Speed control equipment outages A75 Springholm: EIR release

Information requested

You asked numerous questions in relation to the speed activated VAS units and traffic halt signals in Springholm. For ease of reference I have listed your questions in our response below.

1a. Why has the current western Springholm A75 road resurfacing been programmed in multiple phases creating almost a 4 week gap before the speed control inductive loops torn out during the first phase are reinstated and the speed activated halt signals returned to their protective function to curb speeding placing vulnerable active travellers and home frontages in harm's way?

1b. Is there a risk assessment protocol in place that require trunk road maintenance contractors to ensure that the safety of vulnerable active travellers and occupants of frontage homes in trunk route communities is not compromised by any prolonged programmed switch off/removal of safety related signage? If not why not? If existing risk assessment protocols to protect the vulnerable in our communities from added avoidable risk due to the removal/switch off/outages of speed control installations do not yet exist will steps now be taken to create these and incorporate them into trunk road maintenance contracts?

1c. Amey is obtusely asserting no speed related RTCs have occurred during these outages of speed control in Springholm as if to imply everything is essentially ok. Epitome of condescension. Will Transport Scotland rebuke and remind this obviously traffic safety complacent contractor that the mere absence of collision during speed control equipment outages does not in any way equate to an ongoing safe traffic speed management system and that the perception of heightened traffic speeds and attendant increased fast traffic anxiety is a major concern/inhibition for vulnerable active travellers and similarly exposed home frontages?

1d. If a decision was deliberately made to disable/remove but not to incorporate the replacement of the western speed detection inductive loops during the first phase of the programmed road works ending here at 06.00 on 4th March 2025 and to postpone their installation to between 1st and 3rd April 2025 exactly what other considerations were identified by works programmers as being of such importance as to outweigh the need to ensure the speed control outage was minimised for the best protection of the Springholm A75 residents and users?

1e. Why was consideration not given to maintaining the ongoing operation of the existing loops until such time as they could be promptly replaced minimising outage to a few days?

1f. What justification have the contractors for treating the reinstatement of these western inductive speed control loops differently from those to the immediate east of the same set of traffic halt signals which, when the street was resurfaced there several years ago, were placed in situ before the top layer of road surface was applied? We believe that all other Springholm eastern A75 loops associated with either ATC or speed control function were also similarly placed under the top coat during resurfacing at those locations not applied retrospectively by wet disc incision of the new carriageway top coat

1g. Does Transport Scotland have a contract specification requiring existing inductive loops to be reinstated below the carriageway top coat during planned resurfacing to ensure maximum trouble free service life both of the loops and the intergity of the road surface above? If not why not since applying loops by means of incising the carriageway compromises its longer term structural integrity and risks exposing loops to damage and premature failure as well as repeated patch repairs with additional cost to the public purse and attendant risk of speed control equipment outages?

1h. Why has the contractor been permitted to burden the public purse/taxpayer with avoidable added costs by not placing the loops under the road before completing the resurfacing? Is these not an overarching contractual duty to minimise expense consistent with best technical practice? If not why not as both are clearly absent in the way these programmed works are being undertaken in Springholm west?

2. If, as seems most plausible, the contractor simply failed through carelessness not to consider the reinstatement of the planed out loops before the new street surface was completed, white lined, cats eyes and anti skid treatment installed will they be required to absorb the cost of their omission or is this yet another case of the taxpayer having to foot the bill for substandard work incurring additional delay and cost of employing a specialist loops fitter to wet cut the new surface to fit the missing cables along with inevitable temporary traffic management during this operation?

3. This latest prolonged traffic safety outage was avoidable had a better works management flow chart been followed leading to prioritisation of the interests of the vulnerable in harm's way. As it turns out studying your website it seems that more consideration was given to peripheral off road impacts such as listed buildings rather than village pedestrians and frontages exposed to unchecked speeding drivers facing no red halt signals for weeks. Our recent experiences sit so poorly alongside the lofty aims and vision set out in Scotland's Road Safety Framework. Talk is cheap and easy but to improve the traffic risk levels presented to the vulnerable in our fast traffic blighted trunk route communities like Springholm as a prime example being on an international route Transport Scotland and its contractors must also walk the walk. Will any lessons be learned from this episode and standing risk assessment check lists modified/reinforced?

Response

As the information you have requested is 'environmental information' for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA.

This exemption is subject to the 'public interest test'. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.

1a. Why has the current western Springholm A75 road resurfacing been programmed in multiple phases creating almost a 4 week gap before the speed control inductive loops torn out during the first phase are reinstated and the speed activated halt signals returned to their protective function to curb speeding placing vulnerable active travellers and home frontages in harm's way?

The resurfacing works on the A75 at Springholm were planned to be undertaken in multiple phases between Monday 24th February and the 4th March 2025 with overnight closures and a weekend closure in place to facilitate the works in a safe manner. The plan was to remove the loops as part of the resurfacing activity and reinstate (saw cut) the loops once the new surface is in place. This is standard procedure.

A specialist sub-contractor was programmed to install the loops on 4th March as part of the original phased works. Unfortunately, the sub-contractor became unavailable at short notice meaning the loop reinstatement scheduled for the 4th March is now rescheduled to be completed on April 3rd. An additional power cable connecting to the traffic signals was also cut inadvertently which requires a third sub-contractor. The sub-contractor is currently planning to reinstate the power cable on 3rd April. There may be some activity on the 4th April for electronic equipment checks. Should these checks prove satisfactory the signals can be switched back on.

