Construction Safety Risk Mitigation
Publication: Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
Volume 135, Issue 12
Abstract
Construction safety and health management has improved significantly following the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970. In response to this legislation, contractors began implementing safety programs to reduce occupational safety and health hazards on construction sites. Researchers recently found that the current process of selecting specific elements for a safety program is informal. This paper describes the results of a recent study designed to determine the relative effectiveness of safety program elements by quantifying their individual ability to mitigate construction safety and health risks. In order to determine the effectiveness of individual safety program elements, the following research activities were performed: (1) an appropriate safety risk classification system was created using an aggregation of relevant literature; (2) highly effective safety program elements were identified in literature; and (3) the ability of each safety program element to mitigate a portion of each of the safety risk classes was quantified using the Delphi method. The results of the research indicate that the most effective safety program elements are upper management support and commitment and strategic subcontractor selection and management and the least effective elements are recordkeeping and accident analyses and emergency response planning. It is expected that the data presented in this paper can be used to strategically select elements for a safety program, target specific safety and health risks, and influence resource allocation when funds are limited.
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Acknowledgments
The writers would like to thank the 10 expert panelists for their time investment, candor, and significant contributions to this study.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
Volume 135 • Issue 12 • December 2009
Pages: 1316 - 1323
Copyright
© 2009 ASCE.
History
Received: Aug 12, 2008
Accepted: Jun 22, 2009
Published online: Jun 25, 2009
Published in print: Dec 2009
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