National Highways has been working with the government’s Project Speed infrastructure taskforce to develop ways of accelerating the delivery of major road schemes, making it says National Highways’ director David Haimes, “an exciting and challenging opportunity for us and our suppliers to transform how we work together”
Rebuilding the economy and levelling up the country are two of the great opportunities and challenges for us in the highways industry. The Prime Minister announced the Build Back Better, Faster, Greener initiative last year. Since then National Highways has been working with the government’s Project Speed infrastructure taskforce to develop ways of accelerating the delivery of major road schemes.
So far we have almost halved the timeline for the construction period of the £1 billion A66 trans-Pennine road upgrade, from ten years to five. We’ll achieve the time savings, together with our supply chain partners, by using even more modular and offsite construction practices.
We’ve also taken a detailed look at the A66 project timelines to see where we can shift activity to the left and fast track work streams. For example, site investigation and archaeology work have been undertaken within the preliminary design stage. This will support a robust development consent order (DCO).
But the A66 is only a pathfinder for what we want to do next with our supply chain colleagues. Working with the Department for Transport, we want reduce the time it takes to develop, design and deliver. We’ll use new processes that modernise our approach and remove obstacles to progress. And we want to streamline how we run major projects in National Highways, working with our public and private delivery partners. We’ll be looking to embed delivery innovations like those we have used on the A66 and A14.
So the challenge for the highways sector is to accelerate the economic, social and road user benefits by delivering faster. To create and enable new jobs, better connect businesses with customers, and make social and holiday journeys easier for families and friends. And to add social value to local communities and improve the environment around our network.
There is an exciting and challenging opportunity for us and our suppliers to transform how we work together, and connect the country even more quickly and efficiently.
David Haimes is joint director of National Highways’ Regional Investment Programme and is leading the company’s work on accelerating infrastructure delivery. Suppliers will learn much more when David unveils the plan alongside Philip Andrews, Deputy Director of Strategic Roads at the Department for Transport, in the National Highways Theatre at Highways UK on 3 November, at 14.40 – 15.15