According to new Hill Vice President Pete Hankovszky, who has more than 30 years of program and project management and business development experience in rail and transit, even the most technical management solutions start with regular, face-to-face client collaboration.

“That’s why,” he says, “my professional passion is getting out in front of clients as early as possible and working with them to identify their needs. Once we do that, we can start identifying and prioritizing options, building teams that can deliver exactly the expertise our clients require, and drive project success.”

At Hill, Pete will leverage his decades of experience to strengthen Hill’s relationships with transit agencies throughout the country. He says this will facilitate more effective project management, funding, and staffing plans in line with owner expectations.

“I’m an avid fisherman,” adds Pete. “So, I like to think of the work we do in those terms. When you’re fishing, especially in a new place, you can always just head down to a body of water, cast your line a few times, make adjustments on the fly, and hope for the best. But if you visit local bait and tackle shops and develop relationships with people who fish the area—so that they may actually tell you what you need to know—you’re going to have a much higher probability of success.

“In project management, when we have trusted relationships with existing and potential clients, our conversations reveal more about an owner’s goals and the challenges they face, which affords us with opportunities to offer the most effective services.”

And Pete sees plenty of opportunities for rail and transit agencies across the country. “As always, upkeep and state-of-good-repair initiatives are crucial for keeping transit systems operable and safe,” he says. “Addressing internal staffing, systems, or policy challenges can help agencies get more value out of their operations. Long-term capital expenditures and expansions and the acquisition of new technology, have the potential to grow and transform our transit systems and to improve the passenger experience.”

Pete notes that there are also uncertainties, as well as plenty of questions that owners may have, such as: What’s the most impactful project we can execute? What resources do we need? How long is this going to take? How will this impact operations? How will we fund this? So, in addition to forging and strengthening client relationships, Pete looks forward to leveraging Hill’s collective expertise to provide effective oversight.

Pete expects his experience working on behalf of the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) to be valuable for Hill teams and Hill’s clients. He explains: “In a past project management oversight role for the FTA, I coordinated with transit agencies who received federal funding for their projects to make sure all grant requirements were met. To win funding and ensure funding stability throughout your project’s life cycle, the owner must have an effective funding plan in place from day one. As funding is a universal concern for transit agencies, I’ll be collaborating with our transit clients and program and project management teams to navigate funding opportunities and put funding plans in place.”

Pete’s FTA experience includes overseeing work on some of the largest and most high-profile transit projects in New York City during the 21^st century, including the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s (MTA) more than $11 billion Long Island Rail Road East Side Access Project and the MTA’s more than $17 billion Second Avenue Subway Project.

Pete adds that he looks forward to making use of the many tools available at Hill. In addition to our deep bench of subject matter experts, Pete cites Hill’s internal business development tools that help ensure efficient resource allocation and enable us to keep a pulse on the market, rapid team mobilization procedures to make sure we engage potential clients with the right technical team as early as possible, and Hill University, Hill’s internal learning and development tool.

“Hill University is a unique selling point,” he says. “In addition to the project management team we can build for our clients, we can build a learning center for them that houses key information about assets, project management best practices, operations and maintenance, you name it. This kind of tool can be invaluable for owners as they manage certain internal challenges, like training staff or creating knowledge centers.”

However, Pete says the potential to add value starts with relationships. With trusted relationships in place, he says that Hill will be able to promote the free flow of information and cultural alignment, help plan clients’ projects in the context of the market, build teams that deliver exactly the services required, and execute projects in line with client expectations.

“I’m excited to be part of this team,” Pete concludes. “Our professionals have an excellent reputation and many strong relationships with owners throughout the country. Hill’s pure PM model, having no potential conflicts of interest, can give owners added peace of mind. We’re here for you. We’re strictly on your side, and the foundation of our approach is our relationship with you. So, I look forward to collaborating with our clients and my colleagues, to take advantage of the opportunities out there to deliver stronger, more efficient transit systems.”

Connect with Pete at PeteHankovszky@hillintl.com to learn more about how Hill International, Inc. can support your rail and transit needs. Visit www.hillintl.com/rail-transit-practice/ to learn more about our rail and transit practice.

The post Hill’s New Vice President Pete Hankovszky on Relationships as the Foundation of Project Management Success appeared first on Hill International.

“I chose to come to Hill for several reasons, but the true team environment here is what really convinced me,” says new Vice President, Northern California and Transit Practice Leader Jeffrey A. Hurley. “Over the course of my career, I’ve found that a collaborative culture and openness to inputs are what really matter when it comes to reaching better outcomes.”

Hurley’s career in the California rail market spans more than 30 years and encompasses some of the most high-profile rail programs and projects in the state’s history. This includes serving in various engineering and management leadership roles on programs and projects for the Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board (PCJPB), Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART), the Alameda County Transportation Commission (ACTC), the California High-Speed Rail Authority (CAHSRA), and the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA), among others.

