Traffic Management

Traffic Management Rules shall specify the working areas. The position of working areas may continually change due to the operation of the quarry, however as a minimum, the following must be specified as working areas.

• Any place where multiple items of mobile plant are operating
• The operating area around an excavator at a quarry face, tip or stockpile and the traffic movement associated with it.
• The operating area around a dozer on a tip and the traffic movement associated with it.
• The operating area around a loading shovel(s) at quarry faces, tips or stockpiles, processing and loading areas and the traffic movement associated with it.

Traffic Management should aim to reduce the risks associated with traffic movement, traffic management involves a large spread of measures including segregation of pedestrians and vehicles, segregation of light vehicles and quarry plant, car parking for visitors and customers, instructions to vehicle operators to remain in their vehicles at all times, maintenance schemes for vehicles, design and maintenance of roads, provision of required reversing aids, one-way systems, adequate signage and speed restrictions, driver training and competence, design of edge protection along roads and risk assessment of working areas and the implementation of identified control measures.

It is important to provide sufficient parking spaces to allow for employees, staff, site visitors and contractors and to ensure that any walk from the designated parking area can be carried out without exposing persons to quarry vehicle movements.

Brake Testing

A suitable inspection scheme should be in place to ensure brakes are in good condition at all times. The interval between brake testing is dependent upon a number of factors such as vehicle type, vehicle history, road conditions and usage but should generally not exceed 6 monthly intervals. This is often combined with other maintenance work using electronic brake efficiency meters. These meters are portable or can be permanently fixed into a vehicle, easy to use and produce a hard copy evidence of the test results. Electronic brake testing of dumper trucks and loading shovels can indicate brake performance over a period of time and should indicate the need for any remedial action before any loss or failure of the braking system occurs. These meters measure brake effort, which takes into account the vehicle speed and ground slope. The minimum brake performance for rubber tyred machines, derived from BS EN ISO 3450 1996, is a brake efficiency of 28% for a loading shovel without payload and 19% for rigid frame and articulated steer dump trucks with a machine mass over 32 tonne and tested with payload.