many years—such as a third bore of the tunnel, proposed in 1989—however none of these proposals have come