New Zealand Transport Infrastructure – Safety update

A few things have happened in the transport infrastructure domain recently, and these might alter the way we think about our safety risk assessments.

Waka Kotahi (NZTA) have updated their Statistical Value of Life.

For those that use the Statistical Value of Life (SVoL) in their quantitative risk assessments, the value published by NZTA has risen from $4.5m to $12.5m.

One implication for organisations is that Waka Kotahi are signalling that safety now has an even higher priority. Another implication is that organisations may need to update or revisit their existing safety assessments, and this may result in some safety controls being within the bounds of 'proportionate'.

• There’s a good newsroom article on the topic. https://www.newsroom.co.nz/govt-to-pay-three-times-the-price-for-faster-safer-journeys
• Here’s the research study: https://www.nzta.govt.nz/assets/resources/research/reports/698/698-monetised-benefits-and-costs-manual-mbcm-parameter-values.pdf
• Here is NZTA’s statement about how the Monetised Benefits and Costs Manual?(MBCM) replaces the old economic manual: Monetised benefits and costs manual | Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency (nzta.govt.nz)
• And Here is NZTA’s MCBM published 16 April 2023: Monetised benefits and costs manual v1.6 April 2023 (nzta.govt.nz).?You will see the new figure on page 57.

Engineering New Zealand have updated their Health and Safety by Design practice note.

The Engineering New Zealand practice note for Health and Safety by Design has been updated. The practice note reinforces the legal obligations for designers and includes example templates with worked examples to assist users. Because the guidance is general, each organisation might consider how to best apply it in their own context.

Health and Safety by design is the concept that the design of a structure such as a building, equipment such as plan, as well as substances, can be optimised or modified to improve safety of manufacture, use, maintenance, and disposal. The concept also includes the idea that is that it is cheaper, easier, and more effective to consider through-life safety risks early, in the design and pre-design stages

Organisations might consider how their current processes align with this industry published guidance, and further consider the designer's obligations in the Health and Safety at Work Act.

• Here is the page to the practice notes, with resources. See Practice Note 4. https://www.engineeringnz.org/engineer-tools/engineering-documents/practice-notes-and-guidelines/
• Here is a direct link to the practice note: https://d2rjvl4n5h2b61.cloudfront.net/media/documents/PN04_HealthSafety_by_Design.pdf

The National Rail Industry Advisory Forum (NRIAF) released guidance on undertaking safety risk assessments against the ‘So Far As Is Reasonably Practicable’ principle.

The National Rail Industry Advisory Forum has released its guidance on undertaking safety risk assessments to meet the ‘SFAIRP obligations. ?The SFAIRP principle recognises that organisations and duty holders are required to do everything that can be reasonably done, at the time, to eliminate and minimise safety risk.

The guidance outlines the pros and cons of qualitative and quantitative assessments, and how grossly disproportionate might be assessed, along with some other practical pointers.

While this guidance was written with rail organisations in mind, the guidance may prompt some thinking with other industries who use qualitative and quantitative assessment in their assessment of SFAIRP.

• The guidance can be found here: https://www.nzta.govt.nz/roads-and-rail/rail/resources/, along with a supporting video.
• My previous post about this here: https://www.dhirubhai.net/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7044400435956264960/

Construction Health and Safety New Zealand (CHASNZ) recently published a report on Health and Safety by Design practices in New Zealand.

This report highlighted that there are some fundamental gaps in the published statistics of harm in the construction sector, making targeted intervention more difficult. The report also notes that Health and Safety by Design is not an ‘add-on’ process, instead the concepts are integral to designers’ decision-making.

The report also notes that clients take a much larger role in safety than previously recognised, outlining that the constraints the client creates during their decision to build have a very significant effect on the downstream safety.

The implication for organisations, especially clients, is to recognise how much control they have over the potential downstream harm by setting constraints for their design, including the decision to build, location, and the function and operations that will be carried out.

• The download report for the report is here: https://www.chasnz.org/articles/white-paper-launch-improving-health-and-safety-outcomes-for-the-construction-sector-through-better-design-practice

If you think I’ve missed anything, feel free to comment below.?