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Incident Management Systems

In accordance with government legislation regarding the implementation of Incident Management Systems (IMS) on all national roads, Tolcon has been involved in the development, implementation and maintenance of 10 IMS’s in various parts of the country since 1997.

Incident Management is defined as ‘the pre-planned and co-ordinated response to incidents with the aim to restoring normal road capacity and safety levels as quickly as possible’. An incident is considered to be anything that reduces the capacity of the road – mainly, but not exclusively - vehicular crashes.

An IMS consists of all relevant role players that together undertake the planning, co-ordination and management of incidents. Role players include primary emergency services (EMRS; Fire Services; SAPS; Traffic etc.) who respond to incidents, together with secondary and ancillary organisations, for example private ambulances and government departments.

Currently four different systems are being managed by Tolcon and cover a total of 1 200 km. In these areas it has been found that having an incident management system in place results in a reduction in incident duration which leads to improved safety and reduced delays at incident scenes, which in turn translates into a reduction in road user costs and a reduction in economic costs to the economy of the country.

Tolcon has the capability to assess, establish guidelines, develop policies and procedures, communication channels with all stakeholders and then implement incident management systems. The implementation phase includes training of all of personnel, organisations and services that respond to incidents.

The system is further enhanced through ongoing training, revision of procedures, debriefing following incidents and dynamic feedback into the system.