By Johnny Sharp

As Executive Director of Transport for West Midlands, Anne Shaw OBE has been involved in several high-profile projects in recent years, including the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham.

Shaw has worked hard to secure adequate and consistent funding to reshape the transport landscape in the West Midlands and better facilitate and promote walking, cycling and public transport use. On a national level, she also contributed to last year’s Rail and Urban Transport Review, whose recommendations included the development of an infrastructure investment playbook to foster public-private partnerships.

Meanwhile, she led Transport for West Midlands in their switch to a bus franchising model for the region, following five other Mayoral authorities in pursuit of a more efficient way of spending public money. 

She is passionate about taking a broader overview of the network, just not from the point of view of council leaders and senior industry figures, but also those working at the grass roots.

Cost-effectiveness key

“As an organisation, we plan, deliver, operate. When we’re planning things, I speak to the operations teams and ask them, ‘What are the big issues that you are experiencing?’, and ‘How do we shape some policies around that?’. Then when we’re designing interventions, ‘How do we make sure we’re not adding to the cost of operations and maintenance?’, that it’s done in the most cost-effective way?

“We’re responsible for public money here. So, across that breadth we have to make sure we’ve got the right skills and the right ways of working to make sure we’re efficient in using that budget.”

Focusing as much on operations as strategy and infrastructure is key to Shaw’s approach, as she explains: “My role covers policy and strategy, infrastructure delivery and operations, and operations tends to be the element most often forgotten by transport professionals. Yet there’s no good in building a train station if you haven’t got any trains, and it’s no good putting a bus lane in if there are no buses!

“Operations is what people rely on, it’s what the infrastructure is there to enable for the people that actually use the services.

“In public transport, walking, cycling, we’re providing cycle hire schemes, we’re providing bus services. We operate the tram systems, and we’re working with Network Rail and others on rail operations through our rail executive, as well as working with the Bus Centre of Excellence.”

CIHT ‘have offered support’

In her role as a CIHT Trustee without Portfolio, Shaw also feels strongly about the opportunity to, “Give back to an organisation that has supported me so well over the years.”

“It provides an excellent resource for people to come together in the way it’s structured locally within regions, so people [can] network and build industry contacts, as well as benefit from national events like the Annual Conference,” adds Shaw.

Shaw also feels that West Midlands devoting budget to CIHT membership for her staff is a worthwhile investment.

“As an organisation, we actually fund professional membership,” she explains. “I’ve been a big advocate locally for the role that CIHT can have in terms of professional development for our own employees. We’re working with CIHT to help people access the training, careers support and advice, development and professional qualifications, then we can help them to build their careers in their area of specialism.

“The more members you have within CIHT – given the diversity of roles that you’ve got in transport – the more connections they can make with other people, and the more they can see broader pathways and opportunities for the different kinds of careers open to them.”

Discover more about the other Board of Trustees’ members.

Image: Anne Shaw OBE, Executive Director of Transport for West Midlands.