This is the third and final episode of our three-part special looking at the delivery of megaprojects. In this episode we examine the lessons learned from two of the most iconic tunnelling projects of recent times: London’s Crossrail and New York’s East Side Access.

Crossrail was the largest infrastructure project in Europe. Weaving in and out of the spaghetti of existing assets under central London occupied the best efforts of the British tunnelling industry for much of the early 2010’s. The project is a new east-west link through London and will see the first new line added to the London Underground in decades: The Elizabeth Line.

East Side Access in New York is another rail route that extends the Long Island Light Rail Road in Queens to a new station under Grand Central Terminal in Manhattan. Of particular note are the twin station caverns… each of these cathedral-like structures are 350m long, 30m high and 25m wide.

If you would like to listen to the previous episodes first, the links are:

For the first episode, click here.

For the second episode, click here.

Guests

Colin Lawrence, Global Tunnel Practice Leader – Tunnelling, Mott MacDonald

Mark Leggett, Key Account Leader – HS2, Mott MacDonald

Resources

New Dimensions to Delivery is a report from April 2020 that looks at the role the role of collaboration and technology in improving asset delivery and the performance of infrastructure in use.

Partner

Mott MacDonald is a global engineering, management and development consultancy. Its purpose is to improve society by considering social outcomes in everything they do, relentlessly focusing on excellence and digital innovation, transforming their clients’ businesses, our communities and employee opportunities.