How to secure your jobsite

[Al_trees]

Hi all, I thought it would be beneficial for us to discuss how we can secure our jobsite from people and pets.

What do I mean by that?

Well I was working 50ft over a sidewalk and a woman pushing a baby carriage with an infant inside it walked directly under me as I was cutting off a large limb. I had two people working on the ground (one wss off dumoing material), cones blocking the sidewalk and caution tape up around the work area. Both workers were working and not actively monitoring for people throwing caution to the wind. I always look before making a cut so was able to stop my saw just part way into the branch. Saved two lives that day.

Do you hire an extra guy in public areas to stand there and watch for incoming idiots? Most of the time one of my helpers is able to aprehend and send the occasional customer or walk in packing.

Another scenario comes to mind when I was 30ft up making a back cut on a spar leaning over a fence and my helper was on the mini working to pull it over against the back lean. Some person stopped their car, got out and came around the back of the house. This is when I saw them. As I was making the cut they waltzed in like they owned the place and proceeded to walk under the lay of the 45 foot top. I couldn't stop working because it was dangerous for me and even had to lighten some of the back weight for it to pull over. My helper screamed at them and threw them off the job site. We were in the back yard and this was some random fool who wanted us to look at a job up the street.

I suppose we could build a 12 foot wall around every jobsite but someone would just bring a ladder.

Perhaps you put up a sign saying "Do Not Enter"?

I spoke to a personal injury attorney and he seemed to think we could set up caution tape at every job and blah blah blah you should have heard the rest we cannot set up an hour worth of barriers and stuff every time we do a job and neither can you. Saying "can you afford not to?" Wouldn't be practical for what this guy suggested.

So let's hear it folks, what practical steps can we as an industry take to secure our jobsites in order to keep us and the general public safe from themselves?

P.s. Saying to pay up on your insurance and saying something like "it is just the way it is" would not be helpful to anyone.

 

[evo]

I do quite a bit of work for a local ‘Main Street association’. This involves work in city parks and street trees. The VP of mainstreet loves us and is always around, so her task is to deal with the idiots. It’s a win win, because I’m not soo nice with the idiots.

You have to have someone solely tasked for that job to be 100%, and in the event they are ignored they have a whistle or the like to shut the crew down immediately. This doesn’t mean the work crew can let their guard down.. signs cones and tape work to a degree, but it only keeps out 75% or less.

 

[southsoundtree]

Did she and baby carriage duck the tape across the sidewalk?

 

[Benjo75]

I've been searching for a solution to this problem for years. I continually have idiots enter my work zone with no regard to what's happening. We do everything we can to keep them out but we also have to work too.

I see other tree videos and work is going on as usual for the most part. Hardly any people around except the workers. There is a steady stream of onlookers, sightseers, homeowners and all kinds of people that just won't stay back and allow us to work. It may be the part of the country I'm in I don't know. But if I made a video you wouldn't be able to watch it because it would be me and the crew constantly running people out. We set up cones and tape and tell the homeowner and everyone else that they can't be around us while we're working. But it does no good.

 

[SumoClimber]

Anyone else considered(dreaming, I know) a portable electric fence? One of my friends that does show horses has a unit she sets up for temporary paddocks. Just asked, Gallagher Smart Fence. Holder and crank, 320 feet of line, can add extra posts as needed.

No counting for peoples stupidity, though. I've had people come into the enclosure I was using to sandblast building columns, despite about 6 sq feet of assorted warning signs, one of which had to be lifted to turn the doorknob.


New idea, hire a cheap chap, minimum wage. Their whole job is to keep people out of the coned and taped area. Here's their uniform. Extra points for starting the Cone Man youtube channel....

 

[BoomBitch222]

I can hardly keep some of my bozo crew members from meandering heedlessly under me when Im about to drop, let alone onlookers. But I guess Ive been lucky, no actual close calls yet. Our “foreman” I guess you could call him mostly stands and watches so that helps. Perhaps actual signs that say “Tree limbs dropping, danger, do not enter this area” so ppl know what to look for? If ppl see caution tape but nothing on the ground to avoid they probably just assume its from something not currently in progress and ignore it.

 

[Basswood]

For city work cones with the bars across to block walkways, more cones, excessive signage, more cones and a few more cones. There’s a required number of everything set by the city. We also have to place signage at the nearest cross walk to give people the chance to safely cross.

Company policy is similar but slightly less. Block off entrances, make an outer perimeter with the orange cones and an inner perimeter with the smaller yellow cones that say on them “drop zone” where limbs will be directly fallinG.

I do usually cone off the street side enough for a walkway. My thought process has been, people will still come down the sidewalk we have coned off and some will even walk through the barricades. so they at least have the option to safely walk around on our side. I’ve seen way to many people make risky decisions when they ignore the signs earlier on there path and only cross the street where our work zone is or say fuck it and walk through. I’ve noticed less of that if that option is available. I’ll try to make eye contact with anyone coming toward our job site, usually a “don’t even fuckin think about it” look

 

[Anawan]

Not having been there but going by the description, it sounds like someone on the ground should have been spotting your cuts. You didn’t describe someone on rope so I guess you were going to bomb town. That’s great you stopped your cut, of course ultimately the responsibility is yours. I don’t think the lady in the stroller pushed her way through caution tape, so sounds like you might want to start deploying that as well. Working over sidewalks, I’ve almost always used cones and signs and if it’s going to be an active dz, caution tape.

If you think there’s a reasonable or frankly even a slightly unreasonable chance someone might enter your work zone, what’s it take for someone to spend an extra 10 minutes making the work site more visible? Or an extra pair of hands? People over profits, and all that...

But then there’s the guy who walked over our tape and cones as I was felling a large tree and juuuust about done with my back cut. He pushed a couple coworkers aside that tried to stop him and went right into the fell path asking me why I was cutting down that tree. We practically had to tackle him to get him out of the dz. That was a fun one! You can’t protect everyone from their lack of intelligence.

 

[Serf Life]

I yelled at a couple about a month ago, from up in the tree, to “go around the cones”.
“Oh sorry, we didn’t know you were up there”
Yelled at another walker, but they had ear buds in.
Why the fuck did you think the sidewalk was randomly blocked off and work gear and debris around? Those damn urban pixies are at it again, dropping traffic cones all willy nilly for us to walk around.