Criticizes the Road Directorate for tunnel inspections
The Norwegian Road Inspection Authority believes that the Road Directorate has too little overview of tunnel inspections and does not take the responsibility they have seriously enough.
The audit has investigated whether the Norwegian Public Roads Administration has taken care of the safety of tunnels that have not been upgraded according to the tunnel safety regulations.
The Road Safety Authority believes it is serious that the Road Directorate lacks systematics in the work on safety in these tunnels, and are skimpy of its role regarding the requirements laid out by the regulations.
Periodic inspections shall be carried out at least every sixth year to investigate whether tunnels over 500 metres in length comply with the regulations.
The Authority points to that the Directorate does not have an overall national plan for carrying out such inspections. 87 per cent of them are indeed carried out but are not followed up, according to the audit report.
The Norwegian Road Inspection Authority found five serious nonconformities during their audit that will be followed up with the Road Directorate.
© NTB scanpix / #Norway Today
