What does CLOCS require of a construction traffic management plan?

Under the CLOCS Standard, Version 5, the principal contractor develops, implements and maintains a Construction Traffic Management Plan with traffic guidance schemes and vehicle movement plans. Around it sit duties on vehicle routing, site access and egress, trained site access traffic marshals, gate checks and loading on site.

Demiton is not CLOCS and accredits no one. This is an independent explainer. Every duty below is read from CLOCS Standard Version 5, November 2024, read 21 October 2026.

The short answer

The principal contractor must develop, implement and maintain a Construction Traffic Management Plan that includes traffic guidance schemes and vehicle movement plans (cl 5.3(a)-(c)). The principal contractor's duties are binding only where the client's contract or a planning condition requires CLOCS. The plan adds pedestrian and cyclist movement plans where relevant, rests on independent risk assessments by qualified professionals, and follows any local traffic management requirements.

The plan is the centre of a group of duties, each with its own clause: routing, site access and egress, trained marshals, gate checks and loading. The table sets them out in order.

The duties, by clause

The plan and the roads outside the site

On live roads, Chapter 8 and the Temporary Traffic Management Guidance also apply (s 2). The CLOCS plan sets out how construction vehicles move for the project; it does not stand in for the rules that govern work on the highway itself, and a project with works on a live road needs both.

Routing is the clause that connects the plan to the street. The principal contractor must risk-assess and select the safest vehicle routes to and from site, and make every subcontractor, fleet operator and supplier aware they must use them (cl 5.6(a)-(d)). Permitted deviations, such as a temporary road closure, must be communicated clearly (cl 5.6(d)).

At the gate: access, marshals and checks

Inside the boundary the duties become physical. The principal contractor must keep site access and egress clearly marked, managed and clear of obstacles, and apply traffic management principles that minimise hazards (cl 5.8(a)-(c)). The principles the Standard names include one-way systems, avoiding reversing and left-hand turns, and separating pedestrians from vehicles.

It must also appoint competent site access traffic marshals with formal approved training that included practical experience (cl 5.9(b)). The Standard names CLOCS SATM training as one example. Marshals manage site traffic within the construction traffic management plan (cl 5.9(a)).

Then there is the check: the principal contractor must check vehicles and drivers against the CLOCS Standard by observation and frequent formal checks on a checklist, keep the records, and risk-assess and address every non-compliance at once (cl 5.9(c)-(d)). "Frequent": the Standard states no interval, so no window is recorded.

Loading and unloading

The principal contractor must load and unload on site on a stable, graded surface as far as practicable, and use an off-site area only with consent and a risk assessment (cl 5.10(a)-(b)). That is a duty about where loading and unloading happens.

What the library notes on each duty

Quoted a whole sentence at a time from the library's note on each row.

The same plan in Australia

CLOCS-A asks for a traffic management plan too. CLOCS-A is a national voluntary Standard (s 1) that binds a contractor only when the client's contract requires it (s 3), or once the contractor is accredited. Read the CLOCS-A traffic management plan chapter for clause 5.3.4 and the six monthly risk register review beside it.

What this page does not hold

It holds the six duties above. The CLOCS hub lists the rest the library holds, the delivery management system and ground conditions included. It holds no row for the local traffic management requirements the plan must follow. Read the CLOCS Standard and the highway authority's requirements for those.

• Construction logistics planWhat CLOCS Standard v5 requires of a construction logistics plan, who must keep it and when it is reviewed, each duty with its clause.
• Fleet operators and FORSWhat CLOCS Standard v5 requires of a fleet operator, how it points to FORS Silver, and the cited note on London's Direct Vision Standard.

What this page is, and is not

It is the section text this library holds for England, from The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015 (Great Britain), Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996, Part II (Construction Contracts), The Scheme for Construction Contracts (England and Wales) Regulations 1998, as amended for England, and Construction Logistics and Community Safety (CLOCS) Standard, Version 5, with the window and the consequence. It is not legal advice, and it is not a substitute for reading the Regulations, the Act, the Scheme, the CLOCS Standard and the contract you signed.

These pages explain the Standard. They do not mean Demiton checks a job against it, and the duties above are the ones the library holds, not every duty the Standard sets.

Clauses read from the obligation library, release v22, last checked against the source on 21 October 2026.