Running Head: PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Project Management

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Course

December 06, 2020

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Project Management-Dublin Port Tunnel

Introduction

The Dublin tunnel is a road tunnel in Dublin, Ireland, which makes up a part of
the M50 motorway. It was formerly and now widely known as Port Tunnel. The tunnel
opened for HGVs in December 2007 and opened for all types of cars in January 2008.
The dual tunnels create a two-lane twin roadway linking the Dublin Port to the close to
Dublin Airport. The tunnels are 4.5 km long and the overall length of the project is 5.6
km. Although the cost of the tunnel was estimated to be €457, the final cost of this
project was around €752 million. This cost included the cost of land acquisition,
maintenance, design, supervision, insurance, and other legal services. The Dublin
tunnel is the fourth-longest motorway tunnel in Europe.

Road congestion in central Dublin grew serious towards the end of the twentieth
century, with hundreds of heavy goods vehicles moving from and to the Dublin port
through the downtown area. The tunnel prevents surface traffic congestion in the central
city by redirecting HGVs from Dublin Port and straight to the motorway. It seems to
have a positive impact on pedestrians, bus riders, bicyclists riding along city quays,
including increased air quality and better commuting. Vehicles other than HGVs are
strongly accepted at busy hours to prevent drivers from using the tunnel. The estimated
six-minute traveling time via the tunnel supports HGVs moving north and west. As it was
determined that a surface relief path was not possible, a tunnel was selected.

Project Risk Management

To ensure the project does not deviate from its set timeline and accomplishes the
set goals, project risk management is carried out. It is the process of finding, assessing
and responding to the identified risks that may take place during the life of the project.
Risk management should be proactive rather than reactive; that is, the risks should be
identified in advanced and proactive measures must be taken by deciding how to
combat such risks rather than waiting for such risks to turn into hazards and then
reaction spontaneously. Risk management prepares the project team with possibilities
of hazards and failures that the team can experience during the project. Thus, risk

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management is the process of defining, classifying, prioritizing, and planning for risks
before they can become challenges. For various kinds of projects, risk management can
appear different. Risk management techniques on large-scale projects should require
comprehensive detailed preparation for each risk to ensure that mitigating strategies are
in place if complications occur. Risk management might imply a clear, prioritized range
of high or low priority risks for a small level of projects. The risk management of the
Dublin Port Tunnel is discussed below.

How risk is managed in this project

The risks of the project were managed by various authorities and project
managers. During the development process of the Dublin Port Tunnel, which began in
December 2006, the project was managed by London Bridge Associates (LBA). LBA
managed the tunneling infrastructure while the project was mainly managed by Dublin
City Council and the National Roads Authority (LBA, 2006). Certain milestones were set
so that the project achieves each of its milestones without deviating from the main goal.
An important achievement in the project was the successful construction of the bored
tunnels underneath the heavily populated city of North Dublin with minor disruption to
the surrounding population and marginal effects on the overlying structures. Tim Brick is
the project manager of the Dublin Port Tunnel. In compliance with the projected
timeline, Mr. Tim is solely responsible for checking and balancing the smooth execution
of the tunnel design, the access to raw materials, and completion. He is accountable to
the National Roads Authority for the prompt disclosure of any interruption or
mismanagement in the supply chain.

What are the different types of risks?

Following are the different types of risks involved in a tunneling project like the
Dublin Port Tunnel as identified by Reilly & Brown (2004):

1. Risk of harm or accidents with a possibility for death and personal injuries; significant
damage to houses, vehicles, appliances and services, physical damage to third-party
property, employee or third party physical injury; For Dublin Port Tunnel, dozens of
foam tiles on the top of the tunnel were pulled down since they threatened to collapse

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on cars raising potential safety issues. The soundproofing tiles were removed for further
than 300m and space was painted instead. There were instant fears as the foam tiles
began to fall that there would be a possible safety danger as drivers might presume
they were concrete and change lanes abruptly to stop them (Hogan, 2008).

2. Economic risk of machinery and lack of reputation for the parties involved.

3. The risk of failure to meet requirements and established architecture, support service,
and quality parameters; this risk of failure was seen with the acoustic foams that kept
falling off the tunnel roof walls. The authorities claimed that acoustic foam sheets were
mounted on the top of the tunnel for 150 m on either entrance as part of the tunnel
design to assess their efficacy in suppressing the sound of vehicles going through
(Hogan, 2008).

