The European Commission set the traffic political target to halve the number of fatalities by 2010. Apart from the improvement of the vehicles safety, this will be achieved by both the improvement of the containment abilities of vehicle restraint systems and the controlled reduction of the acceleration forces to tolerable levels for the occupants.
A long term research project for the 'Enhancement of the Safety of Traffic Systems by optimizing the Effects of steel Vehicle Restraint Systems', professionally supervised and financially sponsored by

o Professorship for structural steelwork of the 'Institute for Ironworks' of the Technical University, Aachen'
o The 'Fraunhofer Institute for Laser Engineering', Aachen
o The 'Research Association for Steel Application' e.V., Düsseldorf
o The 'Foundation for Steel Application', Essen and
o VOLKMANN & ROSSBACH, Montabaur, together with the manufacturing company SPIG
resulted in the development of a new, deformable construction on shifting plates, instead of the common systems with base plates.

The new construction complies with the requirements of the 'German Road Research Institute' (BASt). It is based on the world wide used system VARIO-GUARD®, and has been adapted to the special construction conditions of bridges.
The new plate-construction cannot tip and only very little energy is transferred into the kerb of the bridge.
BRIDGE-GUARD® has a construction width of 710 mm and an overall height of 1.250 mm. Special tracks control the deflection of the system (max. 710 mm) and therefore a controlled absorption of the impact energy is achieved.
BRIDGE-GUARD® passed the crash tests TB11 and TB 81 according to EN 1317-2 with excellent results and fulfils the highest containment level H4b. BRIDGE-GUARD® is a state-of-the-art accredited vehicle restraint system on bridges.