With testing now underway on the West Midlands Metro extension to Edgbaston Village and set to kick-off in the coming months on the line to Wolverhampton Railway Station, the Midland Metro Alliance are starting to prepare for the handover of the lines to the operator with a new risk assessment process being adopted by the Light Rail Safety Standards Board (LRSSB).
The LRSSB’s BowTieXP software system has been used to allow a comprehensive database of assessments to be developed ahead of the opening of the extensions. Named after the shape of graphics used to illustrate its core principals it contains eight elements: hazard, top event, threats, consequences, preventive barriers, recovery barriers, escalation factors and escalation factor barriers.
Mark Ashmore, LRSSB Safety and Assurance Manager, said: “MMA is one of the first light rail constructors to adopt the BowTie approach in this way since its introduction to the sector. Over recent weeks we have organised a series of workshops for the team at the alliance to help them make the most of the approach that draws on best practice from all stakeholders involved in the project to ascertain the maturity and robustness of the MMA, TfWM, and MMLs processes in delivering the expansion projects. The workshops have also resulted in the production of initial series of Bowtie assessments and risk dashboards. By adopting the system, the alliance has been able to identify the processes and procedures it has in place for allocation of responsibilities, design, construction, testing, acceptance and handover of extension works and assets.”
The BowTie risk assessment database is one of several projects currently being developed by the LRSSB that aim to build a central resource and comprehensive framework for management and mitigation of risk.
Its hoped that the Westside extension – for which testing started earlier in April – will open to passengers in June, provided there are enough trams to run a service that is.
The jargon used in these procedures is impenetrable to ordinary people. It recalls the time when the church conducted all its services in Latin, which nobody but the priests understood. Now we have a new priesthood of experts who have created their own unintelligible language understood by none but them.