INDUSTRY OUTLOOK
“WHEN WE’RE SPEAKING SPECIFICALLY ABOUT INFRASTRUCTURE PROJECTS, IT’S NOT JUST ONE PROJECT, IT’S NOT ONE PROGRAM, IT’S HUNDREDS OF PROJECTS THAT ARE INTERDEPENDENTLY LINKED.” as soon as possible and putting mitigation strategies in place upfront, rather than reacting later when problems are already baked into design, contracts or schedules. London and Paris are also held up as examples of strong integrated planning and coordination. Duplicated works, clashing schedules, inconsistent procurement, mismanaged interfaces and more were all prevented by tight planning, sequencing and governance. THE OPPORTUNITIES Despite the findings, Shelley says it’s not all doom and gloom. He says the recent London and Paris games have demonstrated the biggest opportunity of all for Brisbane, to create a lasting infrastructure impact that will benefit the
community for decades to come. WT sees the next five to six years as an opportunity to “change gears” and establish a new normal for southeast Queensland – one built on resilient, well‑planned infrastructure that can support a larger population, stronger health and education systems, and a more productive economy long after the Games are over. Beyond the infrastructure itself, Shelley adds that the state has a great opportunity to set the standard for the delivery of major scale infrastructure moving forward. “The state’s approach, which could include productivity commission outcomes, risk models, bundling, and stance on delivery could set the blueprint for how Australia operates in that mega infrastructure space for the next while,” he says. “We’ve been around for 76 years, and we’ve worked across most of the major projects. We know what it takes to deliver these projects, and we’ve got that in‑house expertise to be able to deliver the best quality outcome.” To read the full report, visit: wtpartnership. com.au/insights/from-vision-to-legacy-agame-plan-for-brisbane-2032-and-beyondreport/. It’s expected that the infrastructure delivered for the Games will leave a legacy for future growth and project development throughout Queensland.
Images: WT
THE CHALLENGES Just one of the key challenges is the sustained labour shortage, stemming from the COVID pandemic and enduring economic challenges being felt nationally and sector-wide. Analysis conducted by WT, as part of its report, forecasts a rolling three-year average construction labour shortage of 27,200 workers in 2026-27, 43,400 in 2027-28 and 46,000 in 2028-29. One obvious aspect that’s placing even greater strain on the current workforce is the spread of demand. “All of these different government entities have massive pipelines of work, so they’re all trying to vie for the same resource pool and same contracting pool,” Shelley says. “Queensland’s market faces a fundamental step change in the availability of labour and plant. That means traditional delivery models that worked at a smaller capacity level aren’t enough for a program made up of hundreds of projects.” Such demand, as well as other factors, are contributing to price and risk profile escalation, creating greater uncertainty for contractors. WT’s report points to the pipeline’s success depending on integrated planning across agencies, smarter bundling of work, and new ways of working – including digital tools and artificial intelligence – to keep costs, schedules and interfaces under tight control. This includes the potential of more dynamic, on‑the‑fly budgeting and programming rather than milestone‑based schedules. As Shelley explains, it doesn’t help that these issues are exasperated by the large volume of concurrent works that are taking place across the entire project program. “When we’re speaking specifically about infrastructure projects, it’s not just one project, it’s not one program, it’s hundreds of projects that are interdependently linked,” he says. “The risk is that if one project fails, there’s a misalignment across that whole program, and therefore you end up with duplicated works, or you end up with clashing schedules or inconsistent procurement or mismanaged interfaces.” These are similar to the challenges faced by developers of the recent London and Paris games, both of which offer key learnings that can be incorporated into the current Olympic infrastructure delivery. More specifically, both London and Paris show the importance of early risk reduction, understanding the major risks on projects
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