Vehicle fleet safety manager

It is the responsibility of the vehicle fleet safety manager to ensure that the following rules are followed ... 

Fleet safety is often viewed as operator safety, which is definitely a key component of a company s attempt to protect its large dollar investment in vehicles and mobile equipment. It goes without saying that many of the accidents that occur are a direct result of driver error. But driver error is not the fault of the individual. It is the fault of management s failure to institute a fleet safety program that provides organization, direction, and accountability for the fleet of vehicles that the company owns. 

Management experiences large numbers of repairs to the vehicles in its fleet. This should be viewed as an indication of inadequate maintenance and inspection procedures, and an indication of potential unsafe vehicles, which could facilitate or cause accidents. The scheduling of periodic inspections and maintenance activities should be part of management s fleet safety program. Management should maintain a record on each vehicle regarding repairs, inspections, and maintenance. 

PTWs are becoming an important component of the transport system and represent in some cities up to 30% of the motor vehicle fleet [ACE 13], They present both assets for mobility, and also challenges in terms of traffic management and safety. However, only a few countries have in place a national transport strategy for PTWs (e.g. [DFT 05, VIC 08]), though several measures may be taken at the local level. 

In a small fleet organization, a vehicle operator is just as responsible for controlling and preventing accidents as the manager of a large fleet. Vehicle accidents can be especially detrimental to a small fleet because they can be costly. In an effort to prevent accidents, small fleet managers must implement each part of a successful motor fleet safety program. 

Small fleet managers should always set their goals high. In fact, small fleet managers should set their performance to match the performance of a large vehicle fleet with a full-time safety... 

While this does seem to be a comprehensive suite of risk control measures, the real reason for the problem emerged during a potential human error audit and safety management system review which was being rmdertaken at the mine - not one of the 150+ vehicles in the undergrotmd fleet at the mine was fitted with a speedometer. 

Measurement of performance. Quality Management requires that measures of performance be established for every activity. These measures include end-of-pipe measurement, such as amounts of material released into the environment or injury rates, and in-process measures of how efficiently you are managing, such as time to review safety improvement proposals or total resources expended on PSM. Each team should be required to identify potential performance measures for the processes they are developing and the activities these processes manage. Many of the end-of-pipe measures will already exist these should be critically examined to ensure that they truly measure performance and are not unduly influenced by other factors. For example, the number of accidents in a fleet of road vehicles is almost directly dependent on the number of miles driven with no improvement in performance, a reduction in miles driven would reduce the number of accidents. 

Small motor fleet companies should incorporate complete applications, screening, background checks, physical examinations, and testing into the driver selection process. There is less room for error in a small fleet than in larger ones. Every effort should be made to obtain good drivers who hold safety as a number one priority. The steps just outlined should help small fleet managers select highly qualified individuals to operate their motor vehicles. 

Rail Operations is a small unit who oversee the operating of Railtest s fleet of locomotives and other vehicles. It provides the operating inter ce with Railtrack and will have a key part to play in satisfying the needs of the Railway Safety Case. Rail Operations also manage the Old Dalby Test Track, a 21Km railway line which runs from Nottingham to Melton Mowbray. 

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