How to create a forklift traffic management plan using data

Most warehouses have a traffic management plan. It lives in a folder somewhere, usually created when the site first opened or when someone last asked for it during an audit. The problem is that these plans are typically drawn from memory, based on assumptions about how forklifts move, and updated only when something goes wrong.

That is a plan built on guesswork. And guesswork is not a strategy when forklifts are involved.

The numbers make this clear. According to the National Safety Council, forklifts were the source of 84 work-related deaths in the United States in 2024 and over 25,000 DART cases (days away, restricted, or transferred) in 2023–2024. OSHA estimates that between 35,000 and 62,000 injuries occur every year involving powered industrial trucks. A significant proportion of these incidents happen because of poor traffic management — people and forklifts sharing space without clear separation, routes, or controls.

In Australia, SafeWork NSW's 2023 forklift safety report found that inadequate traffic management was one of the most common contributing factors in forklift incidents, alongside pedestrians being struck by forklifts and unstable loads. The report covered 1,538 forklift-related incidents recorded in NSW alone between 2017 and 2022.

A good forklift traffic management plan changes this. A great one uses data to tell you exactly where the risks are, when they peak, and what to do about them.

Why most traffic management plans fail

The typical traffic management plan is a static document. Someone walks the site, sketches the forklift routes and pedestrian paths, and marks them on a floor plan. Signs go up. Lines get painted. The plan goes into the health and safety manual.

Then reality kicks in. Shift patterns change. New racking goes in. Delivery schedules shift. Pedestrian traffic increases in areas nobody anticipated. The painted lines fade, and the plan no longer reflects what actually happens on the floor.

This gap between the documented plan and daily reality is where incidents happen. WorkSafe Victoria reported that in 2022, 142 serious injury claims involved forklifts, with pedestrians being hit accounting for 26 of those claims. Eight people died in forklift incidents in the state over the preceding four years. Their executive director of health and safety noted that too many employers were still failing to implement traffic management plans that adequately separate forklifts from pedestrians.

The fundamental issue is that traditional plans are based on how people think the site operates, not how it actually operates.

What a data-driven traffic management plan looks like

A data-driven plan starts with observation, not assumption. Instead of asking a supervisor to sketch routes from memory, you use actual movement data to map how forklifts and pedestrians interact across the site.

Computer vision AI makes this practical. By analysing footage from existing CCTV cameras, the technology continuously tracks vehicle movements, pedestrian paths, near misses, speed patterns, and exclusion zone breaches. The result is a clear, evidence-based picture of where traffic flows, where it conflicts, and where the highest risks concentrate.

This is where inviol's heatmap feature becomes particularly valuable. Rather than relying on a single walkthrough or a handful of incident reports, heatmaps aggregate thousands of data points over days and weeks. They show you the hot spots — the intersections where near misses cluster, the times of day when pedestrian-forklift interactions spike, the routes that create unnecessary conflict.

The five steps to building a data-driven plan

Step one: establish your baseline. Before changing anything, you need to understand current conditions. Computer vision AI captures this automatically — how many forklift movements per shift, where pedestrians cross forklift routes, which intersections see the most near misses, and what times of day risk peaks. This baseline becomes the benchmark against which you measure every improvement.

Step two: identify conflict zones. With heatmap data in hand, mark every point where forklift routes and pedestrian paths intersect. Pay particular attention to blind corners, loading dock approaches, racking aisles with cross-traffic, and areas near break rooms or offices where foot traffic is high. These are your priority zones for intervention.

Step three: redesign routes and controls. Armed with actual data, redesign forklift routes to eliminate unnecessary intersections with pedestrian paths. OSHA's powered industrial truck standard (29 CFR 1910.178) requires operators to observe traffic regulations, maintain safe following distances, slow down and sound the horn at cross aisles, and yield to pedestrians. The complementary materials handling standard (29 CFR 1910.176(a)) requires permanent aisles and passageways to be appropriately marked where mechanical handling equipment is used. In New Zealand, WorkSafe's managing work site traffic guidelines require PCBUs under the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 to separate pedestrians from vehicles so far as is reasonably practicable, using barriers, signage, and colour-coded zones.

Step four: implement and monitor. Roll out the redesigned plan with clear communication to all teams, then use computer vision AI to continuously monitor compliance. Are forklifts staying on designated routes? Are pedestrians using marked walkways? Are exclusion zones being respected? Continuous monitoring catches drift before it becomes dangerous.

Step five: coach, review, repeat. When the data shows breaches or emerging risk patterns, use the video evidence for coaching conversations with your team. This is not about blame — it is about reviewing real footage together and agreeing on safer approaches. Then update the plan based on what you have learned. A traffic management plan should be a living document that evolves with your operation, not a static artefact.

The data you did not know you needed

One of the most common things inviol customers discover is that their existing processes and physical layouts are creating more risk than they realised. The heatmap feature does not just show where incidents happen — it reveals patterns that are invisible to the human eye during a standard site walkthrough.

For example, a distribution centre might discover that delivery truck arrivals between 6 and 8 am coincide with the highest pedestrian traffic from shift changeovers, creating a two-hour window of significantly elevated risk at the loading dock. Adjusting delivery scheduling by even 30 minutes can dramatically reduce that conflict.

