About
Crossrail International (CI) is a specialist advisory practice, wholly owned by the UK government’s Department for Transport (DfT), that provides strategic advice globally to client organisations developing and delivering complex rail schemes.
CI’s robust advice and support helps clients successfully navigate the complex political, economic and social challenges and opportunities that large infrastructure investments face, unlocking the full potential of their rail infrastructure schemes, creating opportunities to drive sustainable growth, and delivering triple bottom line social, environmental and financial benefits.
Our Mission
Our mission, supported by the DfT as our sole shareholder, is:
- To help clients around the world unlock the full potential of their rail infrastructure schemes, thus enabling the provision of world-class transport networks that drive sustainable growth for businesses and communities.
- To support the transfer of innovation, good practice and lessons learned between client organisations drawing on our own experience and that of our partners.
- To facilitate the profile-raising of the UK’s wide-ranging specialist skills and capabilities in a globally competitive market and contribute to the UK government’s export strategy.
Our history
CI was established on 12 September 2017 to enable clients globally greater access to the significant body of knowledge, skills and expertise that has been created during the lifetime of Crossrail, the project to deliver a new railway for London and the South East of England known as the Elizabeth line, one of the world’s most spectacular rail projects.
Our structure
CI is a UK government ‘Arm’s Length Body’ wholly owned by the UK government’s Department for Transport (DfT). Our Sponsor is The Rt. Hon. Louise Haigh MP, Secretary of State for Transport, supported by Mike Kane MP, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Transport. Oversight is provided by DfT shareholder and client sponsor teams.
Board of Directors
Keith has over 40 years of experience in the rail industry, including 20 years’ leadership experience at executive board level. He was appointed Chairman of Crossrail International in June 2021. Keith has held senior positions in the public transport sector, including the Merseyrail (Serco/Abellio JV), Serco Caledonian Sleeper and Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR) franchises and is currently a non-executive director of Dublin Bus and Scottish Autism.
Michèle is a chartered civil engineer with over 40 years of experience in transport and land use planning, public transport and traffic engineering and research in the UK and overseas, ranging from strategy development to detailed scheme design and implementation. She is one of the Commissioners of the National Infrastructure Commission and until recently was Managing Director of Crossrail 2, a proposed new US$39 billion railway route providing a North-South rail link across London, with responsibility for both developing the project, and gaining funding and powers for it.
Jon is a chartered quantity surveyor with over 35 years of experience in the UK infrastructure sector. In his role as Director of Infrastructure, Enterprise and Growth at the Infrastructure and Projects Authority (IPA), the government’s centre of expertise for infrastructure and major projects, he is responsible for setting the overall strategic direction and leadership for the delivery of the Government’s critical projects and programmes.
Paul is a chartered civil engineer with over 30 years of experience in global infrastructure. He has extensive experience in setting up, running and assuring large-scale, multi-stakeholder infrastructure portfolios, programmes and projects throughout the Americas, UK, Europe, Middle East, Asia and Oceania. Paul specialises in providing assurance, transformational change, project management office (PMO), risk, commercial and digital advisory services.
Leadership Team
CI is led by Chief Executive Officer, Paul Dyson. Paul is responsible to DfT for the establishment and running of the specialist transport infrastructure advisory practice. A chartered civil engineer with over 35 years of experience in global infrastructure, he has extensive experience in setting up, running and assuring large-scale, multi-stakeholder infrastructure portfolios, programmes and projects throughout the Americas, UK, Europe, Africa, Middle East, Asia and Oceania.
Paul is supported by a team that manages operations, marketing and business development, and government stakeholder relations, with the company’s core expertise provided by over 40 expert Crossrail alumni, all specialists in their respective fields.
Expert Advisers
CI’s unique insights are made possible through our specialist advisers who have held senior executive, management and technical roles on the Crossrail project. Our team of expert advisers draw on innovative delivery frameworks and accompanying tools and systems created during the life cycle of Crossrail, many of which are now recognised as UK ‘good practice’.
Our experts also draw on their extensive experience gained on other UK megaprojects, including the Channel Tunnel Rail Link, High Speed 1 (HS1); Heathrow Airport Terminal 5; London 2012 Summer Olympics; Thames Tideway Scheme; and High Speed 2 (HS2), as well as many international megaprojects.
