In message , at
14:49:51 on Sat, 13 Jul 2019, michael adams
remarked:

Mayor Sadiq Khan strengthened the scrutiny powers of Jacobs to reveal
problems with Crossrail and increase the project's transparency.

Is he trying to distance himself from the project's failings,
despite being in charge
the last three and a bit years?

Being in charge ?

Anyone capable of taking overall charge of the largest infrastructure
project in Europe would command a far higher salary and have far
fewer extraneous responsibilities, than does the elected Mayor of
London.

You are confusing strategic and operational.

Or put the other way, as with most levels in politics anyone capable
of taking overall charge of the largest infrastructure project in
Europe - or any aspect therein come to that wouldn't touch any such
elected position with a bargepole.

The Mayor's entire role is to be in charge politically and
strategically. Otherwise he
simply disappears in a puff of logic.

But the reasons the project has been delayed are purely operational.

The strategy was to hire contractors capable - as far as anyone could
judge of fulfilling their particular contracts on time and within
budget.

If the contractors failed to fulfil their contract on time and within
budget this will have for purely operational reasons which they failed
to consider when tendering for the project.

Or are you suggesting Khan should have chosen different contractors ?

I'm suggesting he should have had people monitoring what the contractors
were doing, and more to the point monitoring how well the TfL people
supposed to be managing the contractors were doing.

If only because as in this instance with Kahn, they'd only lay
themselves open to ill-informed and tendentious criticism from craven
opportunists such as yourself.

I bet I'm more qualified than you to comment on this scenario,

So how many such major infrastructure projects have you been personally
involved in then Roland ?

Several. That's my original day-job.

given your total confusion over roles displayed above.

As the self proclaimed expert on the subject would you like
to hazard a guess, historically speaking, as to the percentage
of such major infrastructure projects that have ever been completed
on time and within budget ?

False dichotomy. First of all you have to arrive at a sensible
time/budget prediction, and then monitor how it's going. Sometimes they
over-run, but you need to know about it a great deal sooner than has
happened on Crossrail.

And the only opportunity I'm looking for is a ride on Crossrail,
which is looking vaguer and vaguer all the time.

That's as good an excuse as any for lashing out blindly, I suppose.

I'm critiquing based on my project management experience.

Although rather more familiarity with the chequered history
of all such projects should perhaps have dampemned your
enthusiasm somewhat.

The real question is, why didn't it dampen, much sooner, the enthusiasm
of people who should have been able to see it was running so much later
than claimed.

"A delay to the project only first became public in the summer of last
year, just weeks before the railway was supposed to open in December
2018" https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-47967766

Now predicted to be 2021 or later.

Some of it is really simple, such as:

"Software to allow trains to run on the new Crossrail line does not yet
exist and vital equipment is not in place, five months after the
crisis-hit project was meant to have opened, bosses have admitted."

It doesn't take a genius to ask a question like "has the software needed
to run the trains been delivered yet?".
--
Roland Perry