4. The threats are a huge delay in the development and production of its revenue.

5. Risks, major increases in project costs, and their funding. This was a major risk for
the Dublin Port Tunnel as it was expected in 1999 as well that there is a risk of the
project's cost exceeding the estimated cost by a considerable amount (Frank, 1999).
Although the cost of the tunnel was estimated to be €457, the final cost of this project
was around €752 million. This cost included the cost of land acquisition, maintenance,
design, supervision, insurance, and other legal services.

6. Political risks: Changes in government policies leading to changes in prices of the

raw materials, fluctuation in inflation, and interest rates might affect the savings and
borrowings during the project.

7. Legal risks: permission, grants, and changes in law can all affect the Dublin tunnel
project. For instance, in 1999, it was found that the Austrian engineering company guilty
in London for safety failures leading to a 1994 tunnel collapse at Heathrow Airport is
engaged in the construction of the project for the Dublin Port Tunnel. As a result of this
information, the British Health and Safety Executive developed a report for the Dublin
Port Tunnel. 97 guidelines addressing regulation, risk management, organization,
supervision, coordination, competence, planning, architecture, surveillance, and

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development of tunnels were made in the HSE study - a list so burdensome that the
competitive advantage of the method could be removed (Frank, 1999).

What is the risk responses developed in this project?

As can be seen, the Dublin Port Tunnel project team is very efficient in
responding to the risks. In the case of risk of failure with the acoustic foams that kept
falling off the tunnel roof walls, dozens of foam tiles on the top of the tunnel were pulled
down since they threatened to collapse on cars raising potential safety issues. The
soundproofing tiles were removed for further than 300m and space was painted instead
(Hogan, 2008). Thus, this incident shows that the Dublin Port Tunnel project has
effective risk response and has set teams to immediately take actions to reverse the
damages.

Project Quality Management

What is Project Quality Management in this project and how is it managed

Project Quality Management is the technique by which the quality of the project is
handled and sustained. What is exactly meant by quality depends on each project type.
For instance, for some projects quality management may mean producing products that
satisfy customers whereas, for projects like construction of public areas, quality may
imply compliance with the laws and regulations of the region while ensuring the safety
of the environment and society.

Similarly, for the Dublin Port Tunnel, quality refers to ensuring compliance with
the regulations of the government for constructing the tunnel and ensuring the safety of
the passengers and drivers. For the quality management of this project, a team of
professional engineers is kept on board so that exceptional quality is delivered to the
end consumers. New Austrian Tunneling Method (NATM) is retained as the conforming
bid by the engineers to resolve issues of residents and maintain the quality of the
project. The project's quality was judged based on NATM that was involved in the
construction of the project for the Dublin Port Tunnel which was previously guilty in
London for safety failures leading to a 1994 tunnel collapse at Heathrow Airport.
However, Mr. Murphy who is the project engineer claimed that the project's quality was

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judged based on the HSE report which misled the readers as they perceived the quality
of Dublin Port Tunnel to be poor like the Heathrow Airport Tunnel. While the HSE study
deals exclusively with London clay, but all tunneling in the Marino region through 273
buildings was done at an average depth of 53 ft. through limestone rock, such that the
possibility of failure would be minimal or non-existent (Wallis, 2002).

Furthermore, to ensure the safety of the tunnel and the passengers, drivers using
the tunnel there is a control room located at the south of the Dublin Tunnel where duty
managers and officers are present 24/7. The staff ensures that the quality of the Tunnel
is maintained and the issue of any vehicle is catered to instantly. Also, there are
emergency call zones situated with roadside assistance telephones all over the tunnel.
Through the use of variable message signs, radio, or public loudspeakers, drivers may
be informed of any incident. There exists a ventilation system that would force the
smoke away from the entrance in the course of traffic flow in the case of a fire and
create a safe zone for all the travelers. Furthermore, to ensure high-quality Port Tunnel,
CCTV cameras are installed all along the tunnel to monitor the insights (Gleeson, 2017).
The cameras mounted at each end of the north and south ends are installed to measure
how fast a vehicle is driven by calculating the length of time it takes to cover a given
distance. Also, there are speed limits in place for the vehicles traveling from the tunnel
to reduce the chances of accidents that may impact the quality of the Dublin Port
Tunnel. Because when speed limits are in place, any car going through the tunnels in
fewer than 3 minutes and 20 seconds will be considered to have traveled faster than the
80km/h posted limit.

What are the quality requirements?

