Highway Worker Safety

Deaths of employees being hit by passing vehicles and vehicles involved in accidents make up between 40% and 50% of construction employee deaths, varying a bit from year to year. Other dangers like drop-offs, heavy machinery rollovers, power lines and accidents with power equipment have a tendency to make up the rest, with employees being struck by construction vehicles, each in a smaller amount.

When traffic causes about 1/2 of all road construction employee deaths, clearly powerful traffic controlling measures must be taken. Barriers and devices like speed display signs are steps in the right direction.

When driver feedback signs are employed as traffic security devices in work areas, the velocity of traffic has been shown to drop up to several miles hour. This is significant, because a reduction can slow some cars to a speed that's so much less likely to cause devastating injuries, including fatal ones. A vehicle traveling 40 miles per hour is much more likley to kill a worker than one going 30 miles per hour. Each mile per hour slower a vehicle travels means more chance that someone struck by that auto will survive.

When road construction workers have to stand near vehicles or even in their path such as people who hold signs and flags, slower traffic means they'll have more time to move out of the way if a vehicle gets closer or an accident happens. When you use signs from TraffiCalm Systems, you can be assured that they are highly perceivable and trusty. And because they follow government traffic sign directions so that they're the right size and color that drivers recognise, drivers do heed the signs and slow their vehicles down.

Barriers are widespread in work sectors, but regularly they are the barrel-sized orange and yellow reflective barriers. These are highly identifiable, but they are also flexible. They are handy for drivers because they obviously mark the edges of roads and construction zones. If there's a crash with one of these barriers, their flexible construction makes it unlikely there will be auto damage. Unfortunately, they won't protect workers, so slower moving traffic is still highly important. Display signs can help keep traffic moving slowly to prevent more accidents.