JP Safety Award for Vink

Text: Havana Orange
Image: René van den Burg

The Barneveld-based company receives the award specifically for the demolition and removal, commissioned by J.P. van Eesteren, of the former offices of the European Patent Office in Rijswijk. "This took place ten meters away from the 60,000-square-meter glass facade of the new office," explains Arjan van Hamburg, Head of Safety at J.P. van Eesteren. "No window was broken. Indeed, in the 55,000 man-hour job, absenteeism was very low and only three incidents occurred."

Rauwdouwen

According to Van Hamburg, this was not a matter of luck. "In an industry that is sometimes known for 'roughing it', Vink just handles it incredibly professionally. With a serious work plan for each component, running lots of workplace inspections, regularly submitting improvement proposals ourselves as well as involving our employees in their toolboxes."

The election was conducted via nominations by J.P. van Eesteren's project managers. After extensive checks of track records and analysis of the projects, the professional jury and employees of 'JP' determined with their votes, who became the winner. "Super nice message," said Martijn de Vries, project manager at Vink. "Surely it is a token of extra appreciation for our work. We are proud of it!"

Vase

De Vries describes the demolition of the EPA office as challenging. "It was working on a postage stamp, next to a glass palace. We also used heavy equipment. With a 600-ton Terex-Demag crane with a boom length of 132 meters, it then feels like you are working next to a vase. But it all went fine. Virtually no complaints either. The new office next door was in full operation, so we had to keep the noise from our demolition work to a minimum. The only complaint we got then was that people heard our construction radio. That honestly felt like a compliment."

According to De Vries, the award is a reward for years of investing in safety awareness at Vink. "Fifteen years ago hardly anyone wore a helmet; now everyone wears one. We have our own safety expert; during each workplace inspection he always takes a different employee from the construction site with him, so that it also comes to life for the men in practice, where the safety risks are. We are now in the process of certification on the Safety Ladder for Safety in Contracting (ViA). We already meet the requirements of the Safety Ladder; it's just a matter of the administrative processing."

The Safety Ladder is one of the reasons J.P. van Eesteren created the Safety Awards. "We pay a lot of attention to safety," said Michel Hoogendoorn, Director of Project Realization. "Internally, we present the Safety Awards annually to an individual employee, a project team on a large project and a project team on a small project." With the Safest Construction Partner, we also involve our network. Last year, for example, Terberg Totaal Installaties was the winner.

Safety Ladder

Hoogendoorn: "A large part of our construction production is carried out by subcontractors. They therefore have a major impact on safety on our construction sites. Rewarding good behavior works better than punishing mistakes. Hence the award. It is also an incentive for J.P. van Eesteren to achieve level 4 on the Safety Ladder. And, also important, we take the Governance Code Safety in Construction seriously. From 2022, clients will use the Safety Culture Ladder to make the safety awareness of organizations measurable, transparent and comparable. In order to increase safety awareness as a chain, not only contractors will be required to be certified, but also the principals! This creates a joint and unified approach for the entire sector.

This award is meant as a call to do just that, if you want to continue working for us and other great construction companies. Together we are going for more safety in the chain, with the goal of making the construction site even safer for everyone."