RE: Roadworks aren't working: PH Blog
Discussion
All that jazz said:
Ruffy94 said:
What i can't stand is the stupid signs on the M1 saying 'welcome to our workplace'/'our dad works here'/'lets all get home safely'/'nobody likes a tailgater' etc.
Already annoyed at having to do 40mph for miles and miles, putting a jokey sign up only increases my rage...
It also annoys me beyond reason that they appear to have hands from a chimpanzee Already annoyed at having to do 40mph for miles and miles, putting a jokey sign up only increases my rage...
fuelracer496 said:
Some of the points raised were covered in the last article Dan wrote. Having read a few of the comments, there’s some misunderstanding as to what work is done maintaining the existing highway, why and how. I’ll possibly get put back in my box for this, but it might explain some of it (as a chimp that’s involved in highway maintenance).
• Concrete barriers in central reserves (not reservations, reserves).
Steel barriers are a bit old hat, don’t tolerate impacts and have a short service life. In normal conditions, they’d need their beams and posts replacing after say 20 years. That’s time consuming (consider the Armco repairs at Silverstone / Le Mans and multiply the time taken by the linear length of motorway). Steel wire rope systems fell out of favour after cars started to get sliced and diced, along with motorcycle riders losing limbs and the like. Concrete barriers withstand impacts and are much lower maintenance.
The key thing here is that it reduces carriageway crossings required by the workforce, hence less roadworks. In an impact, more often than not, the barrier will have some scuff marks, but will have suffered zero structural damage so needs no repairs. There are exceptions where HGV’s find their way from Lane 1 to Lane 3, and a standard CSB wont cope, but we’ve never been in a position to provide high containment systems for every linear metre of the network (over railways being the exception). Again, as was mentioned in the last article, barrier systems are designed and tested for the laws of the land in terms of speed.
• Narrow lanes, 50mph limit, average speed cameras
In this day and age, we must maintain the highway whilst keeping road user delays to a minimum. Lots of traffic needs to be shuffled through as many lanes as possible even though the maintenance works eat into the available road width. Something has to give, and it’s the speed limit. There was a time when you could say “get it fixed, cut out as many lanes as you need”. These days, we have to keep 3 lanes open, albeit narrowed – and when you narrow them, the speed must be lowered. Speed cameras are there to try and enforce the reduced speed limit, because drivers in their metal boxes feel invincible
• TM on, no workers working
Put simply, it is too expensive and too dangerous to be putting out and bringing in traffic management on a daily basis, for a scheme of lengthy construction duration. Complaints of no workers being visible are valid, if you know for a fact that works have ceased for reasons other than, for example; concrete curing, waterproofing setting etc. In an ideal world, we’d be shift working 24/7 to reduce the construction phase, but the nature of many schemes at present (throughout the country) is refurbishment or critical substructure repairs, which by their nature require curing time before the next phase starts. Factor in the beautiful British weather, and some activities cannot be undertaken due to inclement weather (BBA certs for waterproofing, for example) can be null and void if laid in the wrong conditions. The underlying thing here is that the general public assume nothing’s happening because we’re lazy and cause disruption because we can.
• Trial signage
In an attempt to get away from the monotony that drivers experience by seeing lots of signs that all look the same, the trial was taken to try and influence driver behaviour in a positive way. It’s a well-known fact that many drivers take no notice of road works signs, due to them being very wordy. Time will tell whether changes take place though.
• General state of the network
The motorway network is very old, and jammed to capacity. When it was designed in the 1960’s, this level of congestion wasn’t anticipated and the materials used didn’t have the service life. It’s fair to say that parts of the network are on life support, just to keep them going a bit longer, because there isn’t the money to replace structures or facilitate full scale repairs (due to road user delays). See the other thread for reasons as to why widening isn't the easy solution that the uninformed believe it is.
A case study, for a scheme I was involved with, on the M5:
An overbridge which doubles as an interchange, has thaumasite attack to its support piers and foundations. The motorway has to be kept open with 3 lanes in each direction, the road above must be kept open to maintain traffic at the junction, but the foundations have to be exposed and substantial amounts of concrete removed from the piers and foundations.
Thaumasite (concrete cancer) turns concrete to mush. It occurs when ground water contains sulfates and makes its way into concrete that had soluble material incorporated into the mix i.e. gypsum in aggregate. Many structures built in the mid to late 1970’s have this trait.
