Highways England has turned its back on Asset Support Contracts in four of its regional areas in favour of bringing decision making, investment and maintenance in house.

 

A new style ‘asset-led delivery model’ currently being used in the East Midlands (Area 7) will be introduced elsewhere when contracts are due for renewal. The model will be rolled out to Cornwall and Devon (Area 1), Somerset, Avon, Wiltshire and Gloucestershire (Area 2), Cumbria and parts of Lancashire (Area 13) and Northumberland, Tyne & Wear, Durham and North Yorkshire (Area 14).

 

Highways England said the move to asset-led delivery “will enable us to take more ownership of investment decisions and to increase our intelligence on local factors that influence where work is needed. By directly engaging suppliers we will help drive down cost and waste”.

 

The new approach will cover maintenance and incident response, design, specialist services such as weather forecasting and laboratory testing and capital project delivery, including emergency repairs.

 

Asset Support Contracts will remain part of Highways England’s delivery strategy going forwards and will shortly be awarding ASCs for Areas 4 and 12.

 

A leading highways commentator described the move away from ASCs as representing “quite a bold move for Highways England”, adding “there will be some frustration among those who were already bidding for work in the Areas”. But he also said that industry will “look with interest to see if Highways England can directly manage works which are usually the forte of major contractors”.

 

WSP Parsons Brinckerhoff’s head of highways and bridges Steve Smith welcomed the new style asset-led delivery model. He said: “When Highways England takes control of this process it will much better be able to prioritise work, control the scope of the work and make decisions. In our view it is a positive thing to be able to deal directly with the decision maker.”

 

(Photo: Highways England)