The Institute of Public Works Engineering Australasia (IPWEA) and the Infrastructure Sustainability Council of Australia (ISCA) have been working together since 2012. IPWEA has partnered with ISCA to identify how the IS Scheme can benefit local councils.
For many local councils, roads are their largest asset class, and road maintenance is consequently the largest operational activity.
Therefore the first collaborative project explored the IS Scheme’s applicability for road operations and maintenance.
IPWEA and ISCA are currently scoping out the next projects exploring and testing how the IS rating tool can be used to benefit local council capital works planning, delivery, operations and maintenance programmes.
To publicly recognise and communicate this ongoing partnership, and also to formalise the collaboration between the two peak bodies, ISCA and IPWEA signed a Memorandum of Understanding in December 2013.
“Local councils around Australia were very involved in the early stages of defining and developing the IS Scheme” indicates Antony Sprigg, ISCA CEO. “It was a Local Council waste water capital works project which secured the first IS Design Rating early in 2013. We hope to see the partnership with IPWEA result in the public works sector further leveraging the IS Scheme to assist with reducing planning and operational costs, maximizing operational performance, improving social license and reducing environmental footprints associated with council infrastructure capital works planning, delivery and operations.”
Chris Champion, CEO with IPWEA, sees sustainability as a critical consideration for public works professionals. “We need to make sustainability an objective in everything that we do. Two of our key initiatives in 2014 are collaboration with ISCA and our upcoming Sustainability in Public Works conference. Our focus is on practical solutions that can be implemented today to safeguard our infrastructure, services and communities for tomorrow.”