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Having witnessed countless large scale construction projects, I’ve been fortunate to see some well organised, professional people take charge of incredibly complex project plans. At the heart of these should be safety. That includes public safety, worker safety and visitor safety from the moment the project gets underway, to the completion date when the keys are handed over. In fact, it often goes further, with maintenance contracts the well-being of employees and other people within the building and the surrounding area is an ongoing concern.

Where the less well organised people fall short tends to be in the preparation. That means preparation in terms of drawing up the appropriate blueprint for the project in advance, but also (and importantly) the demolition of existing structures, land reclamation and so on. This might mean that there is little thought for checking for hazardous substances on site, so that the appropriate action can be taken for the project to proceed. A good example would be to check whether there will be the need to find asbestos removal contractors to remove any health risks to workers that are on site later in the build. It’s not a difficult task to arrange these services, as there are some online services to accommodate the booking of the checks. For example, a construction manager in Hastings, dealing with a demolition phase can quickly get quotes and book asbestos removal in Sussex using a simple form.

It’s these simple tasks that are all too often overlooked, and can result in very serious, long term health implications. If you talk about construction site hazards, you’ll probably find that broken limbs and immediate dangers spring to mind, but the asbestos threat is a great example of how much more serious the danger can be. On the face of it, breaking an arm sounds serious, but compared to the fatal lung conditions that could result from a failure to complete a proper asbestos survey and resulting removal it’s a short term injury.

Of course, that’s not to say that keeping the public off a building site and taking sensible precautions such as scaffolding and harnesses when at height aren’t important. The point is that a fully rounded risk assessment must be completed way before the site is even prepared for the construction project to begin.

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