“California’s rail market has evolved from when I first came out west decades ago into an environment focused on expansion, integration, and modernization,” he explains. He cites initiatives to improve safety, security, accessibility, speed, frequency, reliability, and sustainability as evidence of the state’s progress in upgrading and expanding its rail network. “Positive train control, electrification, and communication-based train control all moved the market forward over the past several years.”

However, Hurley adds that challenges lie ahead. “While the state has made significant progress, particularly with the California High Speed Rail project and the growth of commuter rail, funding, project delivery, and adapting to population shifts remain key considerations.”

Looming knowledge gaps compound these obstacles: “Rail operators have experienced major workforce reductions from the retirement of those who know how to maintain and operate their systems. Bridging the connection between these in-house experts and the next generation is critical to maintain momentum towards California’s vision of an integrated rail system that provides coordinated service.”

To meet those challenges, Hurley says California rail operators are ready to embrace change. “Agencies today are looking at new technologies to enhance safety, efficiency, and the customer experience,” he says, citing examples such as predictive maintenance, automated train operations and robotics for inspections and maintenance, digitizing real-time passenger information, smart ticketing systems, digital twins, electrification, hydrogen- and battery-powered trains, and advanced communication systems.

“Financial constraints, the regulatory environment, and the safety-first focus of rail will dictate how fast California rail operators move to integrate these new tools,” Hurley adds. “But aging infrastructure, increased standardization, and a cultural shift towards smarter technology are speeding up the process.”

He also believes alternate delivery methods can help realize the program and project goals of California’s railroads. “I’ve helped deliver design-build, CM-at-Risk (CMAR), and progressive design-build (PDB) projects, among other delivery methods,” he says. “Each has its advantages and opportunities.”

“The early contractor involvement in PDB can be particularly appealing, allowing for collaborative design development and cost input from the contractor while the owner, if they have the right expertise, can still be closely involved in the design,” Hurley says. “CMAR can help allocate risk to the parties best prepared to handle it, while design-build often makes sense on new alignments and projects with many repetitive design elements.”

Hurley continues.  “For our clients, the right alternative delivery method can reduce risk, streamline design and construction, and foster a more collaborative environment leading to better outcomes for everyone involved.”

But to take full advantage of alternate delivery, owners can use the support of a partner like Hill. “For alternative delivery to work, owners can lean on an outside expert to help them find the right flavor for their specific goals and objectives and then to maximize the advantages of the method throughout delivery,” says Hurley. “Hill can help.”

Hurley expands on the value of a PM partner: “Northern California has 27 passenger rail and transit agencies with similar visions to improve mobility for their communities. From my point of view, the PM function is most critical in the planning phase to help those agencies define their projects. We can coordinate with stakeholders, collaborate with designers, identify funding opportunities, and drive the development process to make certain the constructed project meets the vision and expectations of our clients.”

Hurley’s collaborative attitude, perhaps, reflects his love of the Northern California lifestyle.

“I came out here many years ago for a visit, and I knew I had to make this my home,” he says. “For one thing, the surfing and snowboarding is always good compared to the East Coast. For another, people here understand the value of building sustainable, meaningful infrastructure that transforms communities and improves everyone’s quality of life.”

He concludes, “Helping to deliver these projects is my passion, and I’m looking forward to continuing this work with Hill.”

J.P. Villamizar, Hill Senior Vice President, said of Hurley’s arrival: “Northern California has many exciting rail projects coming online in the years ahead, and we want to help make these opportunities happen. Bringing Jeff on board benefits our rail practice and our entire company in numerous ways, and we’re lucky to have him aboard.”

The post Jeffrey Hurley Joins Hill’s Northern California Rail Practice appeared first on Hill International.

Based in Hill’s Phoenix, AZ, office and responsible for the company’s operations across the Mountain West, Chad’s career to date reflects the approach of treating every project according to its specific challenges and needs. However, he also stresses that capturing and leveraging best practices and lessons learned to benefit project down the line is a process more PM/CM firms should, if not must, embrace, to be successful in today’s data driven, resource constrained market.

“Knowledge transfer is going to become even more and more critical in the years ahead,” he explains. “As long-time SMEs, PMs, and agency leaders look to retire, we need to make sure we’re not losing that expertise.”

Chad speaks from experience. As a superintendent both in the Midwest U.S. and, then with Sundt Construction across the Southwest U.S. on a variety of demanding projects, Chad drove progress through collaboration and cooperation on site and learning from clients and colleagues. This mindset helped earn Chad the Superintendent of the Year award with Pasquinelli Construction and Project Manager of the Year with Sundt.

Following his contracting work but still early in his career, he canvassed mid-level project and portfolio managers across Jacobs Engineering—a global AEC company—to learn their pain points. His findings were surprising: opaque, lack of, and/or out of date data was leading to a largely reactive approach to project risks and challenges. To help solve this problem, and on his own initiative, Chad taught himself SQL and started querying project databases.

