Wales and Borders Franchise bid support

MTR Europe was bidding to Transport for Wales (TfW) for a 15-year franchise to run the Welsh railway network, including the management of the infrastructure and systems for the Core Valley Lines (CVL) which Network Rail / Department for Transport would hand over to TfW.

​

MTR asked Cadenza to lead a small team of discipline experts to develop and write the responses to the infrastructure asset management sections of the bid, including developing fixed, firm and emerging cost estimates for the management of the assets over the franchise. 

​

During the bid, Cadenza identified ways of analysing limited, poor quality data to inform commercial decisions with clear indication of pricing confidence. 

​

Our approach illustrated how we could use remote condition monitoring data including existing and anticipated future AI capabilities to improve decisions.

​

Cadenza created a ground-breaking innovative ‘objectives-led’ approach to asset maintenance prioritisation.

​

Using a sample data set of CVL bridges to demonstrate the concept, our process provided an objective assessment of asset health, steady state, Benefit Cost Ratio, and impact of the interventions (or lack of them) on safety and performance at unit, group or portfolio levels.

​

Cadenza showed a clear line of sight from stakeholder objectives for the infrastructure (such as safety, performance etc.) to prioritisation of maintenance interventions.

​

The model was able to automatically reprioritise interventions within a dynamically variable budget to maximise the desired outcomes. 

​

We could then position asset management as a business investment rather than a liability, including demonstrating the optimum investment level rather than simply extrapolating budgets based on the previous year.

​

Although the MTR bid as a whole was not successful, the asset management section Cadenza led scored the highest marks of the bidders.