Our monthly risk reduction series explores how geofencing technology can help mitigate specific risks in the railway industry, offering practical insights and strategies for creating safer and more efficient work environments. In this edition, we explore how geofencing can help reduce the risk of vehicles entering exclusion zones.
The challenge around exclusion zones on worksites
Exclusion zones play a vital role in protecting both people and infrastructure during railway maintenance and upgrades. They are used to prevent access to specific areas, such as:
- Sets of points
- Live electrical zones
- Protected ecology
Despite clear briefs and physical markers, busy worksites, poor visibility, unfamiliar layouts, and changing conditions mean that teams can unintentionally stray into exclusion areas, leading to incidents such as points run-throughs, environmental damage, or harm to workers.
Traditional methods do not always provide the real-time visibility needed to detect unsafe movements before they escalate. This is where geofencing can offer an advantage.
Enhancing visibility and control with geofencing
Geofencing gives Engineering Supervisors (ESs) unprecedented visibility of asset movements in high-risk areas. By creating virtual boundaries around hazards or exclusion zones, the technology monitors how close vehicles are to these zones and provides instant alerts the moment they cross the boundary.
Using Tended’s Alert Zones feature, worksites can be mapped into three levels:
Safe zones (green): Areas within the possession, worksite, or planned boundaries where assets can operate freely
Warning zones (amber): Buffer areas that provide stopping distance ahead of a hazard. When entered, they trigger early alerts
Danger zones (red): The immediate hazard area. Entering this zone produces a critical alert.
When a Tended device is attached to a vehicle moving between these zones, the Dashboard’s RAG view reflects the event instantly, giving the ES a live, colour-coded status update and the ability to respond quickly.
Reducing the risk of points run-throughs
Points run-throughs are among the most costly vehicle-related incidents on the railway. According to the Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB), each incident costs approximately £250,000* due to infrastructure repairs, train delays, and engineering work disruptions.
Geofencing significantly reduces this risk by providing early warning signs:
- Danger zones are mapped around the points, marking them as red zones
- Warning zones (amber) are drawn on either side, giving the stopping distance needed for early warning and safe braking
- If a device enters the amber or red zone, the system gives an immediate alert, allowing the ES to instruct the driver to stop or adjust course
- A device inside the cab also alerts, directly notifying the driver of their proximity to the points
This early warning capability enables the ES and/or driver to intervene before a points run-through occurs, helping prevent service disruption, infrastructure damage, and costly investigations.
Watch the video with our customer Siemens, which demonstrates this capability:
Maintaining a safe distance from hazardous or protected areas
Exclusion zones are not limited to just engineering hazards. They also help protect environmentally sensitive sites and ensure compliance with ecological regulations (as demonstrated by our customer
Examples include:
- Biodiversity areas, such as habitats under protection
- Vegetation zones, including Japanese knotweed
By drawing virtual boundaries around these zones:
- Drivers receive notifications when approaching restricted areas
- ESs can see if any vehicles or machinery enters a warning or danger zone
- Teams can take immediate corrective action, preventing accidental disturbance
This supports environmental protection and reduces the risk of damaging restricted or ecologically sensitive sites, which can lead to delays and costly investigations.
Enhanced exclusion zone management with geofencing
Geofencing acts as a powerful tool to help teams identify unsafe events before they escalate. Whether reducing the risk of a vehicle running through a set of points or entering protected ecological zones, geofence zones and real-time visibility on the Dashboard help teams operate safely and efficiently. With geofencing, exclusion zone management becomes proactive, creating a safer, more efficient worksite for everyone.
*The 2023 Independent Review of Geofencing is available from the Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB)