“I created a project ‘baseball’ card,” he says. “But instead of hits and RBIs, I had indicators, KPIs, etc. A PM could use this information to spot potential problems before they hit cost and schedule drivers, and come up with recommendations proactively.”

Chad’s initiative and the success of his tracking tools saw him quickly advance with Jacobs, rising to leadership roles in growing the high-tech manufacturing business line, and, ultimately, developing and executing global growth strategy for a $300 million-plus annual portfolio of projects and programs. As he did during his contracting days, he would go on to win numerous company awards for his performance, innovation, and client service.

With Hill, Chad plans to maintain his focus on data-driven decision making and pair it with the company’s emphasis on PM/CM thought leadership, client trust, and sector expertise.

“Every market, like every project, is different,” Chad says. “Phoenix is not Denver, and New Mexico is not Utah. The opportunities may all be driven by population growth, but the challenges and opportunities vary dramatically. What isn’t different is the demand for PM/CM support to meet those challenges and maximize those opportunities. That’s industry wide across the region.”

In Arizona, Chad sees the continued population boom pushing up costs, but also a blooming ecosystem around such as tech-driven battery and chip manufacturing, from suppliers to transport and related facilities. “Arizona is really good at keeping up with its infrastructure needs,” he explains. “That attracts businesses, especially smart businesses like technology companies, and their employees and suppliers create further demand for access to culture, jobs, education, and more. I don’t see any of this stopping any time soon—and one of the things I know Hill can offer are creative ways to help owners control their costs in this environment.”

Elsewhere in the region Chad sees the same need for PM innovation. “In Colorado, in addition to infrastructure growth, you have aerospace and technology companies expanding, while in Utah mining and manufacturing seem poised to take off. And, in New Mexico, projects related to education and energy transmission may be coming down the pipeline soon. It’s an exciting time in an exciting part of the country. I don’t think a shortage of opportunities will be an issue.”

Chad says Hill is ready to take advantage of those opportunities: “I came to Hill for several reasons, one of which is the company’s client-first focus. This is the right approach for these markets. I haven’t been with Hill too long yet, but in the Phoenix office I’m already impressed with the expertise and commitment of our team.”

Chad adds he also came to Hill to be a part of the Global Infrastructure Solutions, Inc. family of companies. “I’ve worked for companies using most ownership models, and GISI’s employee ownership model is the best.”

Senior Vice President, Western Region Manager Greg Heinz, will work with Chad to help him build the region and continue Hill’s success in Phoenix and beyond. “Chad comes to Hill with a track record of success and abundance of confidence,” says Heinz. “I know we’re going to make good things happen for our team and our clients across the region.”

The post Ready, Set, Grow: First VP Chad Koelling Takes Charge of Hill’s Mountain West Region appeared first on Hill International.

In 2017, the Ministry of Environment, Water, and Agriculture (MEWA) assigned NWC the responsibility for management and supervision of the entire distribution sector throughout the Kingdom, including the 13 MEWA regional water services directorates. Subsequently, all directorates were merged under NWC, and since then NWC has become responsible for the water distribution sector across the Kingdom.

Currently, the NWC is working to manage its water resources by investing in new technologies, promoting smart water use, and modernizing its water infrastructure.

From its cluster offices in Jeddah, Abha, Madinah, Riyadh, Dammam, and Qassim, NWC’s approach to delivering its massive portfolio of water programs and projects offer an example of how water authorities in even the most challenging conditions can leverage innovation and conservation to ensure steady and safe supply to their customers.

As announced in September 2023 by the Crown Prince and Prime Minister, NWC’s nearly $80 billion in projects will be delivered in phases over the next several years and will include connecting drinking water with customers, boosting underground water resources, increasing reservoir capacity, reducing network losses, and improving treatment processes and facilities. To help deliver these ambitious projects, NWC awarded Hill International the Program Management Oversight (PMO) contract for their projects.

Hill President, Middle East and North Africa Waleed Abdel-Fattah explained: “Hill’s PMO support encompasses strategic planning and on-site project and construction management, functional support to NWC business units, reporting to NWC’s head office, change management, claims avoidance, project controls, contract management, engineering interface management, testing and commissioning management, knowledge transfer, and project handover and closeout.

“Taken as a whole, these services will help the NWC to realize their new projects holistically, as well as to enjoy schedule and cost efficiencies and proactive knowledge management that will benefit not only these specific projects, but their organization as a whole.”

Abdel-Fattah concluded, “As the world looks to better manage its natural resources, the NWC’s approach provides an excellent example of how technology and commitment, combined with the right planning, oversight, and monitoring support, can realize construction programs and projects of size and scope successfully.”

The post PMO in Saudi Arabia: The Holistic Approach to Realizing a National Mega-Portfolio appeared first on Hill International.

Most AD procurements require fast-tracked schedules. For example, I formerly worked on an AD rail megaproject with an extremely aggressive schedule. On that project, the contractor planned to produce shop drawings and issue pre-final (90%) submittals for owner approval simultaneously. When the owner did not approve the pre-final submittal, the impact on the baseline schedule was hard to mitigate.