The bridge deck has to be propped as the removal of concrete from the piers reduces their capacity. This means trench sheets around the foundation, scaffolds, large props etc which all take up space. A minimum 1m surround is kept around the foundation as working space for guys in the hole (foundations can be several metres below ground). All the TM and safety zones are minimums to maximise the available road width. The works take just under a year to complete due to having to stabilise revetment slopes when you remove ground surrounding the piers. None of it is achievable with overnight closures or 24/7 shift work.
The thing I’m trying to get at, is there’s a lot more going on than the road user sees - If there was a better way of doing it, it would be done that way, but at present there’s a lot of unreasonable expectations from people who expect a first class road network to appear, without any impact to their journeys. We don’t have any fairies to build and maintain the roads, just human beings, who tolerate being exposed to all manner of abuse from road users and having bottles of urine thrown at them. Fun times…
Dan, if you read this – if you get no luck with an invite to a control centre, I can ask about getting you in to the South West RCC in Avonmouth that looks after the South West, and the Smart motorway network around the M4 / M5 interchange. PM me perhaps.
I would rather get credible firms from all over the EU to bid for the work. Cost and timescale then put it to online public vote.• Concrete barriers in central reserves (not reservations, reserves).
Steel barriers are a bit old hat, don’t tolerate impacts and have a short service life. In normal conditions, they’d need their beams and posts replacing after say 20 years. That’s time consuming (consider the Armco repairs at Silverstone / Le Mans and multiply the time taken by the linear length of motorway). Steel wire rope systems fell out of favour after cars started to get sliced and diced, along with motorcycle riders losing limbs and the like. Concrete barriers withstand impacts and are much lower maintenance.
The key thing here is that it reduces carriageway crossings required by the workforce, hence less roadworks. In an impact, more often than not, the barrier will have some scuff marks, but will have suffered zero structural damage so needs no repairs. There are exceptions where HGV’s find their way from Lane 1 to Lane 3, and a standard CSB wont cope, but we’ve never been in a position to provide high containment systems for every linear metre of the network (over railways being the exception). Again, as was mentioned in the last article, barrier systems are designed and tested for the laws of the land in terms of speed.
• Narrow lanes, 50mph limit, average speed cameras
In this day and age, we must maintain the highway whilst keeping road user delays to a minimum. Lots of traffic needs to be shuffled through as many lanes as possible even though the maintenance works eat into the available road width. Something has to give, and it’s the speed limit. There was a time when you could say “get it fixed, cut out as many lanes as you need”. These days, we have to keep 3 lanes open, albeit narrowed – and when you narrow them, the speed must be lowered. Speed cameras are there to try and enforce the reduced speed limit, because drivers in their metal boxes feel invincible
• TM on, no workers working
Put simply, it is too expensive and too dangerous to be putting out and bringing in traffic management on a daily basis, for a scheme of lengthy construction duration. Complaints of no workers being visible are valid, if you know for a fact that works have ceased for reasons other than, for example; concrete curing, waterproofing setting etc. In an ideal world, we’d be shift working 24/7 to reduce the construction phase, but the nature of many schemes at present (throughout the country) is refurbishment or critical substructure repairs, which by their nature require curing time before the next phase starts. Factor in the beautiful British weather, and some activities cannot be undertaken due to inclement weather (BBA certs for waterproofing, for example) can be null and void if laid in the wrong conditions. The underlying thing here is that the general public assume nothing’s happening because we’re lazy and cause disruption because we can.
• Trial signage
In an attempt to get away from the monotony that drivers experience by seeing lots of signs that all look the same, the trial was taken to try and influence driver behaviour in a positive way. It’s a well-known fact that many drivers take no notice of road works signs, due to them being very wordy. Time will tell whether changes take place though.
• General state of the network
The motorway network is very old, and jammed to capacity. When it was designed in the 1960’s, this level of congestion wasn’t anticipated and the materials used didn’t have the service life. It’s fair to say that parts of the network are on life support, just to keep them going a bit longer, because there isn’t the money to replace structures or facilitate full scale repairs (due to road user delays). See the other thread for reasons as to why widening isn't the easy solution that the uninformed believe it is.
A case study, for a scheme I was involved with, on the M5:
An overbridge which doubles as an interchange, has thaumasite attack to its support piers and foundations. The motorway has to be kept open with 3 lanes in each direction, the road above must be kept open to maintain traffic at the junction, but the foundations have to be exposed and substantial amounts of concrete removed from the piers and foundations.
