Posted By Emma Forbes
I had a similar query just recently and found that the "Safety At Street Works and Road Works" Code of Practice
ISBN 011551958-0 priced £5.99 at The Stationery Office was really helpful - a good reference tool. Hope this helps....

Posted By Samantha Fisher
There are a number of different qualifications or card registration schemes for highway workers. Anybody working on the highways should have training on the New Roads and Street Works Act, there are levels for both Supervisors and Operatives. CSCS have cards for highway workers which would require NVQ's or equivalent plus the H&S test (there is a specific test for highway operatives). There are also highway sector schemes required in the Specification for Highway Works which require operatives to have gained NVQ's in specific activities to enable them to be classed as competent to carry out those type of works (trunk roads, motorways etc) There is some good information on the Highways Agency website on different courses and requirements. www.highways.gov.uk/contracts/procure/reg_skills. Hope this all helps

Posted By Samantha Fisher
The standard guidance on layouts is Chapter 8 of the Traffic signs manual and details standard layout of traffic management including required lengths of tapers, size and type of signs required and safety zones that should be allowed. All traffic management should be laid out to these diagrams and you will find that most contractors carrying out highways work on a regular basis will adhere to them especially on trunk roads and motorways as it is the operatives lives that are at risk if it isn't done well. It's the same as any other area of H&S there are always those that think it won't happen to them, "I'm only here for 15mins and it'll take ages to set it out properly" or those that just haven't thought about the risk or don't have the training or knowledge to know any better.

Posted By Robert K Lewis
There most definitely is a requirement for the SCOTVEC C&G certificate for both supervisor and operative under the NRSWA. The publication mentioned by Emma is in fact the formal acop and is linked to the chapter 8 requirements and refers to them for more complex cases. Even work on the footway is covered by the requirements. You should also note that there is an approved code for the re-instatement works and the subsequent liabilities for the work.

Bob

Posted By Ken Taylor
My understanding is that, where street works requiring a licence are carried out on the public highway, there has to be a supervisor with a prescribed qualification and at least one operative with a prescribed qualification. As to setting out cones where there are no licensed street works, it should require permission from the relevant highway authority (but probably rarely does) and to be safe and sufficient should meet the published standards (eg 'Chapter 8'). I don't think there is a specific qualification for coning but competence will be needed by the person performing this task. However, it is some years since my local government work so please correct me if I am out of date on this one.

Posted By Laurie
A couple of years ago I had a team going out to lop some tree branches.

When I asked my local police force if we could cone off the relevant part of he carriageway, they told me not to worry about that as subject to 24 hours notice they would come and do it for me.

They did too!

Worked for me!

Laurie

Posted By Benedict Thierry
Hello everyone,

Yes, Chapter 8, Sector schemes A,B,C&D (operated through Lantra). But these tend to cover longer periods of occupation.

I got the impression this query is for short stops of petween 1 - 60 minutes or so.

For these types of short stop works, I find that the Principal contractor/client often have there own preferences for how these are carried out - variations on a theme. Also depends on time of day, traffic flows, weather conditions, type of road motorway, dual carriageway, single carriageway & local site hazards - hump bridges, bends, brows of hill, sharp bends, type of junction etc.

The client usually have monitoring vehicles moving around patches checking that site rules are being followed. You usually need permission to be on the network, so that they know what & who to expect to be there.

Some issues are very grey at the moment - hopefully things are slowly improving but there are so many conflicts that need considering it sensibly takes time & scrutiny - such as is it better to park with your vehicle front wheels pointing in to the kerb risking your staff being secondary victims in the event of a collision, do you point your vehicle wheels away from the kerb risking putting other road users at risk in the same incident or do you point them straight ahead & hope this avoids both.

As with much medicine - trial & error is often the name of the day.

Benedict

Benedict