Crossrail was one of the first UK projects to successfully deploy value capture tools as a key part of its funding strategy. Its land value capture policy has contributed in excess of £1 billion towards the project’s capital costs and in turn reset many other client’s aspirations to follow similar policies.
Key to maximising value capture is to put in place a clear strategy at the earliest possible stage of a project’s life cycle, thus ensuring that the right supporting legislation, governance and regulation is in place to enable the strategy. Crossrail’s client team led all negotiations directly with developers, creating and then managing all the subsequent commercial agreements, not only maximising benefits to the project purse, but also ensuring that the deals created a win-win for both the public and private sectors.
Additional benefits included the construction of Canary Wharf and Woolwich station boxes, whilst the developers created high quality commercial and retail space together with adjacent housing. These transport-oriented developments (TODs) have helped deliver on Crossrail’s promise to lead on urban renewal and regeneration. This can be seen clearly at Tottenham Court Road Station with the arrival of Crossrail driving this part of the city to provide improved public and private facilities.
Crossrail International’s Expert Adviser, Land Value Capture (LVC) and Transit-Oriented Developments/Communities (TOD/TOC), is Ian Lindsay. Ian is a chartered surveyor and urban development and regeneration specialist with over 30 years of experience delivering complex, mixed-use property development, land value capture and transit-oriented development solutions in infrastructure, commercial and public buildings sectors.
As Land and Property Director at Crossrail, he delivered one of the most complex compulsory purchase programmes ever undertaken in the UK, managed the acquired Crossrail estate and put in place the design, planning and commercial contracts to capture £500 million of value via 3.5 million square feet of transit-oriented developments (TODs).
As Expert Adviser, Ian has provided specialist advice for several rail megaprojects around the world, including the Tel Aviv Metro in Israel; Infrastructure Ontario’s Subway Expansion Programme in Toronto, Canada; and the Sydney Metro in New South Wales, Australia.