The main quality requirements of the Dublin Port Tunnel project are that the
project delivers safety tunneling passage for the drivers with zero risk of collapse or any
other hazard to the passengers. Another quality requirement is that the Dublin Port
Tunnel successfully diverts traffic congestion from the city center. Furthermore, DPT
quality and conformance was also tested based on air quality after the construction of
the tunnel. Since the launch of the DPT and the introduction of the HGV management

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plan, major improvements in traffic and air quality were reported. In the central city,
reductions in 5+ axle vehicles of between 33% and 90% have been registered.

Project Stakeholders Management

Stakeholder management is the process of identifying, monitoring, and improving

the relationship with the stakeholders of the project. The first step of project stakeholder
management is the identification of stakeholders. A stakeholder is defined as any
individual or group of individuals who have a stake or are affected by the construction of
the tunnel. The purpose of stakeholder analysis for this project is to identify which
stakeholder will be affected by the Dublin Tunnel project, directly or indirectly, positively
or negatively. Thus the various stakeholders of the Dublin Tunnel Project are mentioned
below:

External Stakeholders

Owners of land: This stakeholder group comprises all of those who own property or
other resources that, either through voluntary purchase or forced expropriation, will be
indefinitely obtained for the construction of the Dublin Tunnel project and all those
individuals whose land or any other asset is temporarily acquired while the project is
under design and construction.

Travelers and Road users: This stakeholder group includes riders in vehicles, drivers of
trucks, other road users, and passengers whose journey may be interrupted or who may
gain from the implementation of a new Tunnel pathway. For instance, the SVG's may
face interruption as they will be redirected to a tunnel which may have congestion due
to more SGVs traveling through the tunnel for a fixed number of hours. Whereas, car
passengers may benefit as they will have the city center roads with less traffic
congestion.

The general public: Residents across Dublin and beyond could have views on the
project's environmental and social effects on the region. Interests may refer to the
advantages of tourism, the lack of green space, the impact on the atmosphere, social or
economic consequences, or the interests of industry or occupation. The positive
consequences will be the result of a drastic decline in the number of HGVs in the central

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city and smaller towns. As a result, due to reduced travel times, there will be fuel
savings on journeys for vehicles in the area, accident cost savings because of better
roads, and vehicle cost reductions. Although these would be the quantitative effects of
road investment,' other environmental impacts may be noted, such as air pollution,
noise pollution and the impact on the surrounding environment.

Government: Measures to reduce traffic pollution and to develop a safe urban transit
infrastructure are being taken by governments across the world. For these reasons,
some widely considered alternatives in cities include road networks, public transit,
technical strategies, and limits on car entry. Thus, the government will have a major
stake in the development of the Dublin Tunnel project as it will enhance road congestion
leading to the better infrastructure of the city.

Social NGOs/local communities: Organizations of social community, workplace health

and safety priorities, or other related facets of the project that seek to reflect the
thoughts and desires of their representatives and the public at large. These
communities are directly affected by the environmental impact such as air quality, noise
level, and traffic congestion caused by the project.

Internal Stakeholders

Investors: The investors of Dublin Port Tunnel have a direct stake in the project as their
earnings are correlated with the performance and the earnings of the Tunnel. If the
project is successful and operates without any hindrances and charges, then the
investors are likely to earn higher returns on their investments.

Project managers: The project manager will benefit from the success of the Dublin
Tunnel through its revenue generation. However, they may also face disruption during
the construction and operation of the project as they will have to actively manage the
tunnel so that it can continue without any faults or damages. The project managers are
mainly the Dublin City Council and the National Roads Authority that are actively
responsible for the management of the Dublin Tunnel.

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Bibliography
Brown, R. a. (2004). Management and control of cost and Risk for Tunneling and
Infrastructure Projects. International Tunneling Conference. Singapore.

Frank, M. (1999, Feb). Safety lapses firm part of the Dublin tunnel team. Retrieved from
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/safety-lapses-firm-part-of-dublin-tunnel-team-
1.153269

Gleeson, C. (2017, April). How Dublin's Port Tunnel transformed the city. Retrieved from
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/environment/how-dublin-s-port-tunnel-
transformed-the-city-1.3050895

Hogan, T. (2008, January). Safety risks to drivers as tiles fall from the roof of Port
Tunnel. Retrieved from https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/safety-risk-to-
drivers-as-tiles-fall-from-roof-of-port-tunnel-26347057.html

LBA. (2006). Dublin Port Tunnel. Retrieved from https://www.lba.london/project/13598/

Wallis, S. (2002, September). Dublin coping with complicated conditions. Retrieved from
https://www.tunneltalk.com/Ireland-Dublin-Sept02-Port-Tunnel-site-visit.php