Article from BTNews 11 NOVEMBER 2019
High-tech tracking for Heathrow expansion
A state-of-the-art centralised tracking system set to become the nerve centre for the Heathrow expansion project was unveiled by the airport last week. The system will connect the project’s UK-wide network of offsite construction hubs.
Siemens Digital Logistics pitched the idea as part of the Heathrow Innovation Partners process – a search for partners to help to deliver the expanded airport efficiently, affordably and sustainably.
It involves technology tracking in real time the millions of component parts that will make up the expanded airport, enabling the final four logistics hubs now in process of being selected to work in unison throughout construction.
The complex Heathrow expansion programme is pioneering the large-scale use of offsite construction, which the airport says will kick-start the jobs and economic growth expansion is set to bring.
The Innovation Partner search is just one of the ways the airport is looking to spread the benefits of expansion across the UK while mitigating the project’s impact on communities local to Heathrow.
The airport has been looking since 2017 for communities keen to become logistics hubs – construction centres that pre-assemble parts of the expanded airport offsite before transporting them to west London in consolidated loads as they are needed.
(See also Southern Access scheme moves forward in this issue).
www.siemens-digital-logistics.com
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