Expertise
Our key areas of expertise provide a unique service offering, drawing on lessons learned from the Crossrail project and how, as a client organisation, Crossrail Limited dealt with the many challenges it encountered.
Our range of knowledge, skills and expertise includes:
- Acoustics, Noise and Vibration
- Archaeology and Cultural Heritage
- Capacity and Capability Building
- Change Management
- Commercial and Procurement
- Community Relations and Engagement
- Corporate and Public Affairs
- Digital Transformation and Strategy
- Governance, Funding and Financing
- Infrastructure Maintenance, Renewals and Operations
- Knowledge Transfer and Learning Legacy
- Land Value Capture and Transit-Oriented Development/Communities
- Major Programme/Project Delivery
- Mechanical, Electrical and Public Health (MEP) Systems
- Operational Concepts and Interoperability
- Operational Readiness and Bringing Into Service
- Operations and Maintenance
- Organisational Design
- Planning and Scheduling
- Power Distribution and Networks
- Programme Assurance, Gateway Reviews and Business Case Reviews
- Programme and Project Controls
- Programme Initiation and Business Case Development
- Programme/Project Leadership
- Quality Management
- Railway Systems
- Risk Management
- Rolling Stock and Depots
- Route Protection and Safeguarding
- Signalling Control and Telecommunications
- Skills, Employment and Education
- Social Sustainability (Including Equality, Diversity and Inclusion)
- Stakeholder Engagement and Public Consultation
- Station Architecture
- Supply Chain Management
- Sustainability and Net Zero
- Systems Assurance
- Systems Integration
- Systems Safety Assurance
- Transport Planning and Economics
- Tunnelling
- Universal Design
Facts and Figures
Crossrail was the project to deliver the Elizabeth line, the most significant addition to London’s transport network in a generation, running for over 100 kilometres from Reading and Heathrow in the west, through 42 kilometres of new tunnels under central London, to Shenfield and Abbey Wood in the east. The new line includes 10 new stations at Paddington, Bond Street, Tottenham Court Road, Farringdon, Liverpool Street, Whitechapel, Canary Wharf, Custom House, Woolwich and Abbey Wood.
New state-of-art trains are now carrying over 200 million passengers a year. The new service is transforming life and travel in London and the South East, reducing journey times, increasing central London’s rail capacity by 10%, transforming accessibility, and bringing an extra 1.5 million people to within 45 minutes of central London.
Building upon experience from previous projects including High Speed 1 (HS1), Heathrow Terminal 5 and the London 2012 Olympics, The Crossrail delivery organisation developed world-class expertise in major infrastructure delivery from the initiation stage through to delivery and commissioning, and it is this expertise and reputation that Crossrail International is founded upon.
The project was undertaken in one Europe’s busiest and most complex cities, with a hugely complex stakeholder environment and over 40 work sites embedded within existing communities. Its management of stakeholder relations successfully kept London moving through nine years of construction – including its hosting of the 2012 Olympics – as work proceeded on the doorsteps of millions of workers, residents, tourists, businesses and homes.
Crossrail has delivered positive social, economic and environmental change to the communities along the route, as well as nationally. The project is predicted to provide £42 billion of benefits to the UK economy and to support the delivery of over 57,000 new homes along the length of the route.
The project created over 1,000 apprenticeships, and built a tunnelling and underground construction academy (the only one of its type in Europe) to train its 14,000-strong workforce. In addition Europe’s largest man-made nature reserve in the Thames Estuary was created using spoil removed from its tunnels.
Innovation, good practice and lessons learned from the Crossrail project
Documented examples are available to all stakeholders
Knowledge Sharing and Lessons Learned
Since its inception, CI has been hosting visiting delegations from interested international transport clients to view key features of the project. This initiative, which includes visits to view key features of the Crossrail project, is part of the increasingly active global knowledge sharing ethos that enables clients to exchange ideas, innovations, good practice and lessons learned, helping to improve the deliverability of major, complex infrastructure projects around the world – unlocking cities globally.
In addition to working closely with our UK partners, we are also afforded support from other related UK government departments and partnerships, notably the Department for International Trade (DIT); Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO); Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS); UK Export Finance (UKEF), and Infrastructure Exports: UK (IE:UK), as they seek to help promote and finance British trade and investment around the world.
