About Talking Highways
Ideas to challenge, stimulate and inspire
‘Talking Highways’ provides a platform for our speakers, sponsors and associations to delve into the detail of their recent and upcoming projects.
Acting as a preview in the lead up to the Highways UK exhibition on 2nd-3rd November at the NEC in Birmingham, the blog will highlight key themes, topics and debates central to the agenda. Contributors are experts in their field, whether it be automated construction, road safety, or simply where they see their organisation heading in the next decade.
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Equity, Diversity and Inclusion – moving from strategy to implementation – Rachel Billington, AECOM
Empowering people to interpret corporate ED&I strategies within their own workplace context is critical for successful implementation, says AECOM’s Head of ED&I, Europe & India, Rachel Billington. At this year’s Highways UK conference, I asked panellists...

Covid, the economy, and the Roads Policy Trilemma – Michael Whelan, M6Toll
Michael Whelan, General Manager at M6Toll looks at RUC trials in California, Utah and Washington state, and explains how lessons learnt could be applied in the UK The arrival of the Covid19 pandemic in the UK changed everything overnight, not least on our roads. The...

Five trends impacting the future of highways – Andy Theobald, Mott MacDonald
If we want our road infrastructure to be fit for the long term, we must keep pace with the key drivers affecting the highways industry, says Andy Theobald. Providing our clients with long-term solutions means looking ahead, taking a 10 to 20-year time horizon to...

Roadways can handle extreme weather – Jose Javier García Pardenilla, Ferrovial
Jose Javier García Pardenilla, Project Lead at Ferrovial, argues that roads are durable to extreme weather conditions, we just have to redesign how we formulate asphalt pavement. This year, we have seen surprising images from around the world, from airports forced to...

How to make the best choices for sustainable transport – Alex Walton, Arcadis
Alex Walton, Director and Product Owner at Arcadis, explains how we can optimise our transport strategies and make data driven decisions. Transport planners love optimization. We are great at tinkering with signal timings and converging strategic models. But we...

Making connections happen – Duncan Reed and Stuart Campbell, Trimble
Trimble’s Duncan Reed, Business Development Manager, and Stuart Campbell, Head of Sales and Business Development, explores the value of connected technology for civil infrastructure, ahead of Highways UK 2022 Our nation’s civil infrastructure is a critical part of the...

Getting the strategic road network ready for autonomous vehicles calls for collaboration – Joanna White, National Highways
Joanna White, Roads Development Director at National Highways, outlines the importance of collaboration and information sharing to successfully implement connected services. Vehicles are becoming increasingly more sophisticated, designed to keep us safer and make our...

The future of mobility is safer (and how we get there) – Jillian Kowalchuk, Safe and the City
Jillian Kowalchuk, Founder of Safe and the City explains how software and AI can help people feel safer when using the transport network Most people think of Safe & the City as just an app, but that isn’t the full picture. There’s more behind our technologies,...