Thaumasite (concrete cancer) turns concrete to mush. It occurs when ground water contains sulfates and makes its way into concrete that had soluble material incorporated into the mix i.e. gypsum in aggregate. Many structures built in the mid to late 1970’s have this trait.
The bridge deck has to be propped as the removal of concrete from the piers reduces their capacity. This means trench sheets around the foundation, scaffolds, large props etc which all take up space. A minimum 1m surround is kept around the foundation as working space for guys in the hole (foundations can be several metres below ground). All the TM and safety zones are minimums to maximise the available road width. The works take just under a year to complete due to having to stabilise revetment slopes when you remove ground surrounding the piers. None of it is achievable with overnight closures or 24/7 shift work.
The thing I’m trying to get at, is there’s a lot more going on than the road user sees - If there was a better way of doing it, it would be done that way, but at present there’s a lot of unreasonable expectations from people who expect a first class road network to appear, without any impact to their journeys. We don’t have any fairies to build and maintain the roads, just human beings, who tolerate being exposed to all manner of abuse from road users and having bottles of urine thrown at them. Fun times…
Dan, if you read this – if you get no luck with an invite to a control centre, I can ask about getting you in to the South West RCC in Avonmouth that looks after the South West, and the Smart motorway network around the M4 / M5 interchange. PM me perhaps.
Current M62 timescale of 3 years is an absolute joke and I'm not even going to mention the glacial progress being made.
I'm not even sure there is actual proof that 50mph in all lanes makes things safer. Certainly makes it more difficult getting in lane and causes driver frustration.
DonkeyApple said:
All that jazz said:
Ruffy94 said:
What i can't stand is the stupid signs on the M1 saying 'welcome to our workplace'/'our dad works here'/'lets all get home safely'/'nobody likes a tailgater' etc.
Already annoyed at having to do 40mph for miles and miles, putting a jokey sign up only increases my rage...
It also annoys me beyond reason that they appear to have hands from a chimpanzee Already annoyed at having to do 40mph for miles and miles, putting a jokey sign up only increases my rage...
Hate roadworks and hate smart motorways. The stretch just north of derby on the M1 has been there for what feels like forever, I swear they never get any work done!
Recently I was doing some work with a traffic management company, over heard a conversation along the lines of. "Site safery manager says 1500m of cones before the work force is not enough, he wants to up it to 3 miles to ensure safety."
3 bloody miles? 3 sodding miles of 50mph limit for no bloody reason? What's to stop a tired driver travelling those 3 miles then ploughing through the road workers anyway?! Boils my piss!
Recently I was doing some work with a traffic management company, over heard a conversation along the lines of. "Site safery manager says 1500m of cones before the work force is not enough, he wants to up it to 3 miles to ensure safety."
3 bloody miles? 3 sodding miles of 50mph limit for no bloody reason? What's to stop a tired driver travelling those 3 miles then ploughing through the road workers anyway?! Boils my piss!
I appreciate what has been said about concrete curing times, but struggle to understand why sulphates cause a problem - just do an analysis before you lay it FFS? That is why the M25 opened late, the concrete section between Leatherhead and Reigate was sub-standard, and you could argue it still is - I've never travelled on a worse motorway surface than the M25 between J8 & J12! Tyres howl, expansion joints thump, gaps between lanes cause tramlining - makes me think it's a 3rd world standard in what is supposed to be a developed nation!
I have the misfortune to have to use the M3 between Junctions 2 and 4 at least once a week with the 50 average cameras while it is converted into a "Smart" motorway - about as Smart as the Smart car and that is a piece of sh*te! And what exactly in that process makes it take 2 f*****g years to achieve? The signs giving the timescale got removed within weeks of work starting - suggests it was either an embarrassment or worse still it will take even longer! But it's nice to have a pretty sign when I join the M25 saying I am leaving their workzone - well thank f
k for that, I could have mistaken it for a holiday camp! Concrete cures in days even in our climate, but there seems to be very little being poured anyway!
Reminds me of the fiasco on the A3095 (a major link between the M3 and M4) when they built ONE ROUNDABOUT for access to Broadmoor and it took 6 f*****g months, which included about 3 months of single lane traffic with lights that resulted in about 30 minutes of queueing as there are no other realistic alternatives, so my 7 mile commute took the best part of the hour - then our elected representatives bleat about air quality (but then council meetings start after the rush hour I think)! All the A3095 should have been dual-carriageway in the first place - it is at the Camberley and Bracknell ends so what went wrong with the middle bit? I know there is a forest there, but most of that burnt a few years ago anyway! Then just to optimise everyone's misery they f****d about with the Twin Bridges roundabout in Bracknell on the same road so we could practice queueing a bit more, and despite their efforts it is worse than it was, other than when the 7 (yes, SEVEN on one roundabout) sets of lights fail!