This is generally true of any fast-tracked project. Any resubmittals of design packages or permit applications will impact the schedule, contributing to delays and cost overruns that the owner will eventually share—even if the contact language is clear that the contractor is responsible! Plus, on projects with fast-tracked schedules, owner-requested scope changes after contract award are likely to contribute to additional delays and cost overruns.

These are just some examples of schedule risks on AD projects. So, how can project teams mitigate them?

There is not a single solution to mitigating schedule risk, and different types of AD procurement are associated with different risks. In my experience, however, a spirit of partnership can help achieve better schedule risk management and better outcomes on any project. When delays happen, all parties should wear their “project hats” vs. their own hats. They should work together as one team with one goal rather than exchange letters pointing fingers at one another. More specific tactics include:

• As project teams develop their baseline schedules, they can include a learning curve. This allows a project team to better manage expectations and execution. For example, local reviewing agencies have their own administrative preferences and technical requirements. By allowing time to become familiar with standards and preferences of authorities having jurisdiction, the project team can help ensure approvals the first time, prevent delays, and even expedite review and approval of work packages.
• To mitigate delays related to design submittals and permit applications, project teams can agree to expedited reviews and partner with approving agencies to develop process improvement plans (PIP). PIPs can help ensure engineering packages are complete prior to resubmittal and promote compliance with all plans and specifications during construction, helping prevent delays related to rework.
• To maintain a realistic schedule throughout the project and to avoid scope creep, I recommend that owners and contractors price any owner-requested changes using time and materials (T&M) even if their contracts allow for such changes. More importantly, the owner should not include these changes in the project’s substantial completion date. This will help ensure that substantial completion is achievable as originally scheduled for the project.

By sharing scheduling risks on projects procured via AD procurement methods, cultivating partnership on their project teams, and leveraging the tactics listed above, owners can reduce the risk of schedule delays, avoid the need for enforcing liquidated damages, and deliver our crucial infrastructure projects on time and within budget.

About the Author 

Vice President Sami Soufi is an award-winning program executive with more than 30 years of experience leading the delivery of rail and transit megaprojects, including the $6 billion MTA Purple Line Rail Extension in Riverdale, MD, the $3 billion WMATA Silver Line Rail Extension in Washington, DC, and the $13 billion Riyadh Metro in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Sami holds a Master of Science in Construction Engineering and Management from the University of Maryland, College Park; a Master of Engineering in Structural Engineering from McGill University; and a Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering from Middle East Technical University. He is a registered Professional Engineer in Maryland and Virginia. To speak with Sami about your own transit project needs, contact him via email at samisoufi@hillintl.com.

The post Alternative Delivery & Schedule Risk: An Owner’s Guide to Scheduling Alternative Delivery Projects appeared first on Hill International.

That lag has little to do with available technology. Construction technology is, for me, one of the most interesting and promising fields in the market. New hardware and software solutions have the potential to keep personnel safer during high-risk construction activities, streamline document submittals and responses, and reshape the way we think about project controls, and new functionalities and compatibilities enhance our existing tech all the time.

A critical question for construction, which notoriously involves major safety and financial risks and is filled with stakeholders with varying levels of technological comfort and capacity, is what will be the method of adoption.

I had the privilege of participating in a stimulating conversation about this topic at the Project Control Summit 2025 in Galveston, TX. The panel was called “The Great Debate: Old School vs. New School Project Controls,” but that may be a misleading title.

All the panelists agreed that new technologies, such as the latest project management information systems (PMIS), schedule analytics applications, and generative artificial intelligence, have the potential to improve project controls and can support more robust reporting, drive more accurate and standardized data, facilitate process automation, and provide better insights and objective analysis, all of which contribute to better project outcomes. We also agreed that “old-school” processes must help shape the application of new tech.

Our “Great Debate” actually focused on how to adopt emerging technologies: whether it is best to let adoption happen organically at the project level and use case studies to support investment in PMIS platforms over time, or whether organizations should take top-down approaches, with senior leaders mandating broad changes throughout their organizations and monitoring for compliance to support operational objectives.

Both sides made compelling arguments. The organic approach can provide evidence of benefits prior to full-scale implementation. This reduces risk and allows teams to tailor the schedule of their changes to the realities of their work. The top-down approach creates common methodologies, simplifying training and organizational knowledge sharing, and standardizes quality of service across an organization.

Without suggesting a clear winner, I would like to raise one important point, applicable to all organizations, by considering the question from the negative. Resistance to change at lower levels of an organization can slow down the adoption of new technologies and create employee (and potentially customer) dissatisfaction, but resistance from senior leadership will result in no change at all.

So, whether organic or top-down implementation seems correct for your organization, I encourage leaders in the construction industry to stay open to the possibility of technological change and adopting better ways of working. While the process should never be rushed, when the right time to step forward comes, leaders have to lead. Otherwise, as construction technology evolves, we risk getting left behind.

