Roads are increasingly congested with third party assets, such as overhead transmission lines and underground services. This project aims to reduce the negative impacts of these assets on the delivery of transport infrastructure projects, while ensuring they continue to deliver essential public services.
In particular, the quality of information on sub-surface assets is known to be poor, creating a legacy of information deficits when planning and designing road upgrades, and increased likelihood of project delays and contractual claims. This is particularly prevalent within the brownfields of metropolitan areas of major cities.
An assessment of the full impact of utilities on road and rail projects will provide an evidence-base to substantiate issues, highlight areas for change, and identify practical solutions to reduce costs and improve efficiency.
The project will deliver:
- a collective understanding of the problem across all jurisdictions
- case studies demonstrating best practice
- reduced project costs for transport infrastructure managers and third-party asset owners
- opportunities to develop more consistent approaches with specific service providers, especially those operating across jurisdictions, with the potential to streamline third-party processes.
Fivenines Consulting Pty Ltd has been engaged to lead the project and work with Austroads’ member agencies and third-party asset owners. The findings will be published towards the end of 2022.
An online survey of project managers, utilities and local government bodies was conducted as part of this project. While the survey is now closed, if you wish to contribute to the research please contact Robert Eames.
Updated: 2 December 2021.