4th
European Forum of Road Tunnel Safety Officers
High
Quality Meeting of Specialists in Rotterdam (The Netherlands) from 9th to 10th
March 2016
Lausanne (CH), 7
January 2016. There is a great demand of high quality knowledge exchange and
networking for Tunnel Safety Officers in Europe. The 4th European Forum of Road
Tunnel Safety Officers from 9th to 10th March 2016 in Rotterdam (The
Netherlands) opens an opportunity to learn from best practice and connect the
right people. The two-day event is organized by the ITA Committee on
Operational Safety of Underground Facilities (COSUF) in co-operation with the
World Road Association (PIARC) and the European Commission.
Registration latest
23rd February 2016
The Forum is open for
Safety Officers from all over Europe and those which are appointed according to
Directive 2004/54/EC have the chance to join the Forum free of charge. The
conference will be held in English. Prior registration is compulsory and must
indicate name, company, email address and concerned tunnel(s). Registration
should be made as soon as possible by sending the asked details not later than
23rd February 2016 to secretariat@ita-aites.org
First
programme details
For participants
arriving on 8th March 2016 an informal meeting for Tunnel Safety Officers is
organized at 19:30 hours. Registration for the Forum begins on 9th March 2016,
9:00 am. Welcome addresses and introduction starts at 9:30 am. The
presentations will have the topics
- Operating tunnels
safely during refurbishment
- Commissioning and
testing of new and refurbished tunnels
Every session with
various presenters will be introduced by a key note speaker and time for
discussion with exchange of experiences is planned. During the two days the
participants may visit job sites of Maas and Velser Tunnel, which are actually
under renovation. Registered participants will receive additional information
in order to facilitate their arrival in Rotterdam. The latest information on
the programme will be available on www.ita-cosuf.org
Platform
for Road Tunnel Safety Officers in Europe
The trans-European
road network is growing more and more. For this reason, the European Union
decided on 29th April 2004 with the Directive 2004/54/EC to create the position
of a Tunnel Safety Officer to make sure that a minimum of safety requirements
for tunnels in Europe will exist. In 2005, the first Committee on Operational
Safety of Underground Facilities (COSUF) of ITA (International Tunnelling and
Underground Space Association) was founded with 4 Activity Groups. Group 4 -
Road Tunnel Safety Officers - aims to be the platform for European Tunnel
Safety Officers to exchange experiences through its biannual forum and for
development of best practices.
The first European
Forum of Road Tunnel Safety Officers from 4th to 5th November 2009 in Lyon
(France) was co-organized by COSUF, CETU, PIARC and the European Commission.
More than 45 Safety Officers from 18 member states exchanged information,
evaluated first operational experiences and compared role and duty
interpretation of the Safety Officer. After this first event COSUF Activity
Group 4 Tunnel Safety Officers (TSO) started further action. By doing so, COSUF
acknowledges that most of the functions and tasks assigned to the Safety
Officer by the EU Tunnel Directive can only be achieved by a qualitative
approach, making exchanges between Safety Officers of paramount importance.
The second European
Forum on 18th January 2012 in Brussel (Belgium) was organized - with additional
important topics - to discuss guidelines as a complement to the Safety Officers
tasks and functions prescribed in the EU-directive. The third Forum took place
from 27th to 28th March 2014 in Luxembourg (Luxembourg) with the theme
"Tunnel Safety: a joint Effort".
Activity
Groups of COSUF
All COSUF members are
encouraged to take part in at least one Activity Group (AG). However, AG4 is
reserved for Road Tunnel Safety Officers appointed according to the EU
Directive 2004/54/EC and a few other reference members appointed by the AG4
leader. Only COSUF members can take part in the AG activities. Exceptions can
be allowed by the COSUF Steering Board (SB), e.g. to allow the participation of
experts or representatives of other organizations. AG leaders are appointed by
and report to the SB in which they also take part in the activities. Activity
Groups normally meet twice a year, if possible in conjunction with a COSUF
event (e.g. a workshop).
The main topics of
interest in Activity Group 4 are maintenance and refurbishing during operation,
role and responsibility of emergency services, degrading of tunnels and
failures, minimal operation requirements and best practices on tunnel safety
documentation. The scope of COSUF is safety and security in all kinds of tunnels
and underground facilities in operation. During the 4th Forum time will be
spent on identifying new and pressing topics.
Joining ITA COSUF is
very easy. It´s not needed to be an ITA member and for this reason COSUF
welcomes corporate and individual members.
Centre
of Excellence
ITA COSUF is the
first committee of the ITA, the International Tunnelling and Underground Space
Association, founded in 2005. It is the Centre of Excellence consisting of
approx. 80 corporate member organisations and companies from 25 countries all
over the world. The World Road Association PIARC is also supporting ITA COSUF.
Since the very first beginning COSUF is a platform for communication on
operational safety and security in underground facilities. Only the best
specialists in the field of tunnelling are discussing in four different
activity groups about the latest developments.
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