Fisher German has a wide range of expertise in representing utilities and infrastructure clients who assets are impacted by road schemes, and we are expecting demand for these services to grow.
Our national utilities and infrastructure team is expecting to see more road schemes come to fruition in the coming years after the March Budget confirmed that £600bn will be invested in transport and industry over the next five years.
This, along with work progressing on major projects such as HS2 - where we are actively involved in diverting more than 30 different pipelines - means that more utility diversions will need to be actioned as a consequence.
We have worked on a number of large-scale projects, each ensuring the assets of our utility clients including those in water and sewage, gas and electricity, are maintained and are accessible both during and after the work.
We dealt with HS1, where our client had 37 pipeline diversions, as well as road schemes across the UK, which included the A2 and M2 realignment and widening, Sheppey Bridge construction and the East Kent access road, the A6 Manchester Airport Relief Road and the A14 Cambridge to Huntingdon Improvement Scheme.
We are currently working with utility clients on the Lower Thames Crossing - a Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project (NSIP) currently under review which includes the longest road tunnel in the UK stretching 2.6 miles, as well as 14.3 miles of new roads and associated bridges and viaducts.
Giles Lister, Head of Utilities and Infrastructure at Fisher German, said: “We have worked with our utility clients on a wide range of transport schemes – some spanning several years.
“Collaboration is key, and it’s very important that we actively engage with our clients at the early stage of a scheme so that the relevant rights are put in place to protect their assets.
“Working with clients from the start of the project means that we are able to ensure that if there is a requirement to divert utility company assets the necessary agreements are in place with the Acquiring Authority and adjacent landowners that accommodate the company’s requirements.
“We work with the Acquiring Authority and contractors throughout the project to ensure that access to and the integrity of our clients’ assets is maintained and services to their customers are not lost.
“It’s extremely important that agreements put in place actually address the issues that will inevitably cause ongoing problems at the end of the project, ensuring that a utility company’s assets are protected in perpetuity.”
Further information on the services offered by our national team is available by contacting Giles Lister.