Now we have 6 to 8 weeks disruption while the traffic lights at the Rackstraws junction on the A3095 (again) are "upgraded" starting the week the school holidays ended - marvellous scheduling by some tw*t(s)!
eybic must have suffered from this nonsense too as a local!
On a similar topic I grew up near the A3 and fail to understand why we need to be restricted to 50 mph even if the lanes are narrow? They are the same width they were when we drove 60s/70s bangers between Hook underpass and Raynes Park with a 70 mph limit for years and I never had a problem doing that (or significantly more), yet now we have ABS, adaptive cruise, lane departure warnings and all that sh*t 50 mph is the imposed limit? WHY?
BTW I don't want self-driven cars on the roads - if you can't be bothered driving get the fg train or be a bus-wr.
I know the HS2 railway has been somewhat controversial - hardly surprising given that hardly anyone uses the railways for long distance travel unless they are politicians that need to appear in their constituencies from time to time (and only because they can claim the cost on expenses) - but what would benefit far more people (and the ones actually paying for these sort of projects) would surely be another North / South motorway?
We need a road infrastructure that serves the whole population, yet most of the population lives in the South East and it only has about 6 motorways in total - the Midlands and Manchester/Liverpool areas have more than that! Yet people outside the South-East moan about London-centric politics - well try living down here before you judge.
Rant over (at least for now)!
I have the misfortune to have to use the M3 between Junctions 2 and 4 at least once a week with the 50 average cameras while it is converted into a "Smart" motorway - about as Smart as the Smart car and that is a piece of sh*te! And what exactly in that process makes it take 2 f*****g years to achieve? The signs giving the timescale got removed within weeks of work starting - suggests it was either an embarrassment or worse still it will take even longer! But it's nice to have a pretty sign when I join the M25 saying I am leaving their workzone - well thank f
k for that, I could have mistaken it for a holiday camp! Concrete cures in days even in our climate, but there seems to be very little being poured anyway! Reminds me of the fiasco on the A3095 (a major link between the M3 and M4) when they built ONE ROUNDABOUT for access to Broadmoor and it took 6 f*****g months, which included about 3 months of single lane traffic with lights that resulted in about 30 minutes of queueing as there are no other realistic alternatives, so my 7 mile commute took the best part of the hour - then our elected representatives bleat about air quality (but then council meetings start after the rush hour I think)! All the A3095 should have been dual-carriageway in the first place - it is at the Camberley and Bracknell ends so what went wrong with the middle bit? I know there is a forest there, but most of that burnt a few years ago anyway! Then just to optimise everyone's misery they f****d about with the Twin Bridges roundabout in Bracknell on the same road so we could practice queueing a bit more, and despite their efforts it is worse than it was, other than when the 7 (yes, SEVEN on one roundabout) sets of lights fail!
Now we have 6 to 8 weeks disruption while the traffic lights at the Rackstraws junction on the A3095 (again) are "upgraded" starting the week the school holidays ended - marvellous scheduling by some tw*t(s)!
eybic must have suffered from this nonsense too as a local!
On a similar topic I grew up near the A3 and fail to understand why we need to be restricted to 50 mph even if the lanes are narrow? They are the same width they were when we drove 60s/70s bangers between Hook underpass and Raynes Park with a 70 mph limit for years and I never had a problem doing that (or significantly more), yet now we have ABS, adaptive cruise, lane departure warnings and all that sh*t 50 mph is the imposed limit? WHY?
BTW I don't want self-driven cars on the roads - if you can't be bothered driving get the f
g train or be a bus-wr.I know the HS2 railway has been somewhat controversial - hardly surprising given that hardly anyone uses the railways for long distance travel unless they are politicians that need to appear in their constituencies from time to time (and only because they can claim the cost on expenses) - but what would benefit far more people (and the ones actually paying for these sort of projects) would surely be another North / South motorway?
We need a road infrastructure that serves the whole population, yet most of the population lives in the South East and it only has about 6 motorways in total - the Midlands and Manchester/Liverpool areas have more than that! Yet people outside the South-East moan about London-centric politics - well try living down here before you judge.
