Ultimately, this also meant that we could deliver a reduction in the operating deficit for Metro to the government.
“The upshot of this is that we have developed a twenty year asset renewal plan and now have a revenue support plan agreed with government for the next nine years, along with an agreed investment plan for the next eleven in total. This is really good news, as it means that we have secured sufficient funding for Metro for the long term and that funding is enough to allow us to invest in the network, to ensure that it maintained and improved on a planned and efficient basis.”
Work on the Metro network has now been ongoing for sometime now, with many different projects all running at the same time, including works to station, track asset, along with bridges and tunnels.
“From an investment point of view, work will now begin in earnest with the first part of this
Oct/Nov 10
being a blockade in February and March 2011, which will be the first time that we will have ever had a complete closure of all or at least part of the Metro network, to allow us to undertake engineering work.
“One of the main issues which we have faced in the past when we have wanted to undertake major engineering works was that we have only ever had a very short ‘wheels free time’ available to us because last train gets into the depot at around 1am and the first train leaves at around half past four.
“This initial blockade with occur between Chillingham Road and North Shields, lasting for about four weeks. This will allow us to carry out all of the engineering work which we think is necessary on that stretch of line, which includes things like cable renewals, permanent way renewals, work to embankments, cuttings and to the stations.
“This will mean that when we
come out of that blockade we will effectively have a new railway along that stretch of the network and that, apart from routine maintenance, we will not have to go back to that section for a long time.
“One of the issues which we had in the past with regards to maintenance was that we didn’t know enough about our assets and so part of this process over the next nine years will be accumulating that knowledge about our assets so that we can get to a position where we can predict what the optimum time will be to maintain and then to renew an asset. At the moment we are having to do this on a case by case basis and the section of line which we have concentrated the most on is one of the oldest.”
Given the current fragile state of funding around the transport sector, every organisation is looking to reduce its spending, whilst also ensuring that everything that is spent provides value for money.
“Ultimately we will be able to extract efficiencies because, firstly, we will carrying far less emergency repair work and far more planned maintenance and, secondly, we will be adopting more modern working methods, along with the benefits of having new assets and tools. This means that over time we will be able to generate more and more efficiencies as we go forward.
“With regards to maintaining efficiency on the refurbishment project itself, we have put a lot of effort into the planning and management of the work itself and have established a programme management office.
“This means that we will have a proactive process where we can check and challenge what the project managers are telling us, allowing us to monitor both physical and financial progress. When we do experience deviations to that we can take appropriate action, before it becomes a problem.”
rtm51
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