The latest report from the RAIB looks at an incident in September 2021 which saw an 11 year old cyclist suffer serious injuries after being hit by a tram on the East Manchester Line when attempting to cross the tramway. As usual the report goes into detail of what happened in the incident and also gives some recommendations to try and prevent similar incidents from happening again in the future.
What happened?
On Wednesday 1st September 2021 at 1925 an 11 year old boy was involved in a collision with a tram (M5000 3073) near Audenshaw when he attempted to cross the tramway and road. The tram was running westbound between Ashton-under-Lyne and Eccles with the boy using a puffin crossing which crosses both the road and tramway at the junction of Droylsden Road and Kershaw Road.
The boy was waiting at a pedestrian refuge in Droylsden Road; the positioning of this is unusual as although it is mid-carriageway users still need to be aware that traffic can approach from either direction.
The investigation concluded that the boy did not wait for the Puffin crossing to indicate it was safe to cross and when crossing was concentrating on eastbound traffic, not aware of the tram heading westbound. At this location westbound road traffic runs separately to the tramway so the boy had already crossed the westbound carriageway before attempting to cross the road further.
The RAIB also stated that an underlying factor to the incident was that the risk assessment procedures applied during the construction and opening of the East Manchester Line didn’t identify the hazard to pedestrians created by the crossing layout until the tramway construction was advanced to a point where the design couldn’t be easily altered.
Recommendations
The report makes the following recommendations:
- TfGM and Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council should review the layout of the crossing
- TfGM should review its safety management system to ensure adequate processes are in place to identify hazards and control risks at the design stage of tramway projects
- The Light Rail Safety and Standards Board review the application of road safety audits as a means to identify and mitigate hazards during tramway development and construction projects
- Keolis Amey Metrolink should review operational risk assessments covering operation of trams across the network for completeness and adequacy
- TfGM and KAM review the reliability, operation and maintenance of the sanding systems and CCTV systems on the trams (both were found not to be fully working on 3073 during the post-incident investigation)
The full RAIB report can be downloaded from the RAIB website at https://www.gov.uk/government/news/report-082022-collision-between-a-tram-and-a-cyclist-near-audenshaw-tram-stop