1b. Is there a risk assessment protocol in place that require trunk road maintenance contractors to ensure that the safety of vulnerable active travellers and occupants of frontage homes in trunk route communities is not compromised by any prolonged programmed switch off/removal of safety related signage? If not why not? If existing risk assessment protocols to protect the vulnerable in our communities from added avoidable risk due to the removal/switch off/outages of speed control installations do not yet exist will steps now be taken to create these and incorporate them into trunk road maintenance contracts?

Defects on the trunk road are categorised as either a Cat 1 or Cat 2 defect. Cat 1 defects for a highway require to be permanently repaired within 28 days.

1c. Amey is obtusely asserting no speed related RTCs have occurred during these outages of speed control in Springholm as if to imply everything is essentially ok. Epitome of condescension. Will Transport Scotland rebuke and remind this obviously traffic safety complacent contractor that the mere absence of collision during speed control equipment outages does not in any way equate to an ongoing safe traffic speed management system and that the perception of heightened traffic speeds and attendant increased fast traffic anxiety is a major concern/inhibition for vulnerable active travellers and similarly exposed home frontages?

Amey is aiming to reintroduce the signals as soon as reasonably possible expected as per comment in 1 a above.

1d. If a decision was deliberately made to disable/remove but not to incorporate the replacement of the western speed detection inductive loops during the first phase of the programmed road works ending here at 06.00 on 4th March 2025 and to postpone their installation to between 1st and 3rd April 2025 exactly what other considerations were identified by works programmers as being of such importance as to outweigh the need to ensure the speed control outage was minimised for the best protection of the Springholm A75 residents and users?

The reason for the loop reinstalment being completed in April was due to the specialist sub-contractor being unavailable at short notice. All works are expected to be completed as per comment in 1 a above

1e. Why was consideration not given to maintaining the ongoing operation of the existing loops until such time as they could be promptly replaced minimising outage to a few days?

The loops exist within the existing pavement layers of the A75 carriageway and therefore had to be removed and reinstated as part of the resurfacing works.

1f. What justification have the contractors for treating the reinstatement of these western inductive speed control loops differently from those to the immediate east of the same set of traffic halt signals which, when the street was resurfaced there several years ago, were placed in situ before the top layer of road surface was applied? We believe that all other Springholm eastern A75 loops associated with either ATC or speed control function were also similarly placed under the top coat during resurfacing at those locations not applied retrospectively by wet disc incision of the new carriageway top coat

Existing loops laid in the surface course were done as a like-for-like replacement. Installation of the traffic loops in this location has been completed as per industry standard methodology and similar to the method undertaken for the eastern side of the village.

1g. Does Transport Scotland have a contract specification requiring existing inductive loops to be reinstated below the carriageway top coat during planned resurfacing to ensure maximum trouble free service life both of the loops and the intergity of the road surface above? If not why not since applying loops by means of incising the carriageway compromises its longer term structural integrity and risks exposing loops to damage and premature failure as well as repeated patch repairs with additional cost to the public purse and attendant risk of speed control equipment outages?

The works are in accordance with MCH1540F and associated Highway Construction Details.

1h. Why has the contractor been permitted to burden the public purse/taxpayer with avoidable added costs by not placing the loops under the road before completing the resurfacing? Is these not an overarching contractual duty to minimise expense consistent with best technical practice? If not why not as both are clearly absent in the way these programmed works are being undertaken in Springholm west?

There will be no additional cost to Transport Scotland for the completion of the works.

2. If, as seems most plausible, the contractor simply failed through carelessness not to consider the reinstatement of the planed out loops before the new street surface was completed, white lined, cats eyes and anti skid treatment installed will they be required to absorb the cost of their omission or is this yet another case of the taxpayer having to foot the bill for substandard work incurring additional delay and cost of employing a specialist loops fitter to wet cut the new surface to fit the missing cables along with inevitable temporary traffic management during this operation?

As explained above, the cost of the works will not increase due to the delay of this scheme. All costs will be borne between Amey and their sub-contractor.

3. This latest prolonged traffic safety outage was avoidable had a better works management flow chart been followed leading to prioritisation of the interests of the vulnerable in harm's way. As it turns out studying your website it seems that more consideration was given to peripheral off road impacts such as listed buildings rather than village pedestrians and frontages exposed to unchecked speeding drivers facing no red halt signals for weeks. Our recent experiences sit so poorly alongside the lofty aims and vision set out in Scotland's Road Safety Framework. Talk is cheap and easy but to improve the traffic risk levels presented to the vulnerable in our fast traffic blighted trunk route communities like Springholm as a prime example being on an international route Transport Scotland and its contractors must also walk the walk. Will any lessons be learned from this episode and standing risk assessment check lists modified/reinforced?

The works have largely proceeded as planned, The ‘as built’ drawings completed after scheme construction will show the position of the power cable and will be detailed in the Health & Safety file which will inform the Pre Construction Information for any future works. Discussions have been initiated with the sub-contractor and are ongoing regarding the scheme works.

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