Fifteen firms on track for £3.5bn of rail work

Network Rail has named a raft of big-name contractors on a panel to deliver £3.5bn of infrastructure works in the East of England.

The operating body appointed 15 firms including Morgan Sindall, Amey and Bam to its Eastern Routes Partnership (ERP).

The framework will deliver key infrastructure improvement works throughout control period 7 (CP7), which began last month and runs until March 2029.

Network Rail has the option to extend the arrangement for a further five years, meaning it could represent a decade of work for the appointed contractors.

Amco, Bam, Morgan Sindall and Story were named as the general contractors for lot one of the framework, covering building and civils work, with Taziker as structures specialist and CK Rail selected for geotechnics.

Lot two sees Amey and Atkins in the generalist slots for signalling and telecoms, alongside Trackwork as signals specialist and Hawthorne for telecoms.

Amey is joined by Keltbray as generalists for lot three, covering contact systems, while Morgan Sindall will play a specialist role.

Keltbray was named as generalist for lot four in a joint venture with Linbrooke. Octavius is the other generalist on this lot, which will deal with distribution and plant, and Lowery will be specialist.

Network Rail said in procurement documents that it “actively encourages” small firms, new entrants and discipline experts to apply for specialist slots.

“For the generalist level, Network Rail is looking to engage suppliers able to take on projects with increased complexity/stakeholder management and have the ability to deliver the volumes required against the desired unit rates to deliver the strategic business plan,” its initial contract notice added.

Network Rail Eastern Region managing director Jake Kelly said this week: “This launch is the culmination of two years of hard work to bring real innovation to our commercial delivery in CP7. The ERP framework is key to effectively maintaining our infrastructure to deliver a sustained improvement in train performance over the next five years.

“It is designed to strengthen our relationships with our supply chain partners, letting us utilise their skills and experience. ERP also lets us take a more collaborative approach by bringing our engineers, delivery teams and the suppliers together earlier, to identify the minimum viable product.”