Rant over (at least for now)!
As a student living in Leeds (from the South) - I travel using the M1 frequently to make family visits.
The amount of times I have seen ZERO workers during the infuriating 50 zones is genuinely silly. Is it just me who finds it more dangerous being lowered down to a mind numbing 50 when people seem to be far less concentrated behind the wheel? At least at 70+ people *seem* to be paying more attention to the road ahead.
The amount of times I have seen ZERO workers during the infuriating 50 zones is genuinely silly. Is it just me who finds it more dangerous being lowered down to a mind numbing 50 when people seem to be far less concentrated behind the wheel? At least at 70+ people *seem* to be paying more attention to the road ahead.
DeolTheBeast said:
As a student living in Leeds (from the South) - I travel using the M1 frequently to make family visits.
The amount of times I have seen ZERO workers during the infuriating 50 zones is genuinely silly. Is it just me who finds it more dangerous being lowered down to a mind numbing 50 when people seem to be far less concentrated behind the wheel? At least at 70+ people *seem* to be paying more attention to the road ahead.
Good luck with the M1 - even getting to it on the M25 is a PITA!The amount of times I have seen ZERO workers during the infuriating 50 zones is genuinely silly. Is it just me who finds it more dangerous being lowered down to a mind numbing 50 when people seem to be far less concentrated behind the wheel? At least at 70+ people *seem* to be paying more attention to the road ahead.
And frankly from what I saw last night 3 lanes of traffic travelling randomly between about 47 and 54 mph with no lane discipline is far more dangerous than a motorway with the normal (soon to be gone forever?) 70mph limit.
I haven't read the whole thread yet, but has anyone mentioned Japan in these comments?
It's a very different culture but what we can learn from their infrastructure maintenance is the shear level of efficiency. An old record now for sure, but in the week after the 2011 earthquake a section of motorway was rebuilt - and open.
The UK is so full of health and safety "executives" intent on prolonging otherwise menial tasks with constant risk assessments that we've lost sight of the end goal. Plastic "experts" whose only real talent is the provision of excuses for poor performance.
All in my opinion of course.
It's a very different culture but what we can learn from their infrastructure maintenance is the shear level of efficiency. An old record now for sure, but in the week after the 2011 earthquake a section of motorway was rebuilt - and open.
The UK is so full of health and safety "executives" intent on prolonging otherwise menial tasks with constant risk assessments that we've lost sight of the end goal. Plastic "experts" whose only real talent is the provision of excuses for poor performance.
All in my opinion of course.
Mr Tidy said:
I appreciate what has been said about concrete curing times, but struggle to understand why sulphates cause a problem - just do an analysis before you lay it FFS? That is why the M25 opened late, the concrete section between Leatherhead and Reigate was sub-standard, and you could argue it still is - I've never travelled on a worse motorway surface than the M25 between J8 & J12! Tyres howl, expansion joints thump, gaps between lanes cause tramlining - makes me think it's a 3rd world standard in what is supposed to be a developed nation!
As I mentioned, the sulfate issue affects existing structures built in the mid to late 1970's i.e. concrete that has been in the ground for 40 years and is now in very poor condition. These form the bulk of the bridges undergoing concrete repairs at the moment. The repair concrete has a design life that exceeds the service life of the bridge as a whole, and there are other measures in place to ensure it lasts, along with removing the acidic soil in the immediate vicinity to the foundations.It's worth noting that sulfate attack in existing structures is a different beast to poor workmanship in new works. Many of the assets on the network were designed and built before the knowledge of things like sulfate attack existed.
elementad said:
I would rather get credible firms from all over the EU to bid for the work. Cost and timescale then put it to online public vote.
Current M62 timescale of 3 years is an absolute joke and I'm not even going to mention the glacial progress being made.
I'm not even sure there is actual proof that 50mph in all lanes makes things safer. Certainly makes it more difficult getting in lane and causes driver frustration.
The way maintenance contracts, and indeed the road networks are run in Europe are quite different to the UK. The growing pains experienced by bringing in a new firm would possibly lead to other issues. Having used sub-contractors from abroad for specialist elements in recent times, it's not ideal in terms of progressing, certainly when you're on site and trying to sort out an issue urgently.Current M62 timescale of 3 years is an absolute joke and I'm not even going to mention the glacial progress being made.
