Contractor achieves unprecedented safety figures on road project

Contractor May Gurney achieved some of the lowest road construction accident figures ever recorded in the UK on a two year project to dual part of the A11 in Norfolk, which opened in March 2003.

Health and Safety Executive (HSE) figures show that the national average for accident incidents on such a site is 10.97, but on this project May Gurney achieved just 2.7. Only two injuries were serious enough to warrant reporting to HSE and there were only 35 minor cuts and bruises logged across the whole of the two-year contract.

At the peak there were the best part of 200 people working on the 10km (6.25 miles) long site. "We have a nucleus of people who have worked together for the last 20 years - all are long-serving, experienced May Gurney personnel and this has been a key factor in achieving this outstanding safety record," said joint project manager David Huckstep.

To ensure safe working practice, no one was permitted to work alone on the site, and at the end of the working day the site foreman drove the complete length of the site - including much of the 10km of additional slip roads - to ensure that everyone was off site.

Traffic management was a crucial element in achieving these safety results. "We started planning the traffic switches as early as July 2001," said project manager Jeremy Sturla. "Traffic management has been second to none. Flexibility, combined with long term planning and computer technology, has been key."

Safety crews attended the site every day, round the clock, while work was in progress. The 8,500 cones used to keep traffic segregated from the operatives were kept clean by a lorry-mounted washing unit. All direction signs were mounted on professionally produced - not temporary – posts and were kept clean to help the motoring public.
And the 40mph site speed limit – reduced to 30mph when structural work was taking place over the carriageways – was strictly enforced.

Two weeks prior to the official opening, virtually the entire new section of road could have been opened. But in a further May Gurney initiative developed with the HA and the police, speed limits and cones were left in place - to allow motorists to familiarise themselves with the new layout and the positioning of the road junctions. It is hoped this will help prevent the kind of accidents that can occur when a new stretch of fast road is opened for the first time.