Vehicle barriers - development of a model and standard

Vehicle barriers and bollards are widely used to control vehicle access to areas for security, safety or social reasons. Although vehicle barriers may deter the law-abiding and some criminals, many bollards and vehicle barriers can be easily overcome or even dislodged accidentally. The ability of vehicle barriers to resist a deliberate attack has not been exhaustively studied. No nationally, or internationally, acceptable standard has been developed to measure the resistance of a bollard or vehicle barrier to an attack, and hence enable barriers to be classified. Similarly, there is no method of confirming whether a barrier will achieve the required level of protection without expensive crash testing. A project has been initiated by the UK government, with its police forces, to develop a standard to classify bollards and, subsequently, other vehicle barriers, and to develop a computer based model that could be used to predict the performance of bollards under crash conditions. The aim of the project is to enable manufacturers to have their products certified, quickly and relatively cheaply, and for security advisers to be satisfied that vehicle barriers will meet the standard specified. The paper will explain the process that was undertaken in deciding the criteria used to classify bollards, the work undertaken so far, and the next stages of the project to develop a comprehensive standard and test procedure for all forms of vehicle barriers.