If you’ve ever driven by a construction site, you will notice myriad signage up in and around it — have you ever wondered why is it so? Safety signs printing for construction sites is quite important since it serves multifaceted purposes. The primary purpose, of course, alerting the workers that are working on-site and also the visitors visiting that their surroundings can be hazardous if they are not careful about it. Making people aware of the dangers that exist on a construction site if not careful – helps in keeping them out of harm’s way. This, in turn, helps in operation continue as normal as can be on the site. Thus, the benefits of safety signs printing are two-fold of making not only people aware of the danger but also promoting a safer work environment.

Now talking about safety signs printing requirements for construction sites in the UK there are a few categories that have to be looked into before the signs are designed, dependent on the kind of information that they are trying to convey.

You can create a signboard where you can have words and iconography both and many a time having a backlit sign or one that is illuminated helps more in terms of visibility. You should ideally include a pictogram that helps in identifying the action or the hazard that you are warning about.

Workplaces of all kinds do need some sort of safety signs printing, you can take the example of fire exits and how every building needs them, but when talking about construction sites there might be a bunch of them that may be required. For example, if your construction site is the kind that requires a lot of heavy machinery then you will have to put safety sign in 5mm Foamex board that will tell the risk as well as the mandatory options that you will have to ensure that your workers adhere to. Generally, most construction sites in the UK need to get a risk assessment done, post which they are advised on what all sign will be needed for each risk that was discovered.

The next step is the categorization of the signs based on their colour coding and the instructions that come assigned with them. The various colour-coded categories are as follows:

• Red: When it comes to the colour red in safety signs printing, it is generally used to denote some kind of prohibition or danger. The regulations dictate that this should be looked upon as extremely dangerous and in case of an accident in an area with a red coloured sign the immediate reaction should be to shut down any devices and then evacuate.
• Yellow: Yellow in Foamex printing is generally looked upon as a warning sign, wherein it lets you know that you need to be careful and take precautionary measure for your safety.
• Blue: Blue coloured 3mm Foamex or 5mm Foamex signs generally denote if there is any kind of mandatory action or preventative measure that needs to be taken to be on a particular site. It could range from wearing protection gear to any kind of other behaviors that you need to make sure that you adhere to.
• Green: Green safety signs printing is done to denote what the emergency facilities or safe spots are in terms of any sort of accident. In a construction site, they would probably help in gauging what the emergency escape routes are.

As per regulations, you need to make sure that the signs are self-explanatory and clear. Since the colours and most of the symbols that are used in safety signs printing have universal homogeneity, if they are designed well, then people will have an instant reaction of recognition towards them even if they just take a glance.

Hence, once your safety assessment brings up a list of Foamex signs that will be required at your construction sides, make sure that you keep them regularly updated — you are actually legally bound to do so as well. It’s always good to a round-up at the beginning of any construction project regarding foamex signs printing and doing a run-through with your employees regarding all the safety signs that have been put up on the construction site. You need to also ensure that any new workers that join your site are made aware about the signs since you do definitely do not want an untoward incident of any kind.

Paul Petersen