A construction site control room, modelled on NASA mission control, will track every steel beam from design to installation in real time across three major UK infrastructure projects. Construction projects routinely run late and over budget because managers lack real-time data on what has actually been delivered versus what was planned. This project builds a physical “AEC Production Control Room” mounted on each site, displaying live performance metrics that site managers, engineers, and clients can see and act on together. A fourth remote control room will allow executives to benchmark progress across multiple projects simultaneously. If successful, the platform could transform how the UK construction industry operates—reducing delays, cutting cost overruns, and enabling predictive analytics that flag risks before they become problems. The system also feeds into a national Digital Twin capability, allowing long-term operational savings across the infrastructure portfolio. The team will publish the designs openly to encourage industry-wide adoption, aiming for a step-change in construction productivity rather than incremental improvement.
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"Construction projects are infamous for delays, omissions, overruns and often spiraling costs. In line with the Governmental Industrial Strategy Construction Sector Deal, our aim is to improve the performance of UK construction by better, more efficient and proactive rather than reactive project management. We, therefore, propose to build a scalable and repeatable 'plug-and-play' construction management and reporting platform that will be tested on three major infrastructure projects in the UK. This digital project management platform will be accessible via physical site-mounted 'AEC Production Control Rooms' that will display a suite of preconfigured performance metrics using real-time data, facilitating forward planning and collaborative decision making at team, project and portfolio level. A fourth HQ-mounted Master Control Room will enable benchmarking across different projects remotely. Clients, planners, site managers and engineers will be able to track real-time project performance and take action based on insights. These stakeholders will, for the first time, be able to objectively compare _'what was planned'_ versus _'what has been delivered'_. Such a solution will track the status of each construction element (for instance all structural steel elements) from design, approval, manufacture and delivery, all the way to site fitting/completion, and facilitate future opportunities for operational cost savings via Digital Twin capabilities at the national level. A feedback loop will enable predictive analytics such as early risk warnings, benchmarking across different portfolio projects and continuous 4D planning. All information will be set out clearly in both physical and digital space so that the parties involved can either collaborate remotely, or in person within the AEC Production Control Room on site. Some of the barriers to adoption so far include lack of consistent digital and data architecture; contract models to support open and transparent data exchange; and capability at every level of the supply chain, from client (portfolio) to workforce (package) level. Together, our highly innovative and award-winning project team will demonstrate a path forward to overcome each of these barriers, offering a new way of working for the construction industry in an open and collaborative way. Being able to demonstrate the AEC Production Control Room on three major construction projects will enable us to share the benefits, outcomes, and designs with the industry in order to encourage widespread adoption and support an unprecedented quantum leap to a high-performing construction industry."
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