High Containment Parapets

The latest drafted road safety regulations call for the use of high containment guardrails to be taken into serious consideration in order to prevent heavy goods vehicles from leaving the carriageway as a result of collisions or driver error. The type of Guardrail that is able to offer effective high performance levels required for containing heavy goods vehicles are commonly regarded as "New Jersey" made from concrete.  Due to the particular and exclusive profile the "New Jersey" is capable of deflecting even the heaviest of vehicles thereby preventing them from leaving the carriageway.

• H3 Central Reserve - View Spec
• H4A-H4B - View Spec

Taking the original profile of the concrete barriers, SISTEMA redeveloped the same barrier from steel, producing the units in standard 6m and 3m lengths. By using various computer simulation techniques SISTEMA discovered a simple and cost effective method of linking these units together and adopted a more efficient system of fixing the barriers to the structure.

This new type of barrier satisfies the requirement of reducing static load to the external edges of bridges but still offers suitable containment to heavier vehicles.

The linear metre weight of this steel barrier of 140kg/m, which is approximately one sixth of the weight of an equivalent concrete barrier, means it is no longer a necessity to structurally reinforce existing structures for the application of a high containment safety barrier since the Steelgard imparts relatively small forces to the edge beam.

Analyses show the numerous obvious cost advantages available by adopting the Steelgard barrier to not only existing structures, but also new-build, which includes the simple maintenance to the barrier.