Road workers to wear bodycams over driver fears
- Published
Road workers often see vehicles enter coned-off work site areas
Road maintenance workers across Scotland are being given bodycams and alarms to help them deal with dangerous and abusive drivers.
Highways operator Bear Scotland said its workers risked injury and even death when unauthorised vehicles drove into their coned-off work sites.
This can happen when drivers jumped red lights or tried to race through traffic management setups, it said.
The firm said their workers also faced verbal and physical abuse from drivers.
One worker even reported being hit by a bottle of urine that was thrown from a moving car.
Bear Scotland has now put in place systems to protect the safety of its workers including CCTV, bodycams, dashcams and incursion alarms.
Sandra Wilson, the firm's health, safety, and risk manager, said using such technology would allow them to provide police with evidence where necessary.
"We hope that, if the public is increasingly aware these measures are in place, it will deter them from taking risks around roadworks and playing Russian roulette with workers' lives," she said.
In the past year the firm recorded 18 "incursions" - cases of unauthorised vehicles driving into its coned-off work sites.
They reported 12 of the motorists to police, several were charged including a drunk-driver and a driver who tested positive for cocaine.
Two people were left seriously injured as a result of the incursions.
'It is dangerous'
A survey of road workers found that more than half of them had witnessed a near-miss with a vehicle on-site and had seen collisions with traffic-managing equipment.
It said 76% had seen motorists jump red lights in working areas and 13% have had objects thrown at them from moving vehicles.
Duncan Crilley, operations supervisor at Bear Scotland, who is based in Corpach near Fort William, was hit by a bottle of urine while working on-site and the window of a digger was smashed when an apple was thrown at him.
"Every day my traffic management team is phoning the police because somebody has jumped lights or tried to race through convoy setups," he said.
"It is dangerous. The team don't have a safety zone around them because it is being controlled by a 10-mile-an-hour traffic limit.
"You will always get one driver who thinks they can catch up with the convoy by breaking the speed limit and driving through the cones or barriers."
Two years ago, one of the workers on Mr Crilley's team was hit as a result. The driver got out and proceeded to shout abuse at the road workers.
"Drivers get abusive. They shout and swear. They throw objects at us," Mr Crilley said.
"People need to take deep breaths. They have got to realise that there are going to be roadworks. There are going to be accidents in the road. They have no right to take their temper out on roadworkers."