Page 124 - Book_Artelia_10years

Creation
With the construction of 200 km
of new lines, most of them
underground, and 68 stations,
in a densely populated urban
environment, the Grand Paris
Express is unquestionably an
outsize project which calls for a
customised management system
to match.
122 I ARTELIA, 10 YEARS OF EXISTENCE, 100 YEARS OF EXPERIENCE
of