Description
Amey’s services include highways and transport design, together with CDM construction and supervisory services for Northern Ireland’s roads, bridges and footways. A team of Amey consultants based in Belfast and supported by Amey offices UK-wide is responsible for transport planning, infrastructure design, street lighting, project management, geotechnical and environmental investigation.
Efficiency
Delivery within the commission has been achieved by developing and maintaining a strong team ethos with what we believe to be the right mix of senior and junior staff across a range of transportation related disciplines. A close working partnership has also been achieved through the establishment of an agreed Charter facilitating the development of close relations at all levels within the two partner organisations. This process has also help to reduce the fear factor associated with change within our Public Sector Partner.
Workload is programmed and monitored through the 'Plan – Do – Check – Act' cycle. These various stages are detailed below:
Plan: This is the establishment of the Programme which is presented to the client through the Joined-up-programme (JUP). This baseline programme is developed at the commencement of the financial year, detailing the demand workload for the year on a scheme-by-scheme basis. It helps to balance design and construction resources, and is used to optimise work within the same locality. It details the duration, costs (forecast and actual), of each scheme, and also monitors progress against time and cost on a monthly basis.
Do: Once agreed, the baseline JUP provided the basis for the year and formed a measure for Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) relating to predictability of cost and duration of projects. This allowed the Project Managers responsible for managing service delivery to balance their resources within the teams, and the Commission Manager to view and smooth the resource profile, identifying and addressing peaks and troughs in workload.
Check: The Project Managers profiled secured work over agreed time periods using Proform. These plans were monitored and updated on a monthly basis so that through online reports they could establish at project or job level, proposed costs, percentage completions and outputs against actuals. This information was reported via a Red-Amber-Green monitor at PDMG and appropriate actions agreed where necessary. KPIs were also completed for each job and successfully showed the high standard of service delivered in connection with the contract with a rate of return of 80% with average scores of 8/10 and above.
Act: The fourth part of the cycle was to act on actions agreed at the monthly meetings to ensure current requirements were being delivered. This is part of the strive towards continuous improvement and innovative practices.
Open communication channels allowed for any issues or problems to be dealt with quickly to prevent any delay in progress or increase in costs.
Joint training assisted in reducing costs for both Amey and RSC, while ensuring all staff needs were met.
Recording and reporting of KPIs allowed for a quick and easy reporting mechanism to be established to show the overall performance and service provided by Amey.
Innovation
What was different about this project?
1. Mobilisation
Amey initially secured this commission without a presence in Northern Ireland. Within three months, Amey had mobilised and commenced delivery and by the end of year 1 had delivered to budget.
2. Partnership
Amey’s local staff have developed and maintain close working relationships at all levels within our client’s organisation – this has resulted in the efficient two way flow of information.
3. Joint Training
The development of the partnership has been helped greatly by the implementation of joint training events ensuring knowledge sharing occurs throughout the partnership. This process has also helped us to break down barriers to communication at all levels and significantly reduced the perceived fear that a partnership may be the precursor to full scale privatisation.
4. Awards
Recognition of the partnership between Roads Service and Amey was rewarded with the Programme Director for the Belfast office being invited to the Queen’s Garden Party at Buckingham Palace.
This partnership also played a key role in Roads Service receiving the NI Best Practice award in 2008.
Outcome
The following aspects of Amey’s expertise are utilised on this project:
- Major works incorporating scheme feasibility, design, contract preparation, and statutory processes
- Economic appraisals and site supervision
- Minor works incorporating scheme feasibility, design, supervision and post evaluation
- Traffic and Transport including traffic surveys, junction design, traffic modelling, review of Transport/Traffic assessments, design of park and ride facilities, traffic calming design and consultation, road safety audits, bus priority measures, cycling and pedestrian measures
- Advice on adjudications and arbitrations
- Geotechnical design, assessment, certification services and ground investigation
- Noise Assessments
- Completion of environmental surveys, reports and Environmental Impact assessment
- Street lighting design, inspection and testing
- CDM Coordinator
- Provision of staff secondments including private street supervision
- Bridge and structural assessments, design and inspections
- Stakeholder Liaison and Consultation
- Procurement services for both minor and major contracts