Wire (cheese cutter) barriers

[marty]

dave owned an rs250 for a whole day before he siezed it, so i doubt whether he's ever ridden alongside a cheesecutter barrier, so how valuable could his uninformed opinion be anyway?

[devnull]

A site worth looking at:

http://www.fema.ridersrights.org/cra...ier/index.html

Cheese-cutter barriers only get a small mention.
Also contains some excellent safety info for other types of barrier as well (ever looked at the 4x4 posts that hold up an armcote barrier?)

And a link to a TNZ report covering these barriers:

http://www.transportation.org/sites/...ber%202006.pdf

Lastly... a study from Sweden that makes for very interesting reading e.g. 70% of us feel less secure riding next to one of these barriers, and most of us will increase our distance from the barrier

http://epubl.ltu.se/1402-1617/2005/2...X-05233-SE.pdf

[FJRider]

Sadly, untill SOMEONE comes up with a better (cheaper) solution than the wire cutter "barriers", they will probably remain in place. Armco isn't that great to hit either. A.C.C. may get involved, if injurys could be possibly reduced in some practical way.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
No one is listening...TILL YOU FART

[Fub@r]

Sadly, untill SOMEONE comes up with a better (cheaper) solution than the wire cutter "barriers", they will probably remain in place. Armco isn't that great to hit either. A.C.C. may get involved, if injurys could be possibly reduced in some practical way.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
No one is listening...TILL YOU FART

This is the misconception. One report I read said concrete barriers were $150/m with basically no maintenance and an 80yr + lifespan, also can cost even less if done in large runs. Plus it stops all traffic

Wire was $120/m and resulted in $80/m to repair after an impact, its only effective in stopping cars and bikes but not trucks


http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/pdf/nrd.../05-0095-O.pdf

This report directly reports on crash testing using bikes vs concrete and wire. The wire fails miserably. Results are on page 11

[Max Preload]

I was on this exact section of road barely 30 minutes before this death and when I woke up in the morning (ok... afternoon... ) and saw the first Comms Alert of 8:00am, I panicked. I had been accompanying a mate to the Drury offramp as he heads off to Waiuku and I then turned back to head home. It seemed quite feasible that he might have turned back for some reason after we'd parted company. Fortunately, at least for him, it wasn't.

I've often contemplated the damage these things would do if I was to strike one and it doesn't bare thinking about. Needless to say I'm on-board with any action needed to stop further installation of these so-called "barriers". I've just emailed Allan Kirk & Campbell Live.

[Terminated]

--------------------------

[Ixion]

The BRONZ national AGM is next week. I shall be attending. We (BRONZ Auckland) had an item put on the agenda some time ago about this. I expect the discussion to be spirited. I shall be advocating strident and direct action.

The response in the past from Sir Humphrey's minions has been "Well, no motorcyclist has been injured by them so far. So what are you worried about".

I now have a counter to that argument

The most effective weapon with which to attack LTSA may be, not the existence of cheescutters themselves, but their installation.

A gentleman who knows whereof he speaks has posted (here) that the NZ installations do not follow the prescribed standard. There is supposed to be a 3 metre clear strip between road and barrier. Ours seldom have that. If they are not installed in accordance with the required standards and best practice, then arguably LTSA might be guilty of negligence, even criminal negligence.

Can anyone confirm that the site of the recent tragedy did not have that much room between barrier and road lane ?

For my part, if they were to provide a 20 foot grass strip before the barrier I would be much less worried. 20 foot is a good space to regain control or lay the bike down (one of the few instances where I would agree with that technique.)

[Fub@r]

Can anyone confirm that the site of the recent tragedy did not have that much room between barrier and road lane ?

There would be nearly 3m at the impact site, (watch the TV footage) however the rest of that stretch of motorway would be under 3m and covered in plants. So wouldn't be clear or have the minimum setback

[Mikkel]

Hmmm, it's not just the cheese cutter barriers that got my attention... even the concrete barriers are right bastards since they don't go all the way down to the surface. If you can get an arm or a leg between the bottom lip of the barrier and the road way you can get messed up badly by whatever supports the barrier is mounted on. A plastic/rubber curtain to prevent limb-support interaction would be an awesome thing.

-Sorry if this has already been pointed out.

