Could ITS features offer protection against incidents such as the vehicle strike which caused a motorway pedestrian bridge to collapse recently?
Alistair Gollop FIHE MIET
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Luckily this incident did not result in any fatalities, but could a network of over-height vehicle detectors situated on the strategic road network provide a means to warn vehicles that are too tall?
The first issue is that there is no maximum vehicle height in the UK, but the standard minimum clearance distance for structures over the highway is 5.03m (16’6”). It is common to install over-height detection in advance of locations where a structure has less than 5.03m clearance height, such as low bridges or tunnels.
The proposition is: Could a series of over-height detector nodes located widely across the strategic highway network at the start of each entry slip, be used to warn Regional Control Centre's and drivers of vehicles which exceed a threshold height, that there may be a potential issue?
In addition to protecting low structures, this type of infrastructure deployment could provide the following additional benefits:
- To ‘protect’ standard over-bridges and gantries, where there is no height restriction posted. It is common to see damage on the leading edge of bridge decks caused by over-height vehicles. In this particular incident, the pedestrian over-bridge which collapsed as a consequence of being struck did not have a height restriction in place, therefore would not be provided with any form of traditional over-height asset protection.
- A way in which to detect vehicles where a load has shifted, such as has repeatedly occurred with digger arms rising whilst in transit. (NB: It is not clear that this occurred in this incident, despite being caused by a digger on a low-loader, it could be that the load was simply too tall for that bridge).
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Head of Business Development
8 年Doris Stroh
Construction Project Manager at Verra Mobility (Formally American Traffic Solutions)
8 年Without more details, hard to say what would of prevented it. May be no need to reinvent the wheel here tbough, proper advanced warning signs could of helped prevent it.
PM/Senior Transport Planner at Dar
8 年Isn't this exactly why additional clearance is required for pedestrian bridges, rather than just the standard minimum?
General Manager | MEngNZ | MInsD | PhD Candidate
8 年Technology introduces issues such as false alarms and reliability issues. Any solution needs to be all weather (snow/ rain/ ice) and would need to be available with 100% uptime, and fail safe, possibly with a backup. So why use technology when simple mechanical systems exist? https://i.briefreport.co.uk/upload/news/large/14/35/1676369486.jpg
Director at PTC & ITS Planners and Engineers
8 年Yes technology can address this issue but should it, almost certainly not. This section of motorway sees huge numbers of vehicles pass everyday including, due to its location on the route to the Port of Dover and the Euro tunnel terminal, a high level of freight traffic. Until we know where the offending vehicle joined the network and whether it sought permission as an abnormal load it is an insurance job. Someone's premium just went up.