I'm not even sure there is actual proof that 50mph in all lanes makes things safer. Certainly makes it more difficult getting in lane and causes driver frustration.
The change from the Highways Agency to Highways England, long term should lead to some improvement by way of the funding stream being a larger pot over a longer period, as historically it was a year by year deal and when schemes are up to a year in design and over a year in construction.
C.A.R. said:
The UK is so full of health and safety "executives" intent on prolonging otherwise menial tasks with constant risk assessments that we've lost sight of the end goal. Plastic "experts" whose only real talent is the provision of excuses for poor performance.
All in my opinion of course.
There's actually only one HSE. All in my opinion of course.
Also, you cant really blame the HSE or H&S culture for any of this. They're only the result of the blame and claim culture we now have!
C.A.R. said:
I haven't read the whole thread yet, but has anyone mentioned Japan in these comments?
It's a very different culture but what we can learn from their infrastructure maintenance is the shear level of efficiency. An old record now for sure, but in the week after the 2011 earthquake a section of motorway was rebuilt - and open.
The UK is so full of health and safety "executives" intent on prolonging otherwise menial tasks with constant risk assessments that we've lost sight of the end goal. Plastic "experts" whose only real talent is the provision of excuses for poor performance.
All in my opinion of course.
In the event of an emergency incident, the same rules tend to not apply when it comes to durability long term. In the UK it’s rare to have such large incidents, but at a more local level, it’s possible to achieve a great deal in a short time period, providing that everyone is clear about the caveats that go with it – these are not in relation to health and safety, they’re in relation to structural performance. An example would be an underbridge I was involved in the emergency repairs for in 2010, which was later completely replaced in 2013. It's a very different culture but what we can learn from their infrastructure maintenance is the shear level of efficiency. An old record now for sure, but in the week after the 2011 earthquake a section of motorway was rebuilt - and open.
The UK is so full of health and safety "executives" intent on prolonging otherwise menial tasks with constant risk assessments that we've lost sight of the end goal. Plastic "experts" whose only real talent is the provision of excuses for poor performance.
All in my opinion of course.
It was an underbridge, with a thin deck (approx. 220mm thick), riddled with delaminated concrete (to a depth of around 170mm) so you had 50mm of good stuff, the rest was like a smashed up packet of digestive biscuits. An emergency repair was needed in the area sat below lane 3 in both directions (the bridge span was around 30 metres, so quite small). A night time total closure followed by narrow lane running for 24 hours following was the minimum in order to ensure the high strength concrete mix (greatly stronger than the existing) would achieve strength quickly and allow us to resurface over it the following night.
The total closure was required because live load on the bridge would cause reinforcement to oscillate in the concrete as it cured, leaving voids, and due to the deck being so thin, this bridge was visibly quite bouncy. The point regarding the concrete is that this was only an emergency fix to keep it going and stop the motorway falling into the road below. It was done with guarantee that the entire deck would be replaced under the next commission as the use of high strength concrete was only an interim measure to ensure road user delays were kept to a minimum.
You can repair issues quickly, but they will not be a permanent fix. That’s the difference between closing a road overnight and closing it for months. It’s much better for us fix an issue properly by taking the time on site to do it. It’s a false economy to repair a part of the network and only cause a month of delays, when you have to then go out in 2 years’ time to effect the same repair, rather than fix the root of the issue and not have to go back for decades.
You have hit the nail on the head Dan with the last bit of that article. Without cameras enforcing the speed limits, what you get is what we have now, a line of Audi/BMW/Mercs/4x4's flying up lane three at 90mph, then swerving across all three lanes 100 yards before the junction they want.
Its human nature I'm afraid, the only way to get people to do adhere to rules, is to constantly enforce them. Voluntary codes of conduct never work.
Its human nature I'm afraid, the only way to get people to do adhere to rules, is to constantly enforce them. Voluntary codes of conduct never work.
fuelracer496 said:
In the event of an emergency incident, the same rules tend to not apply when it comes to durability long term.
You'd like to think that'd be obvious, wouldn't you? But I'm not convinced that those shouting loudest are actually reading or understanding your posts, more's the pity.Safety, what a joke. I mean its not like anyone's getting killed doing roadworks, is it?.......................
The average fatality rate for those maintaining our road network is one of the highest amongst employment sectors. Over the past ten years 13 road workers* were killed whilst working on motorways and major A roads in England.
