§ Lord Fearnasked Her Majesty's Government:
What inspections are made of road tunnels in England and Wales; and how frequently they are carried out. [HL4038]
§ The Minister of State, Department for Transport, Local Government and the Regions (Lord Falconer of Thoroton)In England, a standard for the inspection of road tunnels, BD 53, was published by the Highways Agency in 1995. This standard describes the procedures to be carried out for the inspection and reported condition of road tunnels on motorways and trunk roads. Standard BD 53 includes the following mandatory schedule of inspections:
Superficial Inspections: carried out on an ongoing basis to identify any obvious deficiencies that could lead to accidents;
General Inspection: every two years for the tunnel structure and annually for the mechanical and eletrical functions;
Principal Inspections: every six years (but exceptionally up to 10 years) for the tunnel structure and every three years (but exceptionally up to five years) for the mechanical and electrical functions.
182WAThe application of BD 53 to other road tunnels is a matter for individual tunnel authorities. The inspection of road tunnels in Wales is a matter for the National Assembly for Wales.
§ Lord Fearnasked Her Majesty's Government:
What inspections are made of rail tunnels in England and Wales; and how frequently they are carried out. [HL4039]
§ Lord Falconer of ThorotonRailtrack advises that rail tunnels in England and Wales are visually inspected annually by a chartered engineer.
§ Lord Fearnasked Her Majesty's Government:
What inspections have been carried out on the Kingsway and Queensway tunnels under the River Mersey in the years 2000, 2001 and 2002 to date; and what were the results. [HL4040]
§ Lord Falconer of ThorotonTwo independent external inspections have taken place on each tunnel in the last three years. For both tunnels, the first of these inspections took place in February 2000 and the second took place in February 2002. The inspections were carried out by a consortium of European motoring organisations.
The results on both occasions were:
Kingsway Tunnel—Good
Queensway Tunnel—Acceptable
In addition, monitoring of conditions and equipment in the tunnels takes place on a continuous basis.
§ Lord Fearnasked Her Majesty's Government:
How many tunnels in England (road and rail) are specifically fitted with fire precautions; and how many are not so fitted. [HL4041]
§ Lord Falconer of ThorotonThere is no central record of the fire precautions taken by each of the tunnel authorities. A range of safety measures are adopted as appropriate for the particular tunnel, its length, location and traffic.
Dissemination of good practice in relation to safety and operational management of road tunnels is provided through a twice-yearly UK Tunnel Operators' Forum for road tunnel operators in the UK and Ireland and through a published standard, BD 53/95, for tunnels records and inspections.
The department does not hold information on the number of rail tunnels fitted, or not fitted, with fire precautions.