Managing Track in Hot Weather UK v Australia

Speakers:

Andy Franklin, Honorary Life Member, PWI UK 

Andy’s career has been in railway civil engineering with much time in aspects of permanent way including plain line and S&C design, maintenance and renewals. Andy joined British Rail in 1973 as a Junior Technical Officer and retired from a role as Principal Project Engineer for Network Rail in 2024 after 50 years. He is, however, still active in the railway industry delivering training to the next generation of track engineers through the PWI.

Of relevance to the presentation Andy has much experience of managing track through the seasons as a technician and Track Maintenance Engineer and latterly as Route Asset Manager [Track] for Wales Route. He has been instrumental in developing standards for managing track in hot and cold weather and was a member of the standing working group evolving and developing the standards up to his retirement.

Today Andy will describe the key challenges, as he sees them, for hot weather management of track in the UK in the light of historic policy changes, changes to track access regimes, lack of long-term strategy and the industry structure today. He will finish with a brief look as what is being studied and developed to address these issues moving forward.

Phuoc Nguyen, PWI AUS

Phuoc Nguyen is an experienced Track/Civil Engineering leader with over 30 years of experience in railway infrastructure maintenance and asset management.

Currently serving as Senior Manager Track Engineering at Sydney Trains, Phuoc leads a high performing track engineering team and provide engineering services to network maintenance teams. He manages the integrity and reliability of track assets to meet asset assurance standards while fostering a culture of collaboration and continuous improvement. 

Phuoc holds a degree in Civil Engineering and a master’s degree in Asset Management from University of Wollongong. He is a member of PWI Australia. Outside of work, he is passionate about mentoring young engineers, promoting sustainable practices, and staying in touch with family and friends.

Join us as we compare and contrast the UK and Australia’s approach to managing track infrastructure in hot weather.

Two well respected and experienced engineers, Andy Franklin and Phuoc Nguyen, will be taking us through the different challenges faced in the UK and Australia with regards to managing track in hot weather, with a look back at the past and a look to the future.

This session will conclude with the opportunity to discuss and ask questions.

This is a first for a collaboration between the

UK and Australia PWI team and will look to schedule more in the future.

This event helps us meet another of our strategic pillars for knowledge share- the opportunity to share technical knowledge and learn from our key members.

Lunch & Learn

The PWI Lunch and Learn sessions were launched in 2024, building a community for industry experts to share their knowledge on Rail Infrastructure Engineering and a great Continuous Professional Development(CPD) opportunity for all!

The topics can cover technical research, project delivery or novel technology; the first ever event covered the delivery of a major rail infrastructure project with the subsequent session on the technical intricacies of turnouts.

The key difference to other PWI chapter events is this event spans all states and wider, looking to connect like-minded professionals from different rail infrastructure managers for the benefit of the rail industry as a whole; with internationally delivered presentations also planned.

This is achieved by holding the events on line via Microsoft Teams, typically every 8 weeks.

For any queries relating to Lunch and Learn sessions please contact us on lunchandlearn@pwinsw.org.au