Reporting on Recent Events
The Yorkshire and Humberside Branch hold a variety of events that provide the region's professionals with many Continuing Professional Development (CPD) opportunities. This page gives a report on the recent events held in the region, and provides an opportunity to download any presentations or other material the speaker(s) have made available.
22 September 2011
Cycling Desire and Design Lines
Venue: Bar Convent Hotel, York
Speaker: Tim Pheby, Cycling Matters
The first in our new series of evening meetings for the 2011-2012 season was held on the 22 September 2011 at the Bar Convent Hotel. The subject was “Cycling Desire and Design Lines” aimed at designing for cyclists in the urban and rural environment. Our thanks go to the speaker for the evening Tim Pheby, an independent consultant at Cycling Matters.
Tim has been involved in cycle planning and engineering for many years, being a professional advisor with Cycling England, consultant with Transport Initiatives, Regional Cycling Coordinator for Yorkshire and an Engineer at the City of York Council. A continental design roundabout he project managed in York won a Prince Michael of Kent Road Safety Award winner in 2003. He also was instrumental, through organising trials, in introducing Speed cushions into the UK.
His presentation showed examples of good and bad practice from the many cycle audits he has carried out. It was structured around the Hierarchy of Provision which is the design process outlined in the Departments of Transports Cycling Infrastructure Design Guide Local Transport Note 2/08. He showed areas where this had been properly considered and more importantly properly designed for and conversely were it had not. The conclusion was an obvious one but one that is quite often overlooked in that the designer should consider the cyclists desire line and aim to design along it mitigating all hazards in the process.
This event was well attended by a good number of people from across the region and was very well received with a healthy debate following the presentation which can be found below:
Speed and Driver Distraction - 17 September 2011
The Yorkshire and Humber branch of the CIHT were very happy to receive the world acknowledged speaker, Oliver Carston on the subject of Speed and Driver Distraction. The speaker held an interesting discussion on the correlation between speed of vehicles and accidents. This discussion took in to account the following safety factors; compliance of road users to restrict their speeds to the limit; the perception of driver risk dependant on surrounding environment and whether as a country we would be able to control road users speeds using automatic control systems.
The second part of this presentation demonstrated evidence of the impact of driver distraction from hand held items on the ability of drivers to react to real life situations. This part of the presentation demonstrated how the ability of drivers varies between the different types of visual and auditory distractions and showed the differences in the drivers’ abilities to deal with hazards such as pedestrians stepping from the kerbline and other peripheral issues. The conclusion of this study showed that hand held items within the car caused a marked reduction in the driver to be able to react appropriately to hazards. .
Overall the talk was very informative and raised considerable discussions and questions and we trust that this enthusiasm is continued in our future events.
Oliver Carsten Presentation
Branch Seminar 2011 - 'More for Less'
The Branch Seminar, "More for Less" held on 16 June was a successful
event attracting over 30 delegates. Branch Chairman, Alan Jeffery,
opened proceedings with a keynote address and the session was chaired
by Alan Carnall. There were excellent presentations from each of our
four speakers and these were supplemented by two question and answer
opportunities.
For those of you unable to attend, photographs and electronic versions of the papers are available below:
Chris Hayton - A1D2B Continuous Improvement Sustained Approach – ‘More for Less’
John Reed - Highways Efficiency
Sue Housley - Introducing Lean into the Highway Agency’s Supply chain
Breakfast Briefing: National, Regional and Local Resilience Arrangements (9 September 2010)
Our thanks to Nick Best, Regional Resilience Director for the Government Office for Yorkshire and Humberside, for his presentation on national, regional and local resilience arrangements.
37 colleagues attended this breakfast meeting to hear an excellent presentation by Nick Best, Director of Resilience at GOYH at Pinsent Mason Leeds. Nick explained resilience; its legislative context within the Civil Contingencies Act 2005; the various categories of responders and their roles and responsibilities; and the national, regional and local context from The Cabinet Office (COBRA), via the Regional Resilience Teams and the Local Gold Silver and Bronze commands.The effects of the 2007 floods were discussed with examples of the potential implications on communications and critical infrastructure (e.g. Ulley Reservoir) and noting that Yorkshire & Humber was the most affected area in the country. The implications of the 91 recommendations from The Pitt Review were explained and how they will affect our future approach to resilience. Finally how resilience will be handled in the future and the new Coalition Government's approach to it were discussed.
His presentation can be downloaded from the link below:
National, Regional and Local Resilience Arrangements, Nick Best
Knowledge Exchange (30 June 2010)
The Yorkshire and Humberside Branch of CIHT has a programme of "Knowledge Exchanges" aimed at public sector organisations. The Institution's purpose is to stimulate debate about specific topics so that experiences (good and bad) can be shared and opportunities for inter-organisation collaboration can be explored.
The event on 30 June was hosted by the University of Leeds and its particular focus was on the potential for mutually beneficial cooperation between academics and public sector practitioners on areas of common interest. For example: research activity (both university and practitioner promoted); professional development; ensuring that graduates gain the skills needed for the work environment; providing useful contact names for future enquiries.
The event was well attended and successful in meeting its objectives. The papers presented during the Knowledge Exchange are attached for reference. If anyone has any queries about this event or has suggestions for the topic of a future event, please contact John Brown (brownpjcm@aol.com).
Public Sector Client Capacity and Capability - June 2010 Knowledge Transfer Partnerships June 2010
Y&H Conference 2010: "What Moves You?" (28 January 2010)
This year, the Branch's annual conference was inspired by the current economic volatility and the pervading issues of climate change, environmental impact, scarcity of finite resources and the consequences of population growth and demographic change.
Clearly no conference can provide remedies for all our problems; what it can do, however, is give an insight into how, across our profession, certain challenging aspects of transportation activity are being managed.
Speaker presentations are available to view below - please click on the name of the presenter to download their presentation:
- Stephen Glaister (RAC Foundation)
- Ian Kirby (Sheffield City Council)
- Jonathan Brown (Yorkshire Forward)
- David Hoggarth (Metro)
- Keith McCabe and Barry Graham (Atkins)
- Elaine Holt (East Coast & Directly Operated Railways)
- Simon Couthard and Barry Graham (Network Rail & Northern Rail respectively)
Copyright is retained by the authors and distribution requests should be made directly to them.
Y&H Diamond Jubile Awards (2nd October 2009)
The Yorkshire and Humberside Branch's 60 year anniversary was celebrated in style with a special Dinner Dance at the Majestic Hotel in Harrogate. Over 180 members were present, including the IHT President, Chief Executive and Past President David Hutchinson.
The event featured the presentation of two awards to commemorate the branch’s Diamond Jubilee Year. An award for the ‘Young Professional of the Year’ was made to Peter Routledge of traffic control consultant IRC. Peter received The John “Blind Jack” Metcalfe Award, sponsored by Hays. Two runners-up for the award, Emma Anforth of JMP and Ryan Penn of Local Transport Projects, received commendations.
A second award for the ‘Best Highways and Transportation Scheme in the Region’ was presented to representatives from a road improvement project at Gildersome, near Leeds, where the M62 at Junction 27 meets the A62. The team received the John Smeaton Award, sponsored by Amey, and was nominated by Birse, Carillion/WSP and Pell Frischmann. The Gildersome scheme narrowly beat an entry by JMP for the Holderness Road Area Action Plan in East Hull, which received a commendation.