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The 800 Million Pound Train Station, a documentary on the making of the new St Pancras train station now showing on BBC2, has been gripping. Not really because of the scale and the ambition of the project but due to the access the cameras have had to the team involved. It's extremely rare to have such a warts and all view of the construction process, and confirms a lot of industry cliches: the precious and pompous architect, the stressed out but hard-nosed contractor, the feckless subbie etc etc. But in spite of the tantrums, tears and bust-ups it presents an industry that is (largely) honest, hard-working, passionate and determined.
Yet you also see an industry still in need of change. Does the project director Claire Carr really need to work seven day weeks to complete the project? Does the process itself really ensure the way the end product is achieved is the most efficient one possible. One quote for me stood out, from George the client's inspector. "It (contracting) is a game," he says. "It's like three dimensional chess." He was discussing the to-ing and fro-ing between client and contractor in passing work, which was excellently presented in last night's episode of what has now become construction's leading soap opera. All very entertaining for a TV show but probably not the best advert for how the industry works.
Mace chairman described the industry still being hampered by the "curse of fragmentation" at the annual JCT Povey Lecture last week. "There remains the old chestnut of the divide between design and construction, as well as the multiplicity of organisations which have to be brought together and orchestrated into a single team to achieve even the most straightforward of projects," he said. It's an old chestnut but one that still needs breaking.
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