Sharing ideas across authority boundaries and among different engineering disciplines will be vital to ensure effective asset management on the country’s local highways network.

 

This was one of the key messages expressed to delegates at last week’s Local Government Technical Advisers Group (TAG) annual president’s conference in London.

 

The conference, which focused on the theme ‘Challenges in Highways Asset Management’, saw new TAG president Rob Gillespie give an opening address.

 

“To make the leap to true long term asset management and planning we need to have a solid understanding of the whole life value of the engineering solutions at our disposal,” he said.

 

“We must draw specifiers, clients, contractors and manufacturers together to nail this one. Materials technology does advance and installation techniques can get better.”

 

But if we are to truly invest for the long term, then performance over the lifecycle must be well understood, measured and appreciated Rob Gillespie said. “Engage early and this will work well,” he added.

 

The conference also included a keynote speech from Transport Minister Andrew Jones. He set out Government plans to provide more than £6Bn for local highways maintenance between now and 2021, including a pot of £578M that will be allocated on the basis of performance.

 

“There is scope for councils to make improvements – to find efficiencies and to invest the money at the right time in their assets’ lifecycles,” he said. But the Minister explained that in an era of increasing devolution, central Government telling local authorities how to do so would not stimulate innovation and the sharing of good ideas.

 

So, he added: “We want to leave the field open for highway authorities to take the initiative, to share ideas and to learn from one another.”

 

Also at the conference RAC Foundation director Steve Gooding said there is a need to continue exploring the scope for better joining up across authority boundaries to improve efficiency and share best practice.

 

“We need more joined up thinking across the engineering disciplines because the composition and design of the roads themselves is something that desperately needs attention,” he added.

 

♦ New TAG president and service director for Ringway’s Hounslow highways PFI Rob Gillespie – whose presidential theme is ‘connectivity and quality of life – spoke to TP Weekly News about his ambitions for the year ahead.

 

“I would like to see our industry recognised more as being a user centric industry, because ultimately the public are our customers,” he said.

 

“Engineers need to be talking more about user outcomes and in language that the public can understand.” 

 

(Department for Transport)