[roadracingoldfart]

One of the strongest reasons for the rope barriers to be installed along the Paekakariki foreshore was that the emegency services can access the scene from either direction as the barrier is easily removable to allow such access.
The other reason was the amount of room between both outer edges of the road, not enough.
The road past the Police weigh station at Paramata has the same barrier installed and has been there for a number of years , but, the distance off the edge of the lane is greater there than can ever be along the foreshore.
I find it very strange that "all" the emergency services should select such a barrier system to be allowed without researching just half of what has been posted on this forum. To my reconning there is enough doubt in the system to have at least ONE of the services to say "hang on , is this the correct system" . Maybe they were just told the good stuff by a good spin doctor , or maybe they just play along to whatever Transit tells them is good and safe.
The problem with the foreshore road is that there is not enough room to allow a vehicle to avoid another in a possible head on scenario so a centre barrier is vital but i fail to see why they are popping up around the countrys roads as rampently as they are. I remember the urban motorway in Wgtn when it was built and the stupid barriers they had there were ripped out or filled with sand to make them safe , dont we learn from our mistakes anymore ???.
Concrete lane seperators are much safer , yes , i have hit one in a car and on a bike.
But driver training MUST be improved before the blood stops flowing on our roads.

[Fub@r]

If you were going to do a protest, block up Queen St and go in to the Transit offices there with evidence and/or submission. Gets the disired attention and doesn't cause too much chaos as the Council is already doing that with its Queen St upgrade

[Conquiztador]

Link to FEMA (Federation of Europena Motorcyclists Associations) info re barriers, and in particular wire barriers at the end.

http://www.fema.ridersrights.org/cra...arrier2005.PDF


Here their report re barriers:

http://www.fema.ridersrights.org/cra...ier/index.html


Hope that helps.

[Zapf]

The BRONZ national AGM is next week. I shall be attending. We (BRONZ Auckland) had an item put on the agenda some time ago about this. I expect the discussion to be spirited. I shall be advocating strident and direct action.

Can anyone confirm that the site of the recent tragedy did not have that much room between barrier and road lane ?

For my part, if they were to provide a 20 foot grass strip before the barrier I would be much less worried. 20 foot is a good space to regain control or lay the bike down (one of the few instances where I would agree with that technique.)

There would be nearly 3m at the impact site, (watch the TV footage) however the rest of that stretch of motorway would be under 3m and covered in plants. So wouldn't be clear or have the minimum setback

I can confirm in the section of the crash site, has around 2m of space between the right hand lane and the rope barrier. I haven't measured it but it is no where close to 3 meters. Also the video footage of the wire rope barrier is different to the wire rope barrier at the incident site. The barrier at the incident site was much taller and is formed of horizontal wire ropes, where as the one in the footage looks mini in comparison.

This was the crash location. Attachment can be opened in Google earth. I'll have GPS data in the near future

[Squiggles]

[QUOTE=Ixion;1257233]
The most effective weapon with which to attack LTSA may be, not the existence of cheescutters themselves, but their installation.[\QUOTE]

This is where it needs to start by stopping.

Ours seldom have that. If they are not installed in accordance with the required standards and best practice, then arguably LTSA might be guilty of negligence, even criminal negligence.

Tis very hard to wave off such a case

Dont like them at all, i doubt we will have them just removed, but stopping any further installations would be a starting point, replacement of the broken ones with normal barriers could be phased in. Fitting of extra devices (even just a sleeve) i dont expect transit will do, as much as we may wish, however if such a accident led to a negligence case i suspect something would have to be done much more quickly.

[cooneyr]

I'm not entering this thing to far for professional reasons (i'm and traffic and transportation engineer) but I have a few suggestions. I don't do road design work so not looked into this in any detail.

Look into the total economic equation i.e. costs and benefits. You need to consider the construction and maintenance costs as well as the benefits of the barriers (yes there is a value placed on life in the evaluation procedures).

If a complete case is to be put forward to TNZ you need to look at the benefits to all road users i.e. motorcyclists, cars, and trucks. You may find for example that wire rope barriers kill motorcyclists and yet trap and slow down cars and trucks where as concrete J rails are better for motorcyclists and yet bounce cars and trucks back into the traffic stream and involve other vehicle in the accident. Tough stuff to study and get info on but try your best.

Lastly if you are going to annoy people contact the Ministry of Transport, Transit New Zealand Head Office in Wellington (sorry I don't have a contact), and Transit Regional Office in your area.

I dont mean to rain on the enthusiasm, rather trying to prove insight into the thinking behind current policy/design rules.

Cheers R