A haul road inspection checklist is a structured drive and walk of the active road network that checks the running surface, windrows, width, grades, intersections, signage, lighting, drainage, dust and the points where light vehicles and people meet heavy equipment, and records who must fix what before the next shift. The complete checklist is below, grouped by section, with what good looks like and when to escalate for every check.
This guide covers what Queensland coal law and Recognised Standard 19 expect of a mine road inspection, the numbers worth carrying in your head, the full checklist, and the ways road inspections fail in practice. Quarry and metalliferous operators can run the same checks against their own road specification.
Why haul road inspections matter
Roads change every shift. Graders cut windrows down, rain softens the pavement, spillage builds up on corners. The road signed off at the start of the week is not the road trucks are running on today.
The consequences are severe. Recognised Standard 19 opens by noting that a large percentage of high potential incidents and serious accidents reported by surface coal mines relate to vehicle interaction and uncontrolled vehicle movement, and that road design and construction has in some cases been a causal factor.
What the law and RS19 require
In Queensland coal, the Coal Mining Safety and Health Regulation 2017 sets the obligations. The ones that shape a road inspection are:
- Section 102A requires a surface mine to have principal hazard management plans that provide for, at least, roads or other vehicle operating areas.
- Section 128 requires the safety and health management system to include a road design and construction specification, developed through formal risk assessment, covering barriers, curvature, grade, guideposts, pavement shape, safety berms, signs, surface material and width. It must control road edges with a vertical drop of more than 0.5 metres, and a primary haul road regularly used for two-way traffic must be at least 3.5 times the width of the largest vehicle regularly using it.
- Section 129 requires a standard operating procedure for maintaining and watering mine roads, including dealing with hazards caused by excessive watering.
- Sections 76 and 144 require the mobile plant procedure to minimise light and heavy vehicle interaction risk, and require adequate lighting having regard to shadow, contrast and glare.
- Sections 106 and 141 set out the open cut examiner’s inspection and the mine’s safety inspection procedure, including making the results, hazards and corrective actions available to workers.
Recognised Standard 19: Design and construction of mine roads is the current edition, dated August 2019. Section 21 is explicit. Surface mines shall conduct a documented compliance audit of their mine roads at least once every twelve months, considering day and night operations, with periodic checks of height clearances and culverts. Daily inspections of active haul roads, including intersections, are to be carried out by competent persons such as open cut examiners and supervisors.
A recognised standard is not the regulation. As the Queensland recognised standards register explains, it states a way of achieving an acceptable level of risk; an operator can manage the risk another way but must be able to show that the method is at least equivalent. For the full standard, read our guide to RS19 mine road design and construction, and for how road inspections sit alongside every other statutory inspection, the guide to mine site inspections in Australia. Current alerts and guidance are published by Resources Safety and Health Queensland.
The numbers to carry into the inspection
Most of a haul road condition assessment is judgement. A handful of checks are not, and the inspector should know the figures for the largest vehicle on each road.
Windrow height against tyre size
RS19 sets the minimum height of an earthen safety berm by the tyre diameter of the largest vehicle regularly using the road. A standard trapezoidal berm shall be at least 50 per cent of that tyre diameter. A standard triangular berm shall be at least 66 per cent. For a truck on 3.5 metre tyres, that is at least 1.75 metres for a trapezoidal windrow and about 2.3 metres for a triangular one. Drainage breakthroughs should be no wider than 1 metre and angled away from the direction of travel. A windrow inspection should measure height against these figures, not estimate it by eye. The detail sits in mine road safety berm requirements.
Road width against vehicle width
RS19 calls for 1.5 times the vehicle operating width on a single lane road and 3.5 times on a double lane road, measured on the usable running pavement clear of guideposts, drains and berms. A truck with a 7 metre operating width needs about 24.5 metres of clear pavement for two-way running. Where it cannot be achieved, RS19 expects a risk assessment and controls such as give way rules or speed limits.
Edges, delineation and intersections
A berm or other barrier is expected where there is a vertical drop of more than 0.5 metres or a shoulder steeper than 1 vertical to 4 horizontal. Delineators on straights should be no more than 100 metres apart, closing to 50 metres or less on tight curves and crests, with haul road guideposts between 1.5 and 2.4 metres high. Median berms inside intersections should be no more than 1.2 metres high so they do not restrict sight distance, which RS19 measures from the eye height of the lowest vehicle using the road, 1.5 metres for a light vehicle. Grade limits are covered in haul road grades and ramps under RS19, and intersection layout in mine road intersection design.
