Why Is It Public Projects Tend To Be Late?
I read in The Times today that the new headquarters building of the European Central Bank is three years late and €500 million over budget.
It’s only similar to Portcullis House, Philharmonie de Paris, the Jubilee Line Extension and innumerable cancelled government computer systems.
At least though in recent years, we seem to be getting our project management better, even if the Eurozone will have to pay the bill for the new ECB headquarters.
The Anonymous Widower 
Public projects are always late and over-budget because of one thing: No accountability. The government has typically unlimited funds and nobody really gets fired (unless there’s a scandal) if things don’t go the right way.
Another reason why public projects are late and over-budget is corruption.
Comment by PM Hut (@pmhut) | February 21, 2014 |
political interference also comes into it.
I once in about 1972 worked with the Construction Branch of the GLC. They were building four blocks of flats, on a site that backed onto a railway line. The planner had got access rights from British Rail and thus all trucks were to enter and leave the site from the railway. He was also going to build the blocks towards the railway, so that as the blocks were finished, they could be released for occupation. But the politicians decided that the blocks should be built in order away from the railway for some spurious reason. The cost rose by a third and the project took longer. The planner, who was good at his job, resigned soon after and went to work at CERN in Geneva.
I won’t repeat some of the stories I know concerning political interference, as some politicians, who are still alive, might consider them defamatory.
Comment by AnonW | February 21, 2014 |