Who is responsible for putting up the construction site signage?

At a construction site on or next to a public road, it is rarely unclear who puts up the signs, but it is unclear who is liable if something is incorrect. The answer is simple: whoever is carrying out the works.

The contractor is liable

The person or company carrying out the works is liable for ensuring that the signage is correctly installed. This does not change depending on who physically puts the signs up. If you put them up yourself (whether as a private individual, a contractor or a construction company), you are personally responsible for ensuring they are correct. If you have them installed by a specialist firm, you, as the project manager, remain responsible for the overall project, but the actual installation is carried out by someone who does this on a daily basis.

Before work begins

If the works are on a larger scale, or if they encroach on part of the footpath, cycle path or carriageway, you must put up the traffic signs before the works begin, specifically the signs listed in the signage plan . The plan is not just a formality to be completed after the event: it sets out which signs go where and also serves as your basis for accountability should anything go wrong.

What if the road signs are incorrect?

In practice, there are two consequences that you see most often:

• The police will not tow away illegally parked vehicles if the parking signs are not correctly positioned or do not meet the legal requirements. Your construction site or move will then be held up whilst the car remains parked there.
• The police may order the works to be halted until the correct signage is in place.

On top of that, you risk being fined with a municipal administrative fine; you can read what that actually means in our article on the municipal administrative fine.

The notification is part of your responsibility

Once you have put up the parking signs and the construction site signage, you must forward the photos and the number plates of the cars that were already there to the municipality and the police. If you do not do this, there will be no evidence and the right to have the vehicles towed away will lapse. You can find out how to do this in Installing parking signs yourself.

Material that complies with the standard

Correct installation starts with the right materials: worn or non-reflective signs are not acceptable, even if they are in the right place. The exact requirements of the standard are set out in our article on the SB250. All our hire equipment complies with it.