How to run a haul road inspection
Drive it in the direction trucks travel, and stop to walk tip heads, ramp tops and bottoms, intersections and anywhere people get out of vehicles.
Inspect at night as well as by day. Lighting, reflectors, glare and truck visibility can only be judged in the dark.
Start from the last report and check whether its defects were fixed. For the open cut examiner this is a legal step: section 106 of the regulation requires the examiner to read the latest examiner’s report in the mine record, and acknowledge in writing that they have read it, before inspecting.
Tie every defect to a place and a person: a location, a photo, the action, its owner and a due time.
The haul road inspection checklist
Use this as the base for your site’s own form. Replace generic triggers with figures from your road specification, and record the largest vehicle and its tyre diameter for each road at the top.
Section A: Running surface
| Check | What good looks like | Escalate if |
|---|---|---|
| Potholes, ruts and corrugations | Smooth, firm running surface | Defects causing trucks to slow, swerve or jolt |
| Soft or wet pavement | Firm under loaded trucks | Pumping, bogging or rutting under load |
| Slipperiness after watering or rain | Surface damp, not slick | Over-watering, pooled water or loss of traction reported |
| Spillage and rocks on the road | Road clear of spilled material | Rocks large enough to damage a tyre or deflect a vehicle |
| Crossfall and camber | Water shedding to the edges | Water sitting on the running surface |
| Superelevation on curves | Built to the specification | Adverse crossfall on a curve |
Section B: Windrows and edges
| Check | What good looks like | Escalate if |
|---|---|---|
| Windrow height | At least the design height for the largest vehicle’s tyre | Below design height anywhere a drop exceeds 0.5 metres |
| Windrow continuity | Continuous, no unplanned gaps | Gaps, graded out sections or breaches at a drop |
| Windrow condition | Compacted, not eroded or slumped | Scalped, eroded, undercut or pushed out by plant |
| Drainage breakthroughs | No wider than 1 metre, angled away from travel | Wide or square cuts a wheel could enter |
| Road edge and shoulder | Stable, protected where required | Unprotected drop or shoulder steeper than 1V to 4H |
| Median berms | Intact, keep left signs at each end | Damaged, or higher than 1.2 metres inside an intersection |
Section C: Width, grades and geometry
| Check | What good looks like | Escalate if |
|---|---|---|
| Running width | At least 3.5 times the largest vehicle’s operating width on two-way roads | Narrowed by windrow creep, stockpiles or parked plant |
| Single lane sections | Signed, with give way or passing rules | Unsigned narrow section or no passing control |
| Ramp grade | Within the site’s design grade | Steeper than design or grade changes near an intersection |
| Flat areas at ramp tops and bottoms | Level stopping area as designed | Trucks stopping or queuing on grade |
| Overhead clearance | Clearance signs in place, no surface build up | Road surface raised under power lines or structures |
Section D: Intersections and sight lines
| Check | What good looks like | Escalate if |
|---|---|---|
| Sight distance on approach | Clear view from light vehicle eye height | View blocked by berms, stockpiles, batters or parked plant |
| Priority and stop control | Signs match the site traffic rules | Missing, damaged or contradictory signs |
| Intersection grade | As flat as practicable | Vehicles must stop and start on grade |
| Channelling berms | Guide vehicles on the correct path | Vehicles cutting corners or crossing the median |
| New or temporary intersections | Assessed before opening | Opened without assessment, signs or lighting |
Section E: Signage, delineation and lighting
| Check | What good looks like | Escalate if |
|---|---|---|
| Speed and warning signs | Present, clean, readable from the cab | Missing, knocked over or covered in dust |
| Delineators and guideposts | Correct spacing and height, reflectors clean | Gaps on curves or crests, reflectors missing or dirty |
| Chevrons on tight curves | At least three, aligned to approaching traffic | Missing or turned the wrong way |
| Intersection lighting | Adequate, no blinding glare | Lights out, or lighting plants dazzling operators |
| Lighting at pedestrian areas | People visible at night | Dark areas where people get out of vehicles |
Section F: Drainage, dust and roadside hazards
| Check | What good looks like | Escalate if |
|---|---|---|
| Table drains | Clear, carrying water away from the road | Blocked, scoured or ponding against the pavement |
| Culverts and floodways | Sound, inlets and outlets clear, depth markers where required | Collapsed, scoured or overtopping |
| Dust | Visibility maintained along the whole road | Dust reducing visibility between vehicles |
| Roadside collision hazards | Rocks, mounds and drains removed or behind a berm | Unprotected crash or rollover hazards beside the road |
Section G: Vehicle and pedestrian interaction points
| Check | What good looks like | Escalate if |
|---|---|---|
| Light vehicle and heavy vehicle separation | Separate roads or controlled crossing points where practicable | Light vehicles using haul routes with no control |
| Parking and go lines | Clear of haul routes, signed | Vehicles parked in the path of haul trucks |
| Pedestrian crossings | Signed, lit and used | People walking on haul roads or crossing blind |
| Work on or beside the road | Barricaded, signed and communicated | Graders, water carts or crews working without controls |
| Open defects from last inspection | Closed or controlled | Carried over with no action or owner |
Where a check reaches its escalation point, record the location, a photo, the immediate control and the person responsible. Link the response to your road trigger levels: the TARP for mine roads and vehicle interaction shows how road conditions map to escalating responses. For dust controls, see RS20 dust control at surface mines.