About the Author

Hill International, Inc. Vice President Jonathan Stewart is a construction leader with more than 29 years of experience transforming operational departments and projects by driving efficiency, accountability, and cost controls. He helps to bridge the gap between business and technology with expertise in managing complex programs and multiple concurrent projects. To speak with Jonathan about your project’s technology needs, contact him via email at JonathanStewart@hillintl.com.

The post Adopting Construction Technology: The Leadership Mindset appeared first on Hill International.

Defining & Prioritizing Available Data

Program-wide data encompasses forecasted budgets and actual costs, project schedules, scopes, material specifications, environmental protection data, sustainability markers, stakeholder feedback, safety performance, and more. When multiplied by all of the individual projects within a program, program-wide data can feel dizzying.

Program management consultants can help owners make dizzying data more manageable by defining and prioritizing data during program planning. This enables the efficient collection and management of specific data sets, reducing administrative costs, facilitating the development of key performance indicators and overall program tracking, and helping ensure that decision makers have access to the right data to make informed decisions throughout a program’s life cycle.

In addition to the vast amounts of relevant and valuable data that a program team should gather, there are also distractions. This “noise” consists of less relevant information that can overwhelm program teams with unnecessary collection, processing, and storage efforts without any strategic benefit.

Owners can work with program managers to clearly define the types of data required for their program, the purpose behind collecting particular data, who will receive related reports, and how the program team intends to leverage the information.

Clarifying Data Production & Ownership Responsibilities

In defining and prioritizing the data available on a program, program managers can also help owners plan organizational data management responsibilities. A program manager who understands the nuances of construction management and project controls—as well as the types of data produced at these and other levels throughout a program organization—is best suited for this role.

By defining data management responsibilities at the outset, owners can establish clear requirements and procedures for managing data. This fosters accountability and allows for the enforcement of contractual obligations. Additionally, owners can collaborate with their program management team to design data management plans. This proactive approach helps prevent common data management challenges, such as misaligned data collection priorities, unrealistic expectations, and untrained staff. A clear understanding of who holds the rights to certain data sets is also crucial at a program’s conclusion, when different stakeholders may require access to data they do not own.

As a general rule, program staff that regularly engage with certain data sets are best suited to manage that data. For example, estimators, schedulers, and project engineers each have unique responsibilities on a program. These professionals should be responsible for managing cost data, milestone dates, and contract specifications, respectively. By empowering team members to take ownership of the data relevant to their functions, program organizations can enhance data accuracy, streamline processes, and improve overall project outcomes. Fostering a culture of data stewardship among specialized staff also helps ensure that other stakeholders have access to the critical information they need, contributing to better decision-making and successful program management.

Selecting the Right Tools

A variety of software solutions exist for program-wide data management. This program management information system (PMIS) technology facilitates the collection, sorting, storage, and reporting of data. As each available PMIS has its pros and cons, owners should consult with an experienced program manager who can identify which PMIS is most suited for their construction program based on its data management, project controls, and/or construction management needs. For instance, on Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport’s Capital Improvement Program, we have used Oracle’s Primavera Unifier for more than a decade. The software’s flexibility and adaptability have proven essential for managing complex projects and accommodating diverse reporting needs across the program.

Once a software is selected, program managers can help set up the PMIS, manage access, and implement training. This includes customizing reports to provide the right data to the right recipients at the right time based on the owner’s established data collection and management priorities.

In addition to software, business processes can help make data management a breeze or a pain point. At a minimum, formal data management processes should include regular training for staff and regular validation to prevent outdated data, poor data collection practices, or critical program decision-making based on the aforementioned. A formal testing phase can help ensure staff understand data management processes at the outset of a program. More importantly, regular reviews of data management processes throughout a program’s life cycle will determine their continued relevance, allowing teams to eliminate redundant or outdated processes and create new ones as needed.

Data-Delivered Program Success

Owners that collaborate with their program management staff to define and prioritize their available data at the outset of a program, clarify data production and ownership responsibilities early, and select the right software and processes to manage data will collect more accurate and timely data. No matter what a program comprises, better data will drive better decision making, lead to more reliable project controls, and contribute to overall program success.

About the Author

Martin Lopez serves as Senior Director, Program Management at Hill International, Inc. He has 38 years of experience in global program and project management, project controls, and construction claims. His key experience includes the $2 billion Capital Improvement Program at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport and the $5.2 billion Panama Canal Expansion. He is a registered civil engineer in California. Martin can be reached at MartinLopez@hillintl.com.

The post Optimizing Data Collection for Program Management Success appeared first on Hill International.

Against this backdrop, water and wastewater utilities have to manage many risks and challenges in implementing their capital improvement programs. Program inefficiencies, poor designer or contractor performance, rework, unexpected conditions, and scheduling conflicts are only a few of the issues that can drive costs up, lengthen schedules, or impact construction quality. Because water and wastewater programs can involve years of construction in residential neighborhoods, street and/or sidewalk closures, service disruptions, unexpected sewage smells, and, sometimes, rate hikes, these programs also face major public relations challenges.

