According to the UK Olympic Delivery Authority, ‘transport plans were a key factor in London winning the right to host the London 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic Games' (ODA, 2006). Indeed, from the outset, the informal objective was that ‘sport – not transport' should dominate the headlines (Emmerson, 2012).
The four London 2012 papers in this issue of Transport demonstrate how the exceptional demands on London's transport system were organised, integrated and delivered so that transport played its role in the success of the 2012 games. They complement three previous ICE Proceedings articles and papers on how the unprecedented transport challenge was overcome by the civil engineering profession (Gooch, 2007; Sumner, 2011; Vicat and Rooney, 2012).
The initial process of identifying the portfolio of transport projects to be put in place is given in the paper by Kershaw (2012). This paper continues to outline the development of the budget, the programme assurance governance, the transition from infrastructure projects to operations and the management of health, safety and sustainability. A description is given of a multi-layered assurance regime put in place to ensure quality outcomes in timely fashion. An outline structure for transport governance within the overall governance for the Olympic Games is provided, with discussion of how a ‘light on process, heavy on performance' approach drove the programme forward to unusually early completion of all capital projects – more than a year before the 2012 games
A central tool in the development of the Olympic transport plan was that of travel demand forecasting, the focus of Dosunmu (2012). The paper describes how a combination of tried and tested models, with innovations and adaptations where necessary, were employed to deal with the uncertainties in travel demand for the games. A series of bespoke tools were developed including models for games family demand forecasting, spectator and workforce demand forecasting and modelling existing commuter volumes. The scope of the modelling exercise described illustrates how the ability for stakeholders to have high quality information to inform the decision-making process was seen as fundamental to success.
The paper by Emmerson (2012) describes the process of delivering transport for the games and sets out the key lessons learned. The process described is focused on minimum intervention overlaid with a bespoke holistic programme of service and infrastructure enhancements primarily around public transport. The author outlines how this allowed numerous transport operators to play their part for the games, without disrupting established processes and on-going responsibilities. The paper concludes with a valuable series of lessons learned, not the least being the need to acknowledge that this was far from ‘business as usual' – a bespoke and integrated response was needed to dovetail with the existing transport provision.
The final themed paper is by Sumner (2012), exploring the legacy of the UK Olympic Delivery Authority transport programme and positioning it within the history of transformational transport investment in London over the past 150 years. The author includes a retrospective on the austerity games of 1948 and how the transport legacy of the London 2012 games fit into the long history of public transport in London. However the main message elaborated in the paper is that of the massive contribution of the 2012 games to the transport system for future generations, classed here as both a physical legacy and ‘soft' legacy.
Turning towards decision support in the operation and maintenance of the strategic network, the paper by Costello et al. (2012) addresses the need for a nationally consistent approach to performance management for the operational regions for the strategic road network. These are currently managed by separate managing agent contractors (MACs), with some inconsistencies in how performance is reported and managed. The framework outlined in the paper incorporates a weighting system to reflect the relative priorities of the Highways Agency. Whilst MACs stand to benefit from clear scoring guidance and improved feedback, the strategic benefit is in the linking of operational activity with key business outcomes and ultimately, benefits for travellers and business.
Guler (2012) reports on a new decision support tool for use in decision making for railway maintenance and renewal and based on geographic information systems (GIS). The paper describes how the system contains a rich maintenance and renewal rule database but also draws on inputs from existing data collection processes. The system has been demonstrated with a conventional railway track and the first stretch of high speed railway in Turkey. The additional GIS user interface provides added value to the decision makers in a context where efficient and timely plans for maintenance and renewal are critical.
Lastly Bhargava et al. (2012) research a model for the permeability of asphalt mix – an important consideration in asphalt mix design. For conventional asphalt pavements low permeability is desirable for the asphalt layer whereas for porous asphalt pavement some degree of permeability is needed for water to seep through the pavement. The paper describes development of a simple numerical model to estimate the permeability of asphalt mixes by taking into account the interconnectivity between the air voids. The success of the model is reported by correlating with experimental observations from three asphalt mix samples.
