Talking Infrastructure

Welcome to season 5 of AECOM’s Talking Infrastructure podcast. Talking Infrastructure delves into the industry’s hot topics, key projects, and the ground-breaking innovations that are helping to solve some of the world’s most complex infrastructure challenges.    Protecting heritage, powering renewal  Protecting heritage while powering renewal is a challenge facing communities and organisations across the UK. As historic buildings and places are adapted to meet modern needs, the question is how to preserve what makes them special while ensuring they remain relevant for future generations.  Collaboration is increasingly at the heart of that challenge. By bringing together different organisations, skills and expertise, it is possible to develop practical and affordable solutions that protect heritage, preserve traditional craftsmanship and support modern requirements.  How can historic buildings be modernised without losing their character and significance? What does effective collaboration look like in complex, live environments? And how can heritage assets help strengthen local identity while enabling places to respond to social and environmental change?  In this special panel discussion recorded at UKREiiF, host Toby Sadler is joined by: Sophia Negus (Regional Director, Business Engineering, AECOM) Alasdair Travers (Design Partner, Purcell)  Christine Davis-Worth (Head of Heritage – Conservation Architect and Heritage Consultant, BDP) Richard Jessup (Associate Chartered Building Surveyor, AtkinsRéalis) Tom Foxall (Regional Director – London and South East, Historic England).  Together, they explore how heritage can be protected while unlocking new opportunities for growth and renewal, sharing examples of how partnership, innovation and traditional skills can help historic assets continue to serve communities for generations to come.  Listen to the full discussion and discover how protecting heritage can help power renewal.  Listen to our latest Talking Infrastructure episode over on: https://aecom.com/podcasts/talking-infrastructure-podcast/  Useful links:  Elizabeth Tower: restoring a national landmark  Connect with us on social:  https://www.linkedin.com/company/aecom/  https://www.instagram.com/aecom/

Welcome to season 5 of AECOM’s Talking Infrastructure podcast. Talking Infrastructure delves into the industry’s hot topics, key projects, and the ground-breaking innovations that are helping to solve some of the world’s most complex infrastructure challenges.  Northern Powerhouse Rail: the choices that will shape delivery  Northern Powerhouse Rail – a new rail network set to be the region’s largest transport investment since the Industrial Revolution, has long been a defining ambition for the North of England. The question now is how to turn that ambition into delivery.  With the next 18 months under the spotlight, attention is turning to the decisions that will shape how NPR progresses, and how widely its benefits can be felt.  What will it take to unlock growth across city regions? Where should investment be prioritised? And how can progress in scheme development help build the confidence needed to move towards construction?  In this special episode of Talking Infrastructure, recorded at UKREiiF, host Toby Sadler leads a discussion with Gordon Kells (Chief Operating Officer, Transpennine Route Upgrade), Lola McEvoy MP, (Darlington, Labour Party), Rosario Barcena (Rail Programme Director, Skanska) and Megan Knights, AECOM’s Strategy and Growth Director for Transportation.   Together, they unpack the critical choices facing NPR – from investment and funding to how city regions can maximise the benefits – and what must happen now to strengthen confidence in delivery and unlock long-term growth across the North.    Listen to our latest Talking Infrastructure episode over on: https://aecom.com/podcasts/talking-infrastructure-podcast/    Useful links:  Masterplanning Welborne Garden Village, one of the UK’s most notable garden communities  Elizabeth Tower: restoring a national landmark  The Northumberland Line: the start of a new golden age for rail  Campus meets city: Actionable insights for place-led university estates  The infrastructure challenge behind England's housing targets  Planning Capability Statement Housing  Brookleigh, Burgess Hill: from stalled site to sustainable community    Connect with us on social:  https://www.linkedin.com/company/aecom/  https://www.instagram.com/aecom/