A Case Study in Public Relations Breakdown

In 2018 and 2019, I worked on a multi-hundred-million-dollar wastewater program for a medium-sized city in the Southern U.S. The program involved enhancing the city’s outdated sewer collection system and treatment facilities to eliminate sanitary sewer overflows, protect water quality, and deliver a system in compliance with all federal and state requirements.

Specific projects included repair or reconstruction of pipes, manholes, pump stations, and wastewater plants. With regards to design and construction, the city’s program team was capable, familiar with the means and methods, and had the required technical and managerial know-how.

While successful by many measures and extremely important for the city, the program struggled with public relations. As an assistant construction manager, I was leading projects in the field and often became the de facto representative for public relations. It’s not uncommon for field staff to handle questions and concerns from the public, but the program team lacked a cohesive public relations strategy to manage the incoming questions, concerns, and complaints. That resulted in an inundation of community concerns that were not always delivered to the right point of contact or addressed in a timely fashion, leading to public frustration.

Without the right public relations strategy, we also experienced management capacity misalignment. For example, I sometimes spent three or four hours of a one-hour forum talking about cracking concrete, dug-up yards, smells, and the removal of trees and shrubbery with community members. That was important work, but when a program team is undertaking more public relations than expected, it can reduce the team’s capacity to manage design, construction, commissioning, and closeout activities.

In addition to frustrating the community and reducing a program team’s management capacity, the lack of an effective public relations strategy can expose local and even state government, as well as other program stakeholders, to complaints and criticism. In the worst-case scenario, this kind of public pressure can impact the feasibility of continued utility infrastructure upgrades, no matter how crucial.

Program Management Solutions

The public relations challenges we faced on the program described above were not any one person or group’s fault, and the success of the program in other areas, despite the challenges with public relations, is a testament to the hard work of the city and their program team. It is extremely difficult to anticipate and plan for a long program’s public relations requirements. That’s why water and wastewater utility capital programs require formal stakeholder engagement plans and communication plans implemented by a program management team with public relations experience.

Experienced program management partners can more accurately anticipate the management capacity needed for public relations services based on the program’s size and scope. Program managers can then customize a stakeholder engagement plan to help ensure processes are in place for engaging and building relationships with the public, assessing public needs and concerns about the program, establishing and managing expectations, communicating information about the work and its impacts, and receiving community feedback. By designating channels for communications and repositories for program information, communication plans help streamline stakeholder engagement, reduce the need for answering the same questions over and over again, and make certain public feedback informs program planning.

An experienced program management partner can also work with owners to make sure staff who are knowledgeable about the program, its stakeholders, and its construction processes have sufficient capacity to serve as designated points of contact, meet with the community, answer questions, share information, and establish and manage expectations throughout a program’s life cycle. By incorporating public relations into the management scope at an early stage, program managers and owners will also develop more realistic staffing and budget requirements.

Water and wastewater utilities have changed a great deal since I started working in the industry as a treatment plant operator in the 90s. Exciting new technology, a new understanding of how contaminants and natural disasters impact our supplies, and new legislation are all shaping the industry’s operations and projects. However, as long as water and wastewater owners continue to implement capital construction programs to maintain affordable systems, protect our water sources, and ensure clean and drinkable water for all, the need for community outreach will always be important. By partnering with the right program management partner, owners will be able to implement effective stakeholder engagement and communication plans and deliver their capital programs in partnership with their communities.

About the Author

Construction Manager Melton Bell Sr. has more than 22 years of experience in the public and private spheres, as well as in the U.S. Armed Forces. He works out of Hill International’s office in Irving, TX. With operational and project expertise in the water/wastewater sector, including work at multiple treatment plants in Louisiana and levee and pump reconstruction after Hurricane Katrina, Melton understands the challenges and constraints utility owners face in upgrading, maintaining, and operating their systems. To speak with Melton about your own water/wastewater project needs, contact him via email at MeltonBell@hillintl.com.

To learn more about Hill’s water/wastewater experience, please visit: https://www.hillintl.com/environmental/.

The post Keeping Your Water/Wastewater Programs Flowing with Public Relations appeared first on Hill International.

However, this is not regularly the case.

Based on my experience working on three rail megaprojects, as well as on cases documented in industry journals, I find that securing project permits to start construction is a common challenge. When project teams are unable to secure permits as planned, their well-oiled machine can quickly break down, causing long-term cost and schedule disruptions and resulting in pulled funding and diminished stakeholder confidence. These outcomes can threaten a project’s feasibility.

So, what can project owners, contractors, and consultants do to overcome this challenge, secure permitting, and keep their projects on track? Below are steps for reducing permitting risk.

