Northern Powerhouse Rail: What the Development Phase Needs to Get Right

On January 14, the UK Government committed £45 billion to Northern Powerhouse Rail. Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander positioned NPR as learning from experience, promising it would be "designed, developed and delivered from the bottom up."

The commitment to learn creates a window for different approaches. The question is whether that window gets used before delivery structures lock in familiar patterns.

What the Evidence Shows

The NAO's 2022 report on Transpennine Route Upgrade provides valuable learning. TRU was announced in 2011 with a £290 million budget and 2019 completion. The programme has escalated to £9-11.5 billion with completion expected 2036-2041.

The NAO's analysis identified root causes: "a lack of engagement between key delivery stakeholders," "insufficient information-sharing," and Network Rail governance "seen as a blocker to progress." TRU East Alliance formed in 2015 and TRU West Alliance in 2017, both before programme scope was settled. The IPA review found this created "an inefficient use of the alliances ahead of main construction works."

These aren't failures of intent. What the evidence shows is systemic: we create collaborative structures before developing collaborative capability. We design governance frameworks before understanding the human dynamics those frameworks need to manage.

HS2's experience adds learning. The ICE Stewart Review found an "imbalance of power between DfT and contractors." HS2 Ltd was "intended to be a 'lean' client but this meant it lacked the resources to deal with significant issues." The Learning Legacy documentation records how "lower-tier supply chains were held back due to isolation of commercial benefits and collaborative ideals."

The pattern suggests our challenge isn't technical competence, it's creating the conditions where that competence works effectively across organisational boundaries.

NPR's Opportunity and Challenge

Northern Powerhouse Rail's governance complexity creates both opportunity and challenge. The programme involves DfT, Treasury, Network Rail, Transport for the North, Liverpool-Manchester Railway Board, six combined authority mayors (who seem to be aligned for now, but standfast an election..!), multiple local authorities, and four strategic design partnership joint ventures.

The six mayors secured funding commitment through collective advocacy - a significant achievement. Whether that alignment carries through depends on managing competing-yet-legitimate priorities. Andy Burnham's focus on Manchester Piccadilly underground station, Steve Rotheram's Liverpool improvements, Tracy Brabin's Leeds capacity and new Bradford station, Kim McGuinness's Leamside Line reopening all serve constituents' interests. Managing those priorities requires collaborative capability most programmes don't invest in until problems emerge.

What Collaboration Requires

In our experience across UK and Canadian infrastructure over 30+ years, genuine collaborative capability requires leaders who hold four characteristics simultaneously: accountable (willing to make tough decisions), robust (able to challenge without pulling punches), humble (genuinely able to listen and acknowledge uncertainty), and capable of creating psychological safety (enabling truth-telling without fear).

That's difficult. Military leadership emphasises accountability and robustness. Organisational development focuses on humility and psychological safety. Few programmes teach all four simultaneously, because holding the tension is uncomfortable. Infrastructure delivery at NPR's scale requires exactly that combination.

Professional Collaboration rests on managing three inherent dilemmas: power dynamics, trust building, and competence demonstration. These don't get “resolved”, they get managed continuously. Power imbalances exist on every programme. Trust takes time to build but seconds to damage. Competence needs demonstration without defensiveness.

The Development Phase Window

NPR's development phase - the recent £1.1 billion immediate allocation - creates a critical window. This is when collaborative infrastructure should be designed: not governance frameworks and reporting lines (though those matter), but behavioural norms, decision-making protocols, and relationship foundations that carry programmes through delivery pressures.

Network Rail's framework appointments have been made. Mott MacDonald-WSP, Arup-SYSTRA, AtkinsRéalis-Arcadis, and Amey OWR are positioned for the design partnership work. These organisations have significant experience. Whether that translates to genuine collaborative capability depends on whether the programme invests in understanding current dynamics before delivery structures become entrenched.

The alternative is proceeding as most programmes do: mature(ish!) the designs, secure the consents, procure the partners, mobilise for construction, and then manage issues as they arise. That approach delivers infrastructure. Whether it delivers within cost, on schedule, or with transformative benefits is where learning from TRU and HS2 becomes valuable. Experience to date on these and other critical projects suggests not.

The evidence is clear that waiting until delivery pressures emerge is too late. Collaborative capability needs building when there's time to get it right.

NPR represents a generational opportunity for the North, a place that is my adopted home and I am passionate about becoming the social and economic powerhouse it has the potential to be. Whether it demonstrates UK infrastructure delivery can achieve world-class collaborative performance depends on decisions made in the next 18-24 months during the development phase, when collaborative norms are forming rather than entrenched.

The technical capability exists. The funding is secured. The political alignment is in place. The question is whether programme leaders will invest in the human infrastructure that makes technical infrastructure succeed.

We hope they make that conscious choice for the future of the programme.  And we want to be part of it.