Welcome to season 5 of AECOM’s Talking Infrastructure podcast. Talking Infrastructure delves into the industry’s hot topics, key projects, and the ground-breaking innovations that are helping to solve some of the world’s most complex infrastructure challenges.    Then, now, next: lessons in building lasting communities  What turns a housing development into a thriving community – a place where people feel they belong, can participate, and are proud to call home?   It is rarely just the homes. It’s the choices made long before people move in, from transport and infrastructure to public space, and the way a place is planned from day one.  In this special episode of Talking Infrastructure, recorded at UKREiiF, host Toby Sadler is joined by Angela Barnicle (Director for City Development, Leeds City Council), Rob Chesworth (Head of Housing and Strategic Land, The Crown Estate), Cathy Francis (Director for New Towns, Infrastructure and Housing Delivery, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government) and Patrick Clarke (Director, UK and Ireland, Masterplanning Lead, AECOM) to explore what it takes to move from housing delivery to creating places that truly work over the long term.  The discussion focuses on infrastructure-led planning, placemaking-first design and the role of public–private partnerships in shaping communities that feel connected, sustainable and built to last. It also asks a more fundamental question: are we learning enough from the places we have already built?  Using a Then, Now and Next lens, the panel reflects on what past developments can teach us, how expectations are changing today, and how those lessons can help us avoid repeating old mistakes – whether delivering large-scale housing schemes or planning the next generation of new towns.    Listen to our latest Talking Infrastructure episode over on: https://aecom.com/podcasts/talking-infrastructure-podcast/    Useful links:  Masterplanning Welborne Garden Village, one of the UK’s most notable garden communities  Elizabeth Tower: restoring a national landmark  The Northumberland Line: the start of a new golden age for rail  Campus meets city: Actionable insights for place-led university estates  The infrastructure challenge behind England's housing targets  Planning Capability Statement Housing  Brookleigh, Burgess Hill: from stalled site to sustainable community  Connect with us on social:  https://www.linkedin.com/company/aecom/  https://www.instagram.com/aecom/

Airports are under increasing pressure to expand, modernise and deliver more – for passengers, for communities and for the wider economy. But with public funding constrained, how can this level of investment be delivered at pace and scale?  As demand for air travel grows and infrastructure comes under strain, private finance is playing a central role – often through partnerships between the public and private sectors. This is reflected in our Rebuilding Britain report, which highlights that unlocking private capital is essential to bridging the UK’s infrastructure gap and enabling complex, large-scale projects to move forward.  In this episode, host Toby Sadler is joined by Nick Platts (Managing Director, Luton Rising), Javier Echave Espot (Chief Operating Officer, Heathrow) and Crawford Burden (Managing Director, Aviation, Europe & India, AECOM) to explore how private finance is acting as a catalyst for airport growth in practice.  Drawing on insights from Heathrow and Luton Airport, the discussion highlights how investment and a variety of partnership models are enabling expansion and improving performance, while delivering wider value for passengers, communities and the economy.  Private finance is about more than capital. It brings the expertise, delivery capability and commercial insight needed to turn ambition into viable, investable projects – and ultimately into infrastructure that works.  At AECOM, we support clients across the full project lifecycle – combining advisory, engineering and deep aviation expertise to help shape investment strategies and translate growth into infrastructure that can be delivered and sustained over the long term.  Listen to our latest Talking Infrastructure episode over on: https://insights.aecom.com/insights/talking-infrastucture Useful links:  Project: London Luton Airport’s expansion: building capacity for the future  Project: Hong Kong International Airport 2030 Study  Blog: People Spotlight: Meet Patricia Ribó Sörensen - Blog  Thought Leadership: Rebuilding Britain: Unlocking growth from the UK’s infrastructure strategy | AECOM Insights    Connect with us on social:  https://www.linkedin.com/company/aecom/  https://www.instagram.com/aecom/

Across the world, extreme weather is putting the systems we rely on under increasing pressure.   At the same time, we’re entering a historic era of infrastructure growth. Electricity demand is rising rapidly – and around 75 per cent of the infrastructure that will exist by mid-century hasn’t yet been built.    So how do we ensure the systems we depend on today – and the infrastructure we build tomorrow – are ready for a changing climate?   In this first episode of Talking Infrastructure’s Season 5, our host Toby Sadler is joined by Marcene Mitchell (WWF), Jane McMillan (SP Energy Networks) and Sally Vivian (AECOM) to discuss what it will take to build climate resilience across critical infrastructure systems.    They cover topics such as:  Why the scale of infrastructure growth ahead creates a critical opportunity to build resilience in from the start   How nature-based solutions can complement traditional engineering to reduce climate risk    Why the incentives shaping infrastructure investment may need to evolve to better support resilience   Why today’s infrastructure decisions could lock in resilience – or vulnerability – for decades to come   Find out more over on: https://insights.aecom.com/insights/talking-infrastucture Useful links:  Come and work for AECOM: discover the recruitment opportunities here: https://acm.to/aecom-jobs Thought Leadership - https://acm.to/Lessons-from-the-Natural-Capital-Laboratory-on-connecting-nature-and-business Project -  https://acm.to/FIDIC-and-WWF-Playbook Project- https://acm.to/Building-climate-resilience Department of Transport’s Sectoral Adaptation Plan (T-SAP II) – a tailored plan assessing infrastructure across all transport modes and how governments and communities can effectively plan and deliver climate-resilience infrastructure (systematic level resilience)  Report – Royal Meteorological Society research report on climate impacts on energy sector (AECOM research report published at end of October). Connect with us on social:  https://www.linkedin.com/company/aecom/  https://www.instagram.com/aecom/