约翰·阿米特爵士, chairman of the UK National Infrastructure Commission, addressed attendees at Bentley Systems’ Year in Infrastructure conference in London, Oct. 16, where he described the findings of the commission’s first long-term national infrastructure assessment report, discussed the “human issue” of collaboration, and offered ways to control capital costs on projects.

Armitt, a civil engineer, previously was chairman of the Olympic Delivery Authority for six years and has held leadership positions with the Institution of Civil Engineers, the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, Network Rail, Union Railways, and Laing International. He was an ENR newsmaker in 2015, recognized for delivering the London Olympics on time, on budget and safely.

The NIC report, Data for the Public Good, sets out the premise that “having more information day to day helps people make better decisions”…and that includes making better decisions about infrastructure. Having data and sharing it appropriately will help the country manage its assets “productively,” the report declares.

Following his opening keynote, Armitt and Greg Bentley, CEO of Bentley Systems, sat down for a conversation onstage:

Bentley:How can public policy promote information sharing?

Armitt:This was one that fell into the box of “too difficult for the moment.” For example, if you go to meetings with different water companies, they will talk about sharing information between their networks … but getting them to actually do it is another issue.

在最高的组织中，您会得到：“是的，我们都将一起进行合作。”我已经在主要政府部门之间看到了它。困难是，是否已告知机长的机舱变化，或者是在与以前相同的方向上以相同的方向行驶的方向。

I think the whole concept of the digital twin is inevitable. [The report,]Data for the Public Good, sparked a lot of debate, and the politicians follow public opinion and professional opinion. So the more we keep banging on about it, the more will get done.

Bentley:让我询问私人投资。我没有意识到英国基础设施计划的前提是，公共资金将与私人资金相匹配。技术成本效益分析如何增加可用的份额？

Armitt:我们听说有一堵墙的钱,nd investors are just looking for “good” projects. By that, they mean projects that make a “good return.” How do they assure a good return?

除了很好(和收入来源very often what they want to see is a government guarantee) you can get the capital costs down [by increasing productivity, industrialization or using new materials].… We need to address these challenges to get a better return if we’re going to have the opportunity for private-sector capital to get a better return. Everyone in this room pays for infrastructure. Government doesn’t have money; it only has our money! We have to make sure it is used in the most cost-effective way.

Bentley:To end on a high note, we certainly think that going digital is everyone’s idea in every industry. The autonomous-vehicle gold rush of brain power has been stimulating. We now see that some parts of it are hard — but we thought it was “eventually” and now we know it is imminent. Let’s all stand up straight and say that going digital is going to create terrific benefits for us.

将共享信息和私人投资组合在一起，可能意味着提供基础架构作为服务的机会，例如作为服务。让我们在Google之前做。当我们将沉浸式可视化和分析可见性介绍到我们正在做的事情上时，就会有各种机会。

Our responsibility at Bentley Systems is to make the engineering information no longer dark, but available to be digital components and digital context for workflows for digital twins that we will be talking about from now on.

Armitt:同样以积极的态度结束时，我从承包商开始生活，所以我是一个乐观主义者 - 您必须是。我们可以想象的任何东西，我们都可以建立。挑战是，我们可以有效地构建它的速度和成本范围？这就是人类灵感的本质。到达那里需要一些时间，但最终我们会这样做。

The great thing about what’s happening at Bentley Systems and the companies you are working with is that you are helping us fulfill that imagination.