Good News (National Highways Programmes),
Carbon Emissions, Net Zero Projects (New Gas Opower Plants,
FutureGrid, Mini NUCs, SMR cost cutting),
MP Strike, Major Infrastructure Turnaround
and Woolly Mammoths again
REPORT
By Miles Shepherd
Executive Advisor & International Correspondent
Salisbury, England, UK
INTRODUCTION
Spring has sprung here in my rural fastness. Local readers might ask how I can tell with all the rain and low cloud and my response is that I can see bluebells, daffodils and hyacinths in my garden, all in bloom! Having run out of space last menoth, I had planned to cover the Infrastructure Projects Authority (IPA) pipeline, a Giga factory in Somerset and decommissioning the Culham Fusion Reactor this month but the IPA bit has been overtaken by events (see below) and the Giga factory is under political review and so not yet in a reportable state. As there is a lot on nuclear already, I’ll skip the Culham news for now. Instead, we start with the Good News of a major project finishing on time, follow up with a summary of Net Zero news and then comment on a rare piece of positive reporting on a major rail project before moving on to the latest speculation about Small Modular Reactors and round off with some news about PM professional associations here in UK.
GOOD NEWS
National Highways have a long running upgrade programme to reduce congestion, improve safety and create more reliable journeys on Britain’s motorway network. This part of the programme redevelops junction 10, where the A3, the major route from London to the Solent area crosses the motorway. It aims to create new and safer routes for cyclists, pedestrians and horse-riders. It includes an additional lane on the A3 in both directions. Capacity increases are planned with a larger roundabout with extra lanes and free flow left turns at all four corners of the junction. Improvements to the local environment and wildlife are also planned. The project started in the summer of 2022 and is scheduled to complete in the summer of 2025 at a cost of £317million.
This latest stage closed a section of the M25 between junction 10 at Wisley to junction 11 at Chertsey. Some 300,000 vehicles use this stretch of motorway daily so the 3 day closure planned for the weekend of 15 – 18 March was expected to have a major impact, to allow for the demolition of the existing Clearmount bridleway bridge and the installation of a large gantry weighing in at 128 tonnes and spanning 63 metres. The work was first of five intentional motorway closures, the work carried out over the weekend builds on the progress Balfour Beatty has already made, having recently demolished the Wisley Lane and Cockcrow footbridges. The work was completed ahead of schedule and the motorway reopened at 22.00 on Sunday, eight hours ahead of the planned completion.
More…
To read entire report, click here
How to cite this report: Shepherd, M. (2024). UK Project Management Roundup, report, PM World Journal, Vol. XIII, Issue IV, April. Available online at https://pmworldlibrary.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/pmwj140-Apr2024-Shepherd-UK-project-management-roundup-report-2.pdf
About the Author
Miles Shepherd
Salisbury, UK
Miles Shepherd is an executive editorial advisor and international correspondent for PM World Journal in the United Kingdom. He is also managing director for MS Projects Ltd, a consulting company supporting various UK and overseas Government agencies, nuclear industry organisations and other businesses. Miles has over 30 years’ experience on a variety of projects in UK, Eastern Europe and Russia. His PM experience includes defence, major IT projects, decommissioning of nuclear reactors, nuclear security, rail and business projects for the UK Government and EU. His consulting work has taken him to Japan, Taiwan, USA and Russia. Past Chair and Fellow of the Association for Project Management (APM), Miles is also past president and chair and a Fellow of the International Project Management Association (IPMA). He was, for seven years, a Director for PMI’s Global Accreditation Centre and is immediate past Chair of the ISO committee developing new international standards for Project Management and for Program/Portfolio Management. He is currently Chairman of the British Standards Institute project management committee. He was involved in setting up APM’s team developing guidelines for project management oversight and governance. Miles is based in Salisbury, England and can be contacted at miles.shepherd@msp-ltd.co.uk.
To view other works by Miles Shepherd, visit his author showcase in the PM World Library at http://pmworldlibrary.net/authors/miles-shepherd/.
