The story of current UK infrastructure is one of ambition constantly plagued with red tape, complex planning processes and fragmented project delivery. Over the past few decades the country has tried to invest in its transport system, housing and energy yet most of these efforts have under delivered. These failures have cost money, time, public trust and a lack of confidence from investors on if the government can actually deliver on the projects it promises.
AECOM recently published a new report “Rebuilding Britain: Unlocking Growth From Uk’s Infrastructure Strategy” which offers a detailed roadmap and a way to navigate these problems in order to deliver high quality infrastructure and solve many of the issues that have continued to plague Britain’s infrastructure for decades. The report explores ten recommendations built around three strategic pillars in Unlocking Private investment, Embracing AI in infrastructure and Accelerating project delivery;
1. A national to regional planning framework
AECOM suggests a coordinated framework where national priorities and regulations are aligned with regional and local plans. The UK currently has different sectors and regions planning independently which has led to inefficiencies and duplication at times for example new housing developments are often approved way before transport or energy upgrades are planned or coordinated leading to congested roads and overstretched power networks. This framework would fix that by facilitating cross-sector integration where different types of infrastructure like energy, water and transport can be designed to work together rather than as isolated systems. It also encourages clustered infrastructures whereby related infrastructure projects are grouped in one area rather than spreading them out so that they can share resources like power, transport links and cooling systems improving efficiency and waste management.
2. Streamlining consenting and planning.
Consulting firms in the UK make millions with the biggest ones like WSP, Kier group and ARUP raking in billions per year. Now this isn’t their fault but they make a lot of money from UK’s major bottle necks and procurement systems which are slow and vulnerable. AECOM suggests cutting duplication in the environmental and technical assessments on projects, introducing clear timetables and milestones for major projects and piloting simplified consenting regimes. This would speed up approvals without sacrificing environmental standards.
3. Oversight for Infrastructure Policy
Most of the regulations governing UK infrastructure are let’s face it outdated, reactive and fragmented between departments and the reason for this is there isn’t dedicated oversight for the policy governing infrastructure. I wish I could go deeper on this topic but this article would then be 50 pages. AECOM suggests that to overcome this, A dedicated minister should be appointed to oversee all infrastructure policy. This would ensure alignment between departments, improve accountability and create a more unified approach in planning and delivery which would in turn overcome the fragmentation that has slowed infrastructure progress.
4. AI- enabled planning and Digital Transformation
The report suggests integrating AI tools early in project design which would optimize layouts, forecast risks and costs more accurately, reduce carbon waste and streamline decision making across the full project lifecycles. Additionally, it calls for what’s knowns as digital twins which are virtual replicas of the physical assets. These digital models would use real-time data to mirror performance and combines with AI could allow predictions for maintenance, fault detection and better energy management. Imagine a road network where predictions for surface repairs are made and completed before damage occurs.
Under its AI- First infrastructure delivery, they also call for a centralized and open infrastructure data platform called NISTA (National Infrastructure and service Transformation Authority). This would collect, manage and curate national infrastructure data sets where it can then be shared openly across government, industry, professionals and researchers. This would allow for innovation by medium-sized enterprises and research institutions, allow for faster decision making through shared intelligence, reduce duplication and errors from isolated systems. These suggestions would give the UK a digital nervous system that is smarter, faster and more accurate.
5. Re-imagining public-private partnerships/ pipeline Transparency
Public funding alone cannot cover the UK’s £725 billion infrastructure pipeline. Private investment is therefore key in delivering infrastructure but the current National Infrastructure Pipeline (NIP) and what investors actually need before they can commit their funds to these projects does not align. The NIP for example lists headline project names, sectors and indicative costs but leaves out important information like the project readiness and development stage, funding and financing structure, risk allocation and mitigation framework, expected returns and financial metrics, delivery timelines, etc all things that are very important to investors. The report therefore calls for modern public-private partnerships that are not only transparent but also flexible and fair. The new partnerships would balance risk and reward between government and investors, protect public value and ensure tax payer money delivers while also being flexible enough to adapt to changing technologies and markets. This would restore confidence in partnership based deliveries and attract high quality investors to long-tern UK projects.
6. Enhancing government capability and confidence
AECOM also suggests that even when commercial risk is transferred, political risk can still inhibit decisive action. To address this, the report recommends enhancing public sector capability which would transform departments into intelligent clients equipped with the technical literacy and AI driven decision making support tools such as the Nature Risk tool which would help depoliticize technical risk assessment accelerating infrastructure delivery. The data driven models would provide accurate insights reducing delays and improving confidence in approvals which would then improve confidence in investors to commit investment with greater certainty.
7. Investing in Good Design and Building Environmental Resilience.
The report calls for more investment in the earlier stages of design. It identifies that historically, investors have been discouraged from investing in design other than the functional requirements. This is because government contracts have always gone to the lowest bids designs rather than those optimized for long-term performance which has forced designers to produce good enough to build but not the best for life-cycle value. They point out that this should not be this way as infrastructure strategy and planning reforms now provide greater certainty in delivery and create conditions that are great for front-loaded design processes. This means spending more time and resources at the concept stage where design quality has a great impact on long term outcome.
By bringing designers, engineers, digital specialists and contractors early on this stage, projects can be de-risked before construction even begins streamlining project delivery and offering a more precise decision making strategy.
CONCLUSION
These issues are not a new discovery, everyone in the sector understands them well but what this report has done differently is provide a clear plan to fix these issues and restore the UK as the infrastructure giant it once was. This is a country that built the first trainline, the first iron bridge and once decided to build 32 towns from scratch and actually did it. By focusing on smarter planning, improved policy, early investment and AI integration, real progress could be made and could alter the way Britain approaches infrastructure. At the end of the day, the future won’t be built by committees or paperwork but by taking action and connecting ideas across sectors, the blueprint is there, all that’s left is to build.
post by Musa Nasser/ November 2025