When 1,000 Deliveries a Day Can't Afford to Stop, SOSEC 200 Keeps HS2 Moving

There are big construction projects, and then there is HS2. The numbers alone are hard to grasp: 30 million cubic metres of earth moved, 81 bridges, 15 viaducts and a workforce of over 4,000 people, all working to deliver Britain’s new high-speed rail backbone. When SG were chosen to provide barrier solutions on the project, it wasn’t a decision taken lightly.

G2S, the section of joint venture EKFB responsible for a 27km stretch of the route, faced a specific and pressing problem. An internal site access road, running parallel to the earthworks haul road and intersecting 18 public roads, was handling close to 1,000 deliveries every day, alongside a relentless flow of articulated dump trucks moving soil and materials. The crossing points keeping all this moving were also the points of greatest risk.

Operatives were spending their days manually opening and closing traditional barriers in all conditions, standing alongside some of the heaviest plant machinery in the country. At a crossing point handling that volume of traffic, the margin for error is slim and the consequences of getting it wrong are serious.

The answer was the SOSEC 200, a fully solar-powered, portable vehicle access barrier that arrives on site ready to work with no mains power and no cabling. Forklift-balanced for easy repositioning and rated for up to for up to 900 openings a day, it was built for sites that don’t stop. Operatives manage access via remote fob from a safe distance, keeping full control of vehicle flow without putting themselves in the path of it. Across a 27km site with 18 intersections to manage, that combination of off-grid reliability and remote operation wasn’t a nice-to-have, it was the only solution that made practical sense.

The impact landed on two fronts simultaneously. Operatives who had spent their days exposed to extreme weather and continuous heavy traffic were no longer in that position, and the crossings themselves ran more smoothly as a result, reducing vehicle waiting times and maintaining the momentum of a construction project that simply cannot afford to lose it.

"Installing SG SOSEC barriers has significantly improved safety and efficiency on-site, enhancing operatives' and public welfare while enabling versatile deployment in any scenario." Dewet Du Plessis, Logistics Manager, G2S

HS2 is the most scrutinised construction project in the country. The contractors on it don’t take chances with equipment that might let them down, and they don’t adopt solutions that don’t demonstrably work. SOSEC 200 is on that site because it earned its place there, and that says more than we ever could.