Conventional portable barrier elements include the well-known traffic cones. While these are most often used to close lanes on dual carriageway roads for repair purposes, they are also used by the police to, for example,"cone off a traffic-free zone at the scene of a road traffic accident or in other situations where temporary closure is required; they are also used for other traffic control purposes including reservation of parking spaces in a car park.

However, while a relatively large number of cones may be needed to isolate a particular area, it is generally sufficient to remove only one or a few cones to allow access and to defeat their intended purpose.

It is an object of the present invention to provide traffic barrier elements which are more effective than conventional traffic cones.

According to one aspect of the invention, a traffic barrier element comprises a body member having a flexible outer covering defining a housing containing a resilient support material, the body member including means for engagement with the ground in use.

The body member is preferably of elongate form so that it can be placed for example across the entrance to a parking space, or two or more barrier elements may be placed end to end to delimit a larger space. The faces of the body member are preferably sloping and the maximum height is such that a vehicle could if necessary drive over the barrier element, especially since the resilient support material renders the element compressible, although in appearance the element is intended to present a real impediment to being over-driven. The faces may carry indicia such as the words NO PARKING but for use by the emergency services or motorists'organisation the indicia may comprise direction arrows,"no entry" symbols and the like. The faces may comprise fold-down flaps to enable different indicia to be displayed. The body member may be trapezoidal in cross section but is preferably triangular. The resilient support material is preferably a foamed plastics material, which may be formed from sheets of such material suitably cut to shape and glued or otherwise attached together to form a hollow resilient support for the outer housing, or which may be cut from a solid block of such material.

In an alternative embodiment, the body member is pyramidal, where the base may be triangular or rectangular. Such an embodiment could be useful, for example, to control parking outside schools.

The ground-engagement means may comprise pockets containing sand or other ballast material, or eyelets may be provided for receipt of ground-cemented bolts or ground-engaging pegs for use in a more permanent situation. Alternatively the base of the housing may carry a layer of an adhesive material. Apertures may also be provided for allowing surface water access through the base covering material to the filler, to increase the weight in use while permitting drainage and air access in storage. The barrier element may include carrying handles.

Embodiments of the invention will now be described by way of example with reference to the accompanying drawing.

The drawing is a perspective view of a triangular-section barrier element 10 of height at the apex of six inches and a length of 4 feet. The covering material 11 is formed from vinyl sheeting and the filler material 12, shown through a cut-away part of the covering, is a polyurethane foam, although other foamed plastics materials would suffice. The longitudinal lower edges of the element are formed with cavities or pockets 13,14 sealed at one end 15 and having a sealable opening 16 at the other end for filling with sand. The faces of the element have fold-down flaps hinged longitudinally along the face centre-line; the flaps may be secured in the up or down position by"Velcro" (RTM) material or the like. As illustrated, the left flap 17 is secured in the up position and displays a"No Entry" sign, whereas the right flap 18 is secured in the down position and displays a"lane change" sign. Of course, such indicia can be removable so that they can be chosen for use according to circumstances.

The barrier element is small enough to fit in the boot of a car or especially in a light van or on board an emergency vehicle and can be handled by one person. In position on the ground, however, it is stable in windy conditions and will not float or be swept away by running surface water.

An alternative pyramidal embodiment may be formed from four triangular sheets of foamed plastics material glued together at their edges to form a hollow triangular pyramid and covered with vinyl sheeting. One or more eyelets may be provided at corner regions for anchoring to the ground.