Another common discovery: forklift operators naturally develop informal shortcuts through the site that bypass marked routes. These shortcuts might save 20 seconds per trip but create uncontrolled intersections with pedestrian paths. Without continuous monitoring data, these patterns remain invisible until someone gets hurt.

This is where a data-driven traffic management plan delivers value beyond pure safety. Customers regularly find that the layout and process changes prompted by the data also improve throughput, reduce travel distances, and result in less damage to goods and machinery. What started as a safety exercise ends up delivering operational efficiency gains that show up directly on the bottom line.

Making the plan stick: why coaching matters more than compliance

Frank Bird's landmark 1969 study of 1.75 million incident reports across 297 organisations established that for every serious injury, there are roughly 10 minor injuries, 30 property-damage events, and 600 near misses. The implication is powerful: the events that precede a serious incident are happening constantly, and most of them go unreported.

A data-driven traffic management plan makes these near misses visible. Computer vision AI captures the 600-to-1 events that never make it into a traditional incident report — the pedestrian who stepped into a forklift's path and jumped back, the operator who ran a blind corner too fast but was fortunate nobody was there.

The question is what you do with that information. The most effective approach is not adding more rules or harsher penalties. It is coaching. When a supervisor can sit down with a team member, review a short video clip of a specific event with faces blurred for privacy, and have a constructive conversation about what happened and how to prevent it next time, you get lasting behaviour change. inviol customers typically see a 67% reduction in risk through this coaching-first approach.

This matters because compliance alone is not enough. OSHA's powered industrial trucks standard ranked sixth among the most frequently cited violations in 2024, with 2,248 citations and over $8 million in penalties. In Australia, Safe Work Australia's Key WHS Statistics 2025 report found that vehicle incidents accounted for 42% of all worker fatalities in 2024, with 66% of all workplace deaths involving at least one vehicle. Regulation sets the minimum standard. A coaching-first culture, supported by continuous data, raises the bar.

What to include in your plan

A comprehensive forklift traffic management plan should document designated forklift routes and approved travel directions, pedestrian-only zones and marked walkways, exclusion zones around high-risk areas such as loading docks and blind intersections, speed limits for different zones (particularly near pedestrian crossings), rules for intersections (who yields, horn requirements, mirror placement), shift-specific traffic patterns where volumes differ, visitor and contractor protocols, and the review schedule with data sources used for updates.

In New Zealand, the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 places a duty on PCBUs to eliminate risks where reasonably practicable, or minimise them through control measures. Traffic management plans are specifically cited as a required control where forklifts operate alongside workers. In Australia, SafeWork NSW's compliance campaign found that over 230 businesses required formal direction to meet their forklift safety obligations — and inadequate traffic management was a recurring theme.

Start with what you have

You do not need to overhaul your entire site overnight. inviol works with your existing CCTV infrastructure — it does not require every camera, just a selection covering your highest-risk areas. The system processes 99% of data on-premise, so there are no privacy concerns about video footage leaving the site.

Start by identifying your top three conflict zones — the areas where you suspect the highest forklift-pedestrian interaction. Let the data confirm or challenge your assumptions. Then use what you learn to update your traffic management plan with evidence instead of guesswork.

The AI safety walks feature can also complement your traffic management reviews by providing structured, data-backed site assessments that capture conditions traditional walkthroughs miss.

If you are ready to build a traffic management plan based on what actually happens on your site, book a demo and see how the heatmap and coaching tools work with your existing cameras.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a forklift traffic management plan?

A forklift traffic management plan is a documented system that defines how forklifts, other vehicles, and pedestrians move safely around a work site. It includes designated routes, speed limits, pedestrian zones, exclusion areas, intersection rules, and signage. In New Zealand, PCBUs are required under the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 to implement traffic management controls where forklifts operate near workers.

Why should a traffic management plan be data-driven?

Traditional plans are based on assumptions about how a site operates. Data-driven plans use actual movement patterns, near-miss records, and heatmap analysis to identify where risks genuinely concentrate. This reveals blind spots that walkthroughs miss — like informal forklift shortcuts or times of day when pedestrian-forklift conflicts peak.

How does computer vision AI help with forklift traffic management?

Computer vision AI analyses existing CCTV footage to continuously track forklift movements, pedestrian paths, near misses, speed violations, and exclusion zone breaches. It generates heatmaps showing where risk concentrates over time, giving safety teams evidence-based insights to redesign routes, adjust schedules, and target coaching conversations.

What regulations require a forklift traffic management plan?

In the United States, OSHA's standards 29 CFR 1910.178 and 29 CFR 1910.176(a) require traffic regulations, marked aisles, and pedestrian separation where powered industrial trucks operate. In New Zealand, the HSWA 2015 requires PCBUs to manage traffic-related risks. In Australia, work health and safety regulations and SafeWork guidance require traffic management plans wherever forklifts operate alongside pedestrians.

How often should a forklift traffic management plan be reviewed?

At minimum, review your plan annually and after any significant site change — new racking, altered delivery schedules, or changes to pedestrian routes. With continuous monitoring from computer vision AI, you can review and refine on an ongoing basis rather than waiting for scheduled audits, catching emerging risks before they become incidents.