Last month, IEMA attended an industry event to mark the launch of Crossrail's learning legacy.
The project has already generated a significant level of learning across 12 themes (see below). IEMA is the delivery partner for the environment theme, so members can look forward to receiving a wealth of updates, webinars and resources on the innovations achieved and lessons learned during the planning and construction phases.
Crossrail, which links Reading to the west of London with Abbey Wood and Shenfield to the east, is Europe’s largest construction project. It is now almost 75% complete, and on schedule for opening in December 2018.
Josh Fothergill, policy and practice lead at IEMA, explained the institute’s backing for the legacy initiative: ‘Crossrail’s environment and sustainability innovations offer our profession huge learning opportunities. At IEMA, we feel the legacy goes far beyond learning. This is about inspiration, direction and the power of what is possible.’
The learning legacy was launched at an event on 26 February, attended by Andrew Wolstenholme, chief executive at Crossrail; Tony Meggs, chief executive at the Infrastructure and Projects Authority; and Alison Munro, managing director of development at HS2.
The legacy aims to share insights from the project with the wider UK infrastructure industry. With more than £400bn of infrastructure projects identified in the government’s National Infrastructure Plan, Crossrail’s learning legacy initiative seeks to collate knowledge and share good practice. ‘Passing on the lessons and good practice that we have learned at Crossrail is an absolutely essential part of raising the bar in the delivery of major projects,’ said Wolstenholme. ‘With an unprecedented number of infrastructure schemes around the corner, now is the time to start sharing what we have learned so the UK can build on its reputation for delivering safely, on time and on budget.’
The first batch of published material shares some of the early lessons that have been learned. It includes technical papers, peer-reviewed case studies and procedures. These have been published on a dedicated website learninglegacy.crossrail.co.uk. Further material will be published every six months until the project is complete. Members will receive invitations to legacy webinars and other opportunities later in 2016 when the main collection of environmental learning documents are published.
In February, London mayor Boris Johnson announced that Crossrail would be called the Elizabeth line when services start in 2018.
Crossrail’s learning legacy themes
- Environment
- Project and programme management
- Procurement
- Authorisation and consents
- Land and property
- Health and safety
- Engineering
- Operations
- Talent and resources
- External affairs
- Innovation
- Information management and technology
