Just look at any highway construction zone and you're likely to see at least one fallen, mangled cone. While rubber cones can pop back upright after a glancing blow, a direct hit renders them unusable and unrepairable. They also are heavy and cumbersome to deploy when you have a whole stack of them, especially because sometimes they stick together, says Carcell.Īnother shortcoming with traditional rubber cones is the cost of replacement. While the ubiquitous rubber traffic cone is a vast improvement over the wooden barricade, the same challenges Scanlon's design partially overcame with respect to wooden barriers – portability, resilience, visibility and storage space – still persist, especially in emergency response operations.Ī key shortcoming for emergency responders is the amount of room a stack of cones takes up in an already-cramped ambulance or apparatus. Traffic channelizing devices are critical to making a safe space for emergency personnel to respond to a roadway incident. This is where traffic cones come back into the story. "But people don't always pay attention, which means you have to pay more attention to yourself."ĮMS workers need to be able to focus on the patient – not on roadway safety – which is why they deserve every tool at their disposal to get drivers' attention and make roadway emergency scenes more visible. When an accident occurs, it's likely at least one of the town's narrow two lanes of travel needs to be channelized to make the scene safer for EMS responders working with patients, says Carcell. The population of the town on the shores of Lake Erie, dubbed "Ohio's first summer resort," balloons in summer with tourists and a motorcycle rally. Just ask Rachel Carcell, a captain in the Geneva-on-the-Lake Fire Department in Ohio. While there is an entire genre of materials dedicated to educating the public to " move over and slow down" when emergency personnel (and road workers) are present, inattentive or speeding drivers and lack of visibility still contribute to accidents and fatalities. ![]() Law enforcement officers, tow operators, road service technicians and transportation workers accounted for an additional 39 fatalities. The important role traffic cones play in public safetyĪccording to the Emergency Responder Safety Institute, 11 fire and EMS workers were struck and killed by vehicles while working roadway incidents in 2022. But even some 80 years after Scanlon's patent, there was still room for improvement, especially in the area of public safety, where traffic cones are deployed to create a protected workspace for emergency personnel responding to roadway or roadside incidents. ![]() Scanlon's safety marker, granted a patent in 1943, was designed to return to an upright position when struck by a glancing blow.Īdvantages of Scanlon's rubber safety markers were higher visibility, resilience when struck, ease of deployment and ability to be stacked for storage. He noted that the large wooden barriers could cause hazard to automobiles that accidentally struck them. An innovative new design for traffic safety cones makes roadway incident scenes more visible while being easier to deploy.
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