Proactive Planning Support on £25M Urban Highway Works Reduced Delay and CE Backlog

After successfully completing the programming works for the first phase of a major bus route enhancement into the centre of one of the UK’s largest cities, Project Planning were invited to produce the tender programme for the next phase.

The scheme, valued at around £25M, covers around 30 km of highway improvement leading into this major city.  Our client was successful in winning the NEC4 contract and started work soon after. 

Urban realm schemes of this scale are typically subject to significant change, and this project was no exception.  With a Compensation Event (CE) rate greater than 1 per day it was necessary for Project Planning Ltd to step up support for this project.  While not every CE had a direct time impact, there were several each week requiring programme analysis and response.

Because our tender programmes are always prepared in sufficient detail to demonstrate the effect of change later, the project team were able to respond effectively as events unfolded. We were able to quickly identify the affected activities, model each change on the Accepted Programme, and issue CE support programmes under Clause 60 and Clause 62, enabling the commercial team to submit accurate and timely quotations.

All too often, projects fall behind in modelling Compensation Events and the planner and QS become overwhelmed with a backlog. In this instance, Project Planning Ltd maintained an up-to-date, transparent programme record throughout, ensuring that over 100 time-related CEs were fully assessed and evidenced.

Although the scheme has faced significant change, our proactive and structured planning support has allowed the project team to clearly demonstrate the causes of delay and maintain control of time-related risk – providing clarity to all parties under the NEC4 contract.

Project Planning Ltd are currently providing ongoing support to this live project.