While the long term trend is downwards, there were four fatal incidents involving road workers in 2010 and one in 2012. There is therefore an ongoing need for the industry to work together to reduce risks for road workers and continue to strive for zero harm year on year.
The average fatality rate for those maintaining our road network is one of the highest amongst employment sectors. Over the past ten years 13 road workers* were killed whilst working on motorways and major A roads in England.
While the long term trend is downwards, there were four fatal incidents involving road workers in 2010 and one in 2012. There is therefore an ongoing need for the industry to work together to reduce risks for road workers and continue to strive for zero harm year on year.
- Source: The Highways Agency: Road workers include all operatives working on the Agency’s network who are directly exposed to risk from network users. These include all workers contracted to work for the Agency in traffic management activities and incident support services, maintenance and renewal schemes, vehicle recovery operators and any other activities where live traffic is present. We have identified road workers as a separate operational area for the purposes of Aiming for Zero, due to the high-risk nature of their work. However, they are a natural subset of the construction and maintenance worker group.
SirSquidalot said:
Hate roadworks and hate smart motorways. The stretch just north of derby on the M1 has been there for what feels like forever, I swear they never get any work done!
Recently I was doing some work with a traffic management company, over heard a conversation along the lines of. "Site safery manager says 1500m of cones before the work force is not enough, he wants to up it to 3 miles to ensure safety."
3 bloody miles? 3 sodding miles of 50mph limit for no bloody reason? What's to stop a tired driver travelling those 3 miles then ploughing through the road workers anyway?! Boils my piss!
Recently I was doing some work with a traffic management company, over heard a conversation along the lines of. "Site safery manager says 1500m of cones before the work force is not enough, he wants to up it to 3 miles to ensure safety."
3 bloody miles? 3 sodding miles of 50mph limit for no bloody reason? What's to stop a tired driver travelling those 3 miles then ploughing through the road workers anyway?! Boils my piss!
I'm a long time lurker rather than a regular poster and this thread had me all geared up to write an essay based on personal experience of working in the highways maintenance industry, however I see Fuelracer (who I happen to work with, albeit I'm in a site based engineering role and he is in a design role) has beaten me to it!
One thing I will say is, when I'm out on site near as damn it every day I work 10-12+ hours in all weathers to get the jobs done, the standard of driving we see is utterly shocking! I understand the frustration of petrolheads (who in general do show a higher level of driving ability than the general public) however we need to protect ourselves from the retards who think its ok to do a U turn in a contraflow on the M5 (I saw this last year). We have people following works vehicles into closures because they didn't understand what the flashing beacons and indicators meant, we have had people bouncing off the varioguard (the temporary steel barriers at work areas) while taking selfies, wagons knocking cars off the roads into work sites while changing lanes, people standing on the brakes when next to us to see what we are doing then getting rear ended. The list goes on...
One thing I will say is, when I'm out on site near as damn it every day I work 10-12+ hours in all weathers to get the jobs done, the standard of driving we see is utterly shocking! I understand the frustration of petrolheads (who in general do show a higher level of driving ability than the general public) however we need to protect ourselves from the retards who think its ok to do a U turn in a contraflow on the M5 (I saw this last year). We have people following works vehicles into closures because they didn't understand what the flashing beacons and indicators meant, we have had people bouncing off the varioguard (the temporary steel barriers at work areas) while taking selfies, wagons knocking cars off the roads into work sites while changing lanes, people standing on the brakes when next to us to see what we are doing then getting rear ended. The list goes on...
Hackney said:
I've driven the M1 north and south several times in the last week or so.
There are 20 miles of "roadworks" leading up to J19.
There is no work going on for 19.5 miles, then there's the M1 / M6 junction work.
No work. NO WORK. Nothing.
No machinery, no people, no activity of any kind.
It's been like this for weeks if not months and promises to be like this for many more weeks to come.
Why?
It's hard to be understanding of the reasons when no reason can be seen.
ThisThere are 20 miles of "roadworks" leading up to J19.
There is no work going on for 19.5 miles, then there's the M1 / M6 junction work.
No work. NO WORK. Nothing.
No machinery, no people, no activity of any kind.
It's been like this for weeks if not months and promises to be like this for many more weeks to come.
Why?
It's hard to be understanding of the reasons when no reason can be seen.
very depressing I have to do jct 21 to the A43 and it's all 50mph, I never see any work people :-(
what you do see is cars doing 80mph+ on it, must be cloned numer plates, I know it's very tempting to clip some on for the motorway use.
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