Imagine this: A forklift driver rounds a corner, unexpectedly colliding with a pedestrian.  The resulting injuries and legal ramifications cost the company thousands, not to mention the emotional toll.

This scenario, unfortunately, is far too common.  But it’s entirely preventable. The key? A well-planned and effectively implemented Traffic or Vehicle Management Plan (TMP/VMP). Your plan will outline on-site traffic flow, potential traffic/pedestrian interactions, how to manage risk, and where people and vehicles should move around.

We get asked all the time if we create TMPs. The short answer is, no we don’t. But we can guide you through six critical steps, and put you in touch with experts along the way. When you have a plan and want to install physical controls, that’s where we can offer tailored solutions to bring your plan to life, and improve safety on your worksite.

This article answers the most pressing questions businesses have about TMPs and VMPs, guiding you through the six essential steps from initial assessment, creating plans, installing controls and ongoing maintenance.

Do you need a Vehicle Management Plan or a Traffic Management Plan?

Good question! While both plans aim to manage vehicle and people movement they are both used in different contexts. While a lot of health and safety professionals use the terms interchangeably, they are quite different.  Essentially, a TMP deals with the external environment and traffic considerations, ie public roads, while a VMP focuses on internal vehicle management practices.

If you are a contractor about to do work on a public road or about to hold an event, you will need a TMP (sometimes called a temporary traffic management plan, or TTM). The plan will set out how to manage safety risks and traffic flow around your specific site or event. It will include strategies to minimise disruption, ensure safety for vehicles, pedestrians and workers and optimise traffic movement.

On the other hand, if you’re working from a more controlled environment, like a warehouse or loading yard, a Vehicle Management Plan (VMP) is what you will need. This is more specialised, concentrating on managing vehicle and people movements to balance the safety and efficiency of your operations.

Where are you on the journey?

Let’s start at the beginning. Navigating what you need to do to create and implement a TMP/VMP can be complex. So, we’ve created a one-page journey map to guide you through six important steps:

Step 1: Risk assessment – identify possible problems
Step 2: Create your plan – make ideas official
Step 3: Get people on board – creating a safety culture
Step 4: Install physical controls (this is where Vanguard can help)
Step 5: Evaluate and refine – is your plan managing risk?
Step 6: Maintenance – keep things working as they should.

This can help you identify where you are at, what actions you need to take, and who can support you if needed. Remember, we are here to help with a free consultation and advice at all stages so give us a call anytime.

Tailoring the plan to your workplace

Let’s work through each of the six steps. This journey map is specifically set out for developing a workplace vehicle management plan. While it isn’t a one-size-fits-all process, keep in mind your objective is safety and efficiency.

Step 1: Risk assessment

The first step, and arguably the most important, is identifying potential hazards and assessing the risks.  It doesn’t need to be overly complicated. You can walk around your site with a critical eye, imagining how vehicles might interact with workers, pedestrians, and structures. Are there blind corners, narrow pathways, or areas with limited visibility where collisions could happen?  What about loading docks or high-traffic areas? What about the type of vehicles in use?  Are there pedestrians, cyclists, or other vulnerable road users present?

Once you’ve identified these potential hazards, you need to evaluate likelihood — that is, how likely an event is to occur — and severity — how serious the consequences would be.  A simple risk matrix can help here.

By identifying the problems, you can match effective solutions in your plan to manage those risks. That way, you won’t be over-engineering your controls and wasting your time or money.

Step 2: Create your plan

It is always a good idea to get a qualified person to prepare your plan (don’t worry if you don’t have someone in your company; we’ll look at who can help you in the next section). Having the right person for the job means that your plan will align with relevant legislation (such as the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015) and ensure you meet your legal and ethical responsibilities in the workplace.

The WorkSafe guide to managing worksite traffic is also a great resource.

To save money and time, choose a professional that takes a risk-based approach to ensure your plan is tailored to manage the actual risks on your worksite or project. The process usually starts with:

Comprehensive Planning and Risk Assessment

• Identifying all potential hazards (e.g., blind corners, poorly lit areas, high-traffic zones).
• Assessing the risks associated with each hazard using a risk matrix.

Stakeholder Engagement

• Involving key personnel, from senior management to front-line workers, early in the process.
• Creating a communication plan to ensure buy-in and address concerns.

Design and documentation

• Showing clear routes for pedestrians and vehicles.
• Using diagrams and one-page safety maps (like the one below) to visually communicate the plan.

Image: Example of a one-page safety map (source: Rifft Solutions)

Who to call when you need help creating your plan

Ok, so you are ready to put your plan on paper and want some professional help. Choosing the right professional depends on your site complexity and specific requirements.