Where haul road inspections go wrong
Ticking “windrows OK” without a number. A tick records an opinion. A measured height against design records a fact, and catches the slow loss of height from repeated grading.
Inspecting the network as one item. A single “haul roads” line hides which road, ramp or intersection. Defects need a location.
Daylight only. Lighting failures, glare and invisible delineators are night problems that a daytime program never finds.
Findings that never leave the form. If the soft patch on the ramp lives on paper in the examiner’s vehicle, it does not exist for the grader operator or the next shift. The same trap, a checklist that looks complete but controls nothing, is covered in why general checklists create a false sense of safety.
Treating the road and the vehicle separately. Worn brakes on a steep wet ramp is one risk, not two. Road checks should sit alongside the pre-start inspection requirements for mobile plant, and roads to the dump alongside the dump inspection checklist.
Getting road defects off the form and onto the map
The real problem with road inspections is not the checklist. It is that a defect found at 5am on the south ramp has to reach the grader operator, the shift supervisor and the next examiner, in a form that tells them exactly where it is and whether it has been fixed.
In HazView, the road inspection can be pinned to its location on the mine map, or attached to a specific road hazard, so a low windrow or blocked culvert appears where it is for every role. An “escalate” answer can open a follow-up section asking for a photo, the immediate control and the owner, and a TARP level can be carried in the answer options so the response comes out of the inspection itself. The inspection works offline on the road and syncs when back in reception, the examiner signs off and a countersignature can be nominated by role, and a PDF record can be emailed on submit. The site’s existing road form is converted like for like first. See how this works for open cut examiners using HazView, or book a demo to walk a road inspection on your own map.
Related guides
- Mine Site Inspections in Australia: What the Law Requires, What to Check and What a Defensible Record Looks Like
- Isolation Verification Checklist for Mines and Quarries
- Quarry Inspection App: What a Quarry Actually Needs
- Critical Control Verification Checklists That Prove the Control Works
- All Inspections & Checklists guides
Frequently asked questions
How often should haul roads be inspected?
RS19 expects daily inspections of active haul roads, including intersections, by competent persons such as open cut examiners and supervisors, plus a documented compliance audit of the road network at least once every twelve months covering day and night operations. Your safety and health management system may require more, for example after heavy rain.
How high should a haul road windrow be?
Under RS19, a standard trapezoidal safety berm must be at least 50 per cent of the tyre diameter of the largest vehicle regularly using the road, and a standard triangular berm at least 66 per cent. Your road specification may set higher figures.
Does RS19 apply to quarries?
RS19 is made under the Coal Mining Safety and Health Act 1999 and applies to mine roads at surface coal mines in Queensland, including the surface areas of underground coal mines. Quarries and metalliferous mines are not bound by it, but their own duty to manage road risk remains, and RS19’s figures are a practical benchmark for their road specification.
Who should do the haul road inspection?
A competent person. RS19 names open cut examiners and supervisors as examples, and the inspection should link to the examiner’s statutory inspection and the mine’s safety inspection procedure under sections 106 and 141 of the regulation.