Cross River Rail is a new 10.2km heavy rail line through central Brisbane that includes a 5.9km twin tunnel under the Brisbane River and CBD. The total project, valued at $6.1 billion, is being delivered in several procurement packages the largest of which are the Tunnel, Station and Development PPP package and the Rail Systems and Integration Alliance package.

Cross River Rail will unlock a bottleneck at the core of Brisbane’s transport network that will allow more trains to run more often and will integrate with new busways and new roads to provide a ‘turn-up-and-go’ transport system for the whole of south east Queensland.

Our people’s involvement

At pre-procurement phase, members of our team undertook the following activities:

• Strategic and project evaluation advice through the project’s pre-feasibility phase

• Input into development of the Cross River Rail Options Report (Preliminary Evaluation) under Queensland’s Project Assessment Framework.

Transaction management services included:

• Delivery strategy development, including re-packaging approach, resulting in the change of package battery limits and subsequent reduction in commercial interfaces and risks

• Support to industry engagement and market sounding

• Commercial principles advice for the major packages

• Transaction planning and management, implementation, and coordination of the transaction strategy

• Developing a detailed schedule of key activities and timeframes for development of all components of transaction documentation and key transaction processes

• Developing detailed evaluation plans for each phase of the transaction processes

• Preparing and managing virtual data rooms

• Facilitating and managing the EOI processes including clarifications, addenda and notices

• Facilitating and managing the RFP phase interactive tender process

• Managing the commercial and contractual discussions and negotiations with tenderers

• Facilitating and coordinating the evaluation process, including Evaluation Panel and evaluation teams

• Development and finalisation of contract documentation ready for contract award

Key achievements and value-add

• Input into successful completion of the business case for the State’s top priority project that was subsequently approved by the Building Queensland Board and Queensland Government

• Business case led to ‘in-principle’ funding commitment from the Queensland Government

• One of the first business cases to be undertaken under Building Queensland’s detailed business case framework

• Maximising early market interest and activity given uncertainty (at the time) surrounding the project through collaborative and early engagement with the market

• Successfully completing EOI evaluations, and subsequent shortlisting in February 2018

• Successfully completing RFP evaluations, negotiations and contract documentation to contract and financial close

• Client satisfaction that all deliverables (particularly for REOI, EOI and RFP) were completed on time, providing significant market confidence benefits