While we don’t create plans for you, we’re happy to guide you through the process and suggest people who can.  A good place to start is with an online search for these types of consultants in your area:

Traffic management consultants

These experts possess in-depth knowledge of traffic management principles, legislation, and best practices. They can help you to:

• Assess risks and potential hazards within your workplace.
• Design a safe and efficient traffic management system tailored to your specific needs.
• Ensure compliance with all relevant regulations and standards.
• Integrate health and safety considerations into your plan.

Parallaxx are highly experienced and can help you with both TMPs and VMPs.

Health and safety consultants

• Identify potential hazards and assess associated risks.
• Help you develop a plan that minimises risks and ensures compliance with the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015.
• Provide guidance on best practices for risk management and accident prevention.

Andy Cook at Health and Safety 101 has a wealth of knowledge and experience in this area.

Civil or transportation engineers

For complex projects or those involving significant traffic management challenges, they can:

• Design sophisticated traffic control systems.
• Address intricate site-specific requirements.
• Ensure compliance with complex engineering standards.

If you are unsure where to start, please reach out to our team to discuss your project or workplace and recommend suitable providers based on what you need.

Bring your plan to life: from paper to practice

A vehicle management plan needs to become a living, breathing part of your workplace culture.  This means more than just posting a document; it requires a proactive approach to embedding safety into every aspect of your operations.  Here’s how you can make that happen:

Step 3. Get people on board

You can’t achieve safety without people. Help them to take ownership and make safety a shared responsibility, empowering every employee to contribute to a safe work environment by:
● Conducting training on all procedures, safety protocols, and using safety equipment.
● Clearly communicating channels for reporting hazards, near misses, and any safety concerns.

Read here for more tips on how to create a safety culture.

Step 4. Install physical controls

This is where Vanguard steps in to help you bring your plan to life. We will come onsite to review your plan, understand your operation and help you design and implement the controls needed to keep your people and assets safe.  Managing risks with physical controls is what we do best.

We will work with you to understand your operations and come up with the best fit-for-purpose solution for your site that balances safety and efficiency.

To find out more about the process we’ll guide you through here, you can read about our 5 Step Safety Design Process.

Image: Physical barriers installed to separate pedestrians from vehicles

Ensure your plan stays effective

Ok, so you have your team trained, policies and procedures are in place, physical controls are installed and everyone is making safety their business. Well done! But things don’t stop there. Regularly monitoring and maintaining your investment (steps 5 and 6) ensures you can adapt to new hazards and keep things working as they should.

Step 5: Evaluate and refine your plan

Here are a few tips to keep your workplace safe and plan up to date:
● Evaluate your plan to make sure you are addressing risk, check for new risks, and ensure new staff are trained.
● Do regular inspections, such as daily checks, weekly walkthroughs, or monthly audits, depending on your operations.
● Track key metrics to monitor critical safety indicators—near misses, accidents, violations.
● Adapt and improve by regularly reviewing and updating your plan to accommodate changes in processes, equipment, or personnel.

Step 6: Maintenance

Regularly inspecting your equipment, signs, displayed plans and other relevant controls ensures consistency and compliance. Don’t wait for an accident to realise something needs replacing. If something needs fixing, fix it. If policies need updating, it’s best to update them. If people need training, make sure they are trained. And if you are unsure of what to do, please give us a call and we can guide you.

It’s also important to check your physical controls as well. If you see any signs of barriers or bollards that have been hit and are no longer acting as a safety measure, contact our team to discuss repairs and maintenance to get your equipment performing again.

Consequences of not having a plan

If you have got this far and are thinking, But I’ve only got a small yard with a few trucks and crew, maybe I don’t need a plan. I’ll get by without one. Consider this – can you deal with the legal, reputational and ethical burden of killing or injuring another person, especially when it could have been prevented?

Take a look at WorkSafe’s site traffic guidance on how to prevent hurting others and avoid fines by adequately managing foreseeable risks. Remember, not having a management plan when a vehicle-related injury occurs on your worksite could be seen as a direct breach of your duty of care to ensure the safety of your workers and others on site.

It could also be a costly decision if operations are shut down or your insurance is denied when it is found that not having a plan contributed to the accident.

Get started with your plan

If you’ve read enough and you are ready to take action, it’s time to get in touch.

We know that creating a safe worksite requires careful planning and a commitment to safety.  Wherever you are on the traffic management journey, we are here to help guide you in your role of reducing harm for effective risk management.

While we don’t make vehicle management plans, our expert team will guide you at every step, from initial assessment through to getting the right physicla safety controls in place to bring your plan to life.

Contact us to start the conversation and let’s work together to help you create a safe and productive workplace.