In March I was invited to a Italian PIARC conference, discussing Temporary alternative measures for tunnel safety.

30 April 2019 expires the deadline assigned by the European Commission for safety of in road tunnels on the Trans-European Road Network. The conference focused on ways to improve safety by alternative measures, necessary in many cases due to difficulties encountered by public institutions and motorway operators in carrying out all the planned interventions. 

In late march 2019, we had a meeting in the international D.5 Road Tunnel Operations Committee, in Florence. The meeting focused on the outcomes from the 2016 - 2019 cycle and the reports and preparation of the presentations to the world road congress in Abu Dhabi in November. 

In march 2019, I invited PIARC D.5 Road Tunnel Operations Committee, Workgroup 3 Human factors and ITS, to Bergen for a final meeting before papers being presented later this year on the world congress in Abu Dhabi. The workgroup is working with a report on case studies and recommendations on provisions for persons of reduced mobility and a technology watch on Intelligent Transports Systems (ITS). 

New energy carriers (also known as NEC) for road transport, such as battery electric cars, and fuel cell cars, entail new risks for the safety of tunnels and underground parking lots. In order to get an idea of the magnitude of these risks are and how they can be controlled, research is needed, preferably in a European context. That is the most important outcome of the two-day international Workshop on NEC in Road Tunnels that took place in Utrecht on 20 and 21 and was organized by KPT, ITA-COSUF and PIARC.