Prior to awarding a contract, owners and their proposed consultants and contractors should compile a non-contractual draft list of permits that they expect to need for the project. They should also meet with relevant permitting agencies to discuss the project, common pitfalls in managing submittals, agency preferences (e.g., digital vs. paper submittals), usual review times, and options for expediting reviews when needed. By doing so, project partners will be able to schedule permitting activities more accurately and align their submittal processes with permitting agency preferences.

When onboarding team members, do not underestimate the value of local experience with permitting agencies. Such experience can help ensure smooth submittal processes in line with agency preferences while reducing the need for on-project learning to train staff on submittal processes. As a bonus, team members who have worked with permitting agencies may have established relationships with personnel at those agencies, opening additional doors for informally communicating questions or concerns during the project.

After contract award, cultivate a partnering culture through frequent team meetings and a variety of partnering tools such as partnering charters. Formal communications plans encourage informal one-to-one discussions within the project organization and create standard documentation practices for technical resolutions. Partnering sessions with reviewing agencies are especially important on infrastructure megaprojects, where the size of the project system and the number of variable inputs heighten risk and the potential for cost/budget slippage. A project team committed to partnering will resolve issues without pointing fingers, more flexibly mitigate setbacks, and collaborate with a focus on shared project success.

As the project progresses through design, each member of the project team should resolve to separate technical decision-making from contractual or commercial considerations. Statements such as “This isn’t in the contract” or “This will have cost and schedule implications” are important, but they cannot override the project’s engineering progress. Instead, all technical resolutions should revolve around applicable codes and standards and their relation to the project’s scope as applicable. The project partners can hold separate meetings to resolve contractual or commercial issues stemming from any technical resolution.

As code or standard-related comments come up during technical meetings, project teams should address these in due detail. A little extra time spent here can result in considerable time savings during review cycles. Additionally, the project team should agree on a framework to address any conflicting codes and standards.

When the time comes for permitting submittals, project partners should implement a quality assurance/quality control system with discipline leads. Based on their meetings with permitting agencies and the entire team’s feedback during technical meetings, contractors are encouraged to develop permitting checklists for every permitting agency. The team should also perform an interdisciplinary review of all packages prior to submittal and never issue a package without a thorough quality review. This will help build reviewing agencies’ confidence. Finally, if a submittal is rejected, the team must collaborate as true partners to agree on an expedited path forward by using clearly detailed “check-sets,” including explanations addressing permitting agency comments that are inconsistent with owner criteria.

By taking these steps, the project team will increase the likelihood of achieving their permitting schedule in accordance with project scope and keep their infrastructure megaproject moving like a well-oiled machine.

About the Author 

Vice President Sami Soufi is an award-winning program executive with more than 30 years of experience leading the delivery of rail and transit megaprojects, including the $6 billion MTA Purple Line Rail Extension in Riverdale, MD, the $3 billion WMATA Silver Line Rail Extension in Washington, DC, and the $13 billion Riyadh Metro in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Sami holds a Master of Science in Construction Engineering and Management from the University of Maryland, College Park; a Master of Engineering in Structural Engineering from McGill University; and a Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering from Middle East Technical University. He is a registered Professional Engineer in Maryland and Virginia. To speak with Sami about your own transit project needs, contact him via email at samisoufi@hillintl.com.

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“InvestAI is just one high-profile example of the many public and private responses to European demand for increased in-house data infrastructure and data capacity,” says Hill International Country Manager, Italy Andrea Tota. “In line with the EU’s Digital Decade program, we can expect continued investment and continued growth in the market as technology companies and developers, their project teams, and public officials collaborate to realize the next generation of European data centers.”

Finding the Funding, Finding the Land

Even with strong public support, delivering a data center is a complex endeavor. In Europe, two critical risks facing owners involve their projects’ financial feasibility and local land-use requirements, explains Andrea. “The financial and land-use risks are very much related,” he adds. “In Italy, for example, much of the territory is already urbanized. So, today, urban planning does not include the consumption of new land. Furthermore, being a country of great landscape, historical and environmental value, a large part of the territory is subject to constraints. For this reason, data center developers are called to invest in the reconversion of buildings and abandoned areas, and this involves a variety of challenges.”

According to Andrea, common challenges associated with brownfield data center developments include:

• Infrastructure deficiencies limiting network connectivity and/or the uptake of power supply/distribution systems.
• Contamination and compliance issues, including the need for environmental remediation and permitting challenges.
• Local site characteristics, such as seismic requirements, proximity to flood-prone areas, etc.
• Dimensional and spatial constraints, such as irregular plots that limit optimal layouts and power and/or prevent the fulfilment of logistical requirements.
• High demolition costs.
• The perception of brownfield projects as higher risk by investors.

Such risks can threaten projects by increasing upfront costs, limiting operational capacity, and/or reducing potential returns on investment. To achieve project success and profitability on their brownfield data center investments, developers require effective project management.

Realizing Returns

Leveraging real estate experience and a deep familiarity with the risks involved in data center and brownfield construction, Andrea and other experts within Hill’s Italian Data Center Department conduct preliminary analyses and due diligence to assess sites, existing assets, and project plans. With such assessments, project managers can flag operational inefficiencies early and implement project management processes and tools to mitigate or eliminate risks.

“We understand developer and end user requirements” says Andrea. “For example, we know how to develop a good test-fit for a standard hyperscale or edge facility to evaluate land opportunities, how to assess environmental or permitting risk during acquisition, and how to verify power availability for an area. After evaluating those and other constraints with owners, we use our construction experience to identify suitable solutions for those areas with the greatest potential for improvement according to market-specific best practices. Considering owners’ financial goals, we then develop construction strategies for delivering upgrades cost effectively, propose alternative procurement strategies for long-lead items, and support tenant partnering initiatives to get data centers up and running at their peak as soon as possible.”

Project managers can also manage permitting services related to compliance with local regulations. “Regulations surrounding data centers are changing rapidly,” says Andrea. “Last year, for instance, the Italian Ministry of Environment and Energy Security issued sustainability guidelines for data centers. We help our data center clients in the country develop their environmental impact assessments (EIA) in line with those guidelines and collaborate to identify the best strategies for permitting and design.”

By staying on top of regulatory issues on behalf of owners, project managers help capture all relevant regulations in project specifications, promoting the delivery of compliant facilities, preventing delays in EIA approvals or the need for rework, and saving money and time. Additionally, understanding the regulatory environment allows owners to take advantage of tax incentives for green building practices or renewable energy installations, contributing further towards a project’s financial feasibility.

A Network of Urban Hubs

Many developers are exploring ways to enhance brownfield data center projects by integrating their facilities with surrounding urban districts. By connecting data centers to neighboring heating systems, developers can supply heat to homes, offices, and other nearby buildings. In this way, data centers go from energy sinks to sustainability hubs, reducing the need for fossil fuel-based heating and cutting carbon dioxide emissions.

“This is an exciting prospect for developers,” says Andrea. “With the proper regulatory framework, it would help resolve some of the challenges related to identifying locations for projects and make brownfield projects more attractive to investors. It would also, of course, contribute to making data centers more sustainable in line with relevant local regulations and the European Green Deal.”

Plus, by locating data centers of different sizes in urban districts, developers can establish networks of edge data centers. “While traditional data centers remain indispensable, edge data centers, with their decentralized infrastructure, bring services closer to end users,” explains Deerns Italia Business Developer, Data Centers Mauro Rigo. “Specifically, edge data infrastructure processes data much closer to the source. This enables faster, safer, and more efficient data management, reduces latency and increases user satisfaction, and brings advantages for IoT [internet of things] technology, as well as certain AI applications.”

Despite the potential benefits, there are challenges associated with delivering data centers in urban settings, especially in residential neighborhoods. During design, developers must achieve architectural harmony with surrounding structures while meeting all operational requirements, and construction requires strict logistics and safety plans. “Social integration is probably even more important than the technical challenges,” adds Deerns Italia Unit Director, Data Centers Danilo Andreotti. “Involving local communities helps raise awareness about the benefits of data centers, such as job creation and technological advancement. Transparency about operations and any environmental impacts is also key to building trust.”

Project managers can facilitate community involvement and transparency through strategic messaging. Andrea mentions the development and implementation of formal communications plans and the management of all community outreach initiatives as services that can facilitate stakeholder engagement and alleviate community concerns about energy reliability, noise or vibrations from data center operations, and/or architectural integration of data center facilities into neighborhoods.

“Implementing data center infrastructure as part of mixed-use developments would also support urban integration,” Andrea goes on. “A win-win approach would be to pair data centers with facilities for which it can be hard to find space in urban settings, such as skate parks, padel courts, art installations, or even farms.”

Delivering the Infrastructure of the Digital Decade

While all construction involves risk, the financial/land-use risks and the changing regulatory environment associated with data center construction in Europe make these projects uniquely challenging. However, as technologies such as AI and cloud computing become further entrenched in European economic, cultural, and social life, demand for secure, reliable in-house data center capacity will only continue to grow.

With EU support for data infrastructure, as well as the technical and management expertise of a dedicated project manager, technology companies and developers can continue to innovate in the sector, deliver financially feasible and sustainable urban data center hubs, and establish the infrastructure for Europe’s digital decade.

This article is based in part on “Edge Data Centers: A New Paradigm for Sustainability and Urban Integration,” a panel discussion organized by Deerns and held on April 2 at Data Center Nation Milan 2025. Andrea Tota spoke on the panel alongside Deerns Data Center Sector Director Colin Wyatt, Mediterra Chief Executive Officer Emmanuel Becker, Bryden Wood Architecture Director Mauro Burgio, Colliers Head of Data Centers Faustino Musicco, and Data Center Nation Global Strategic Advisor Simon Allen.

For more information about Hill’s work on data centers around the world, please visit: https://www.hillintl.com/projects/?_sft_sector=technology.

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