Megaprojects - KPMG

UP FRONT
Time changes
everything
Megaprojects often bring with them
mega-challenges. Cost and time overruns,
obsolete technology, shifting
political support and turbulent economic
conditions are all frequent horror
stories that emerge from the annals of
megaproject delivery.
But, as Bent Flyvbjerg notes in his
interview on page 12, almost all of these
big challenges ultimately boil down to one
thing: time. Given that most megaprojects
require a decade – some much more – to
complete, the passage of time clearly has
a major impact on the eventual success
of megaprojects.
The more time between planning
and delivery, the more likely that new
challenges and complexities will arise.
Technology changes every few years,
political priorities evolve on an almost
weekly basis, and economic cycles rise
and fall with the subtlety of a bull in a
china shop.
Yet the human brain is not particularly
equipped to prophesize future trends and
disruptions. Even the most imaginative
megaproject designer can’t know all of
the changes that will occur in the world
throughout the asset’s life-cycle. So rather
than making huge and unquantifiable
guesses, many infrastructure owners
and planners are instead focusing on
developing strategies to help ‘futureproof’
their designs to flex with the
changes that will almost certainly occur;
undoubtedly a more achievable and
sensible goal.
Take technological change, for example.
Rather than going to ‘bleeding edge’
technology, many megaproject planners
are instead demanding proven and tested
technology that can inter-operate with
future systems. Similarly, changes in the
political arena can often be mitigated by
creating robust regulatory regimes and
independent infrastructure bodies that
have the authority to move ahead with
development through the political cycles.
Within this publication, we have included
a number of projects that exemplify
this new, more flexible approach to
megaproject development. Queensland’s
Reconstruction Authority (page 30)
is a great example of how an independent
authority can cut through the complexity
of politics and administrative red tape
to achieve great things. UK’s Crossrail
program (page 48) mixes tried and
tested technology with a handful of
new innovations to ensure the line serves
Londoners well into the future. Mexico’s
planned tourist city (page 56) plans to tap
into a wide mix of investors to smooth
out economic cycles.
But megaproject participants must be
warned: trying to identify and respond
to all of the potential changes can often
lead to project paralysis. The trick here
is to do whatever possible to futureproof
the project, identify the most
disruptive future trends and focus on
taking a holistic approach to design and
delivery. What happens after that, only
time will tell.
Megaprojects | INSIGHT | 9