Australia’s population is growing fast. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, it will increase to more than 28 million people by 2031. And in that year, as a nation we will be investing $377 billion annually in infrastructure to support this growth (up from $187 billion in 2011).

Ensuring that infrastructure investment meets the service level requirements of growing communities with changing demographics is a significant challenge. There is increased pressure on infrastructure managers to create infrastructure networks that support a high-quality, first-world standard of living for our future communities.

Australia’s current government has acknowledged the need for improved infrastructure networks, last year appointing a Minister for Cities and the Built Environment. Although Minister Jamie Briggs resigned on December 29, 2015, the portfolio, now under the command of Environment Minister Greg Hunt, remains an important tool in securing the future connectivity of our cities.

The Minister is charged with delivering on a 20-minute commute promise – that is, ensuring no important destination in major urban areas – such as offices, schools or shops – is greater than 20 minutes away by foot, bicycle or public transport. And this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the broader infrastructure challenges we will face as the population grows and changes.

The demands of a changing population will require infrastructure managers to be more astute about how they allocate available funds for asset infrastructure investment, and manage the delivery of resulting programs and projects. After all, the infrastructure needs of today will be different to those of the future, with demographic and population changes requiring myriad complex infrastructure networks – from electricity and water networks to new roads, better public transport and the expansion of the Australian communications network, to name just the headline items.

Growing pains: What’s holding us back?

Effective long-term infrastructure planning is a multidimensional process that requires a lot of asset knowledge – information such as level-of-service, condition and capacity metrics, for example. Currently, infrastructure planners are being held back from conducting the required modelling, prioritisation and optimisation processes because a common platform for managing this information does not typically exist within organisations.

Similarly, when you move to project delivery, having timely access to infrastructure planning information, in conjunction with a sound project management system to control key metrics – such as those related to cost, scheduling, resources, forecasts and contractors – can heavily influence project success.

In fact, 48% of projects, both private and public, “fail to meet their baseline time, cost and quality objectives”, largely due to lack of timely, accurate planning information.

And when construction is complete, organisations require a systematic approach to commission, capitalise and hand over assets to the operations and maintenance department.

The pressure is mounting for a better way to ensure we can achieve Australia’s 20-minute commute, and beyond.

A better way to plan for the future

 

Ensuring we are making better investment decisions about our infrastructure will require sophisticated data systems to manage asset information across the asset lifecycle, from a common platform across an organisation. 

It is the lack of an integrated, lifecycle–based approach to asset planning, delivery and management that is holding us back from delivering the right infrastructure to meet the demands of our changing population.

An integrated approach provides greater transparency and performance of assets across their lifecycle by breaking down knowledge silos and process inefficiencies that traditionally exist when different business units use different systems to maintain discrete business processes.

As the Australian population grows, infrastructure owners need a way to manage processes such as modelling, planning, funding, project delivery, commissioning and operations using one integrated system, to better allocate available funds and manage program and project delivery effectively – especially if we are to meet challenges such as the ‘20 minute commute’.

Author:
Luke Fleming, Industry Manager for Project Intensive Industries, TechnologyOne
Luke has worked in Asset and Project Management enterprises for over 15 years. He has extensive experience in the mining, construction, civil engineering and engineering services industries both in Australia and internationally. Luke’s current position is Industry Manager for Project Intensive industries. Within these industries, Luke has a sound understanding of the challenges facing these industries as well as extensive experience with both their business and system processes. Having worked both on the solution provider and client side throughout his career, Luke has a sound understanding of both the business and system processes within his industries of expertise.