Aggregate Industries

Overview

Aggregate Industries are at the frontline of the construction and infrastructure industry, producing and supplying an array of construction materials.  With over 330 sites with more than 4.100 dedicated employees, they are home to everything from aggregates, asphalt, ready-mixed concrete and precast concrete products.

World wide AI employs over 90,000 employees in over 80 countries and holds the leading position in all regions with a balanced portfolio of developing and mature markets.

The brief

As Aggregate Senior Contracts Manager Manager, Colin Holland is responsible for developing and managing Aggregate Industries safety strategies across their national sites, Colin is an instrumental member of the senior management team who is dedicated to supporting employee development to enhance the company’s safety culture.  After reports of several incidents involving collisions with vehicles throughout their national contracting business, Colin’s investigation team set out to understand why these collisions were happening, what effect these accidents were having on the business and its employees and to develop strategies to reduce any risks associated with these types of accidents. Their investigations identified that blind spots around the vehicles were an area of concern, the size of vehicles, driving position and working environments increased reduced visibility for operators.

Colin expressed another concern and one that every company faces, which is the reporting of vehicle defects, vehicle inspection and defect reporting is required and needs to be completed to meet PUWER regulations. Their research found that there was no system on the market that offered any proof or evidence that these types of vehicle inspection had been carried out by the operative prior to using the vehicle or machinery.

These concerns led to Aggregate Industries looking at new technologies to support their safety initiatives, after a glowing recommendation from a colleague about Vision Techniques reputation as a collaborative partner, we were approached with a very clear brief. The brief was to reduce the risk of harm or injury not only to their employees but the general public, they also needed to find a way of providing evidence of incidents which could be used to enhance their training programmes and promote a safe working culture.

Colin’s comments “its rare to find companies that want to review and support future developments, I am confident that our partnership is going to be a long and successful one.”

The Solution

The collaboration began with a full consultation. Our technical and sales team conducted various site visits looking at all areas of the company’s operations, these visits gave us the opportunity to meet and talk with managers, site supervisors, sub-contractors and operatives. Allowing us to gain valuable insights into the complexity of their work.

The solution was to trial BANKSMAN AUTOBRAKING with forward and rear-facing cameras integrated with our VT RECORD3.  Banksman Autobraking works to eliminate vehicle collisions by utilising an Auto-braking Radar System. It uses low-energy microwaves emitted from the vehicle to automatically activate the vehicle’s braking system if anything is detected within a defined exclusion zone.

The system alerts the driver and when integrated with VT CAMERAS and DVR, sends a downloadable video footage clip of the exclusion zone to a designated person as soon as the auto-braking system is activated or deactivated. This enables the designated person to gain an immediate real-time assessment of the scenario. The footage can also be used for investigative and training purposes, to support workforce engagement and improve the behavioural safety culture. Since its installation, there have been zero reversing incidents reported on sites where Banksman has been deployed.

Following on from the successful roll-out of BANKSMAN AUTOBRAKING across Aggregate Industries southern region, the collaboration has achieved the highest accolade winning a Highways England Award for Excellence in Safety.  Banksman Autobraking was commended for its potential to drive improvements in behavioural safety culture and raise safety performance in the highways sector. Judges commented that Banksman Auto braking is something that would get real results in driving improvements in behavioural safety culture and tackling a known issue in highways industry safety performance.

Work hasn’t stopped VT and Aggregate industries continue to push boundaries with the development of a new reporting tool, never seen before by the industry.  Due to be launched in the coming months all will be revealed, one thing we can promise is that it will change industry standards.  Watch this space!!!!