Safe Driving - Lessons Learned in Organising a Large Transportation Project
Authors: Hudson P. A. 
Published: April 2018

This paper follows on from a previous paper (SPE-179472)i, which looked at a large-scale high hazard road transportation project, which was run as part of a construction project to improve the Port of Cotonou, Benin West Africa. This project included a reconstruction of port infrastructure, construction of a new quay and an extension of an existing groyne (a type of dyke in the sea).

The project undertook a program of construction that required the transportation of a large volume of rock (approximately 360,000 tons). The rock had to be of a sufficient quality as it was intended for the construction of a groyne that would stop littoral sand movements and reduce the long-term dredging requirement at the port. Given that this was a coast developed by littoral action, the rock was not available locally due to the geology. The nearest suitable mines were around 150km inland to the north.

The location of the construction site lay at the center of the largest city in the country. The resultant route exposed the operation to a number of different situations and driving conditions. The route would have to pass right through the city with heavily loaded trucks as well as traversing a second city on the route down the country from the mining area. This obviously represented a number of challenges to the safety of both those involved in the transportation of the rock as well as third parties along the whole of the route.

The project used the Hearts and Minds tool "Driving for Excellence" developed for the Energy Institute in order to achieve the best safety and environmental performance. Unlike most driving safety tools, which concentrate upon the skills and attitudes of the drivers, Driving for Excellence also supports the entire transport process, which defines the context within which the drivers and their vehicles operate.

The project started with a number of high-level meetings between the contractor tasked with the project to build the groyne and the project management consultant (PMC) of the combined port projects, which represented the balanced interest of all parties including the client, the funding agency and the port authority. Early on it became clear that there were two overriding conditions that needed consideration. Firstly that there was a contractual obligation to operate safely and that the contractor's own intention was indeed to operate the transportation element with the utmost care. Secondly there was a contractual requirement to undertake a number of specific programs imposed by the funding agency, which were identified as being beneficial to the overall safety and health of those impacted by the rock transportation.

The early meetings indicated the need to find a working methodology that could demonstrate clearly that the risks were being managed. At these meetings the "Driving for Excellence" tool was suggested by the PMC as a starting point for what was considered by all parties to represent the greatest safety risk element of the project.

Initial discussions were based around two competing views of what would be best. The client organization, on the one hand, strongly favored the transportation of the rock using the national rail network over the use of the road network. The contractor, on the other hand, strongly favored the use of their own trained driver pool, which had just completed a large road-building project. These drivers had a recent track record of successfully operating in a road transport operation.

The discussions focused on the rate of production, the rate of supply to the construction site and the anticipated environmental conditions at the construction site. This was particularly important as the weather conditions related to the sustained wave heights, which would limit or curtail completely the ability to place stone to the groyne extension leading to demands on supply as well as limitations to available stockage space.

The PMC was of the opinion that the major effort of the transportation should not be made by rail. This was given the state of the railway, including considerations that the railway was narrow gauge rail and could only carry quite limited loads. Furthermore, the railway was in a poor condition and so was going to require a degree of upgrade before any transport could be carried out. There were also no suitable trucks for loading the crushed stone grade and that no direct rail connection was available to load neither at the mine site, nor at the port site thus still requiring road transportation and double handling. This would add to the cost and increase rather than decrease exposure.

Other than the issues related to the railway, the PMC agreed with the contractor that experience in the driver pool from a previous project represented an under-appreciated resource that had the potential to produce a significantly better outcome than would normally be expected. The contractor agreed to make use of the "Driving for Excellence" tool and set up a number of working groups amongst the drivers, the leadership teams and the supervisors.