Cedric Stephens | Insurance protection against roadwork mishaps

QUESTION: A lot of road construction is now taking place. Most of it is happening in Kingston, St Andrew, and St Catherine. Reports suggest that more projects are planned for other areas. These activities are said to be disrupting the flow of traffic, having negative impacts on some businesses, and causing other problems. Road construction also creates hazards for motorists and pedestrians. From what I have seen, little is being done to prevent motor vehicle accidents at these sites especially at nights. Are there any safety standards that contractors must comply with which? Do they carry insurance to protect them in case something was to go wrong?

- M. W., Kingston 19.

INSURANCE HELPLINE: Thanks for your timely and intriguing questions. Big road projects like those you describe are generally handled by private contractors. They do so under contracts on behalf of the government. The supervising agency is the National Works Agency (NWA).

Persons in my small network I have a Twitter account unlike the Bank of Jamaica but don't have any followers because I don't use it have added their voices to the debate about these infrastructure projects. Is it wise to undertake them all at the same time? Is the disruption worth it?

Absent from these conversations is the inability to connect these projects to the government's plan to stimulate growth in the economy.

Three Jamaicans died recently in incidents in Florida and Italy. In one case, a man who worked with a company that was involved in the construction of a pedestrian bridge was killed. The bridge crossed an eight-lane highway in Miami. The structure collapsed shortly after it had been installed. In the other case, a 656-foot section of an Italian bridge linking Genoa to a motorway in France collapsed.

That event, which occurred last month, took place while work was being done to shore up its foundation. Forty-three persons, most of them motorists, were killed. Two had Jamaican roots.

These cases add strength to your argument. Local road projects are laden with risks to motorists. Unless risk management forms part of the process of construction, bad things are likely to occur.

I wrote to an NWA official to find out about the precautions and standards that contractors, and subcontractors, must comply with in order to protect members of the public and motorists in relation to the extensive roadwork that is being carried out. These are things that are usually set out in the contracts, which are monitored by the agency. No response was available when this article went to press.

Other sources offer information about some of the things that can go wrong at road-construction sites. US personal injury law firm Edgar Snyder & Associates says: "construction sites can become just as dangerous as bad roads. If a sign or cone is misplaced, drivers may not know how to safely navigate the construction. Debris can also pose a threat by littering the roadway, making it just as risky as the damaged street. Misplaced barrels and poor lighting can make a routine drive dangerous. If these zones are not kept safe, they can cause accidents."

For example, some motorists seem unaware that braking distances are likely to increase on unasphalted sections of road surfaces, hence the need for slower speeds. The JUTC bus that I saw barrelling down Constant Spring Road towards Mary Brown's Corner in Kingston on Thursday afternoon was oblivious of the fact that he or she was driving in a construction zone.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that the two largest hazards in construction zones are the passing of motor vehicle traffic on the outside of the zone that collide with equipment or other vehicles during the movement of construction vehicles and equipment within the work zone. The Federal Highway Administration estimates that one driver or construction worker is killed every 14 minutes in work-construction zones in the United States.

Even though I am not a lawyer, commonsense tells me that there are many situations where a road-construction contractor or subcontractor can be held legally liable for a work-zone accident. These can occur when a contractor negligently sets up a work site or when construction equipment, owned or hired, causes the accident. An accident could also be caused by the negligent action of employees.

Specific examples include:

- The improper placing of warning signs for motorists and pedestrians;

- Creating confusion for motorists by not clearly stating which lanes are open for them to use;

- Using inadequate warning lights on construction vehicles and equipment that fail to warn drivers of their presence at night;

- Affecting motorists' vision with excessive or improperly placed lighting;

- Creating dangerous roadway hazards by failing to maintain the construction site; and

- Failing to provide clear and legible detour directions for motorists to avoid the construction sites.

What is negligence? It's the "failure to exercise that degree of care which a person of ordinary prudence (a reasonable person) would exercise under the same circumstances. It also refers to conduct that falls below the standard established by law for the protection of others against unreasonable risk of harm".

Contractors are usually required under the terms of their contracts to buy, among other things, third party or public liability insurance to cover "their legal liability to pay damages to others" for amounts not less than those specified in the contract. The insured amounts can run into tens or hundreds of millions of dollars given the many things that can, and do, go wrong.

These types of insurances are very complex. They require detailed vetting by specialists before the contracts are signed to ensure that they are worth the paper on which they are written.

- Cedric E. Stephens provides independent information and advice about the management of risks and insurance. For free information or counsel, write to: aegis@flowja.com