Korea Expressway Introduces Safety Management System at Highway Construction Sites

This photo provided by Asan City Government shows a highway construction site.

SEOUL, April 15 (Korea Bizwire) — The Korea Expressway Corp., which manages South Korea’s highways across the nation, said Thursday it had introduced a “safety signal light” system in which it assesses the safety level of highway construction sites once a month and visualizes the result by color.

The new system was introduced last month at 82 construction sites with a completion rate of higher than 15 percent.

The Korea Occupational Safety and Health Agency is responsible for assessing the safety of workers, including the implementation of occupational safety and health measures and risk assessment, while the Korea Authority of Land and Infrastructure Safety is in charge of assessing the establishment and implementation of safety management plans and the consistency between design and construction.

Depending on the results of the assessment, sites with a high risk of danger are indicated with red in the Korea Expressway’s internal safety management system, while normal and low-risk sites are indicated as yellow and green, respectively.

For sites indicated as red or yellow, the Korea Expressway carries out separate safety management, with a focus on removing risk factors and improving shortcomings.

“After carrying out a trial operation this year, we will strive to establish the safety signal light system as an exemplary safety management method for construction sites, and to be used even by other public institutions,” an official at the Korea Expressway said.

Lina Jang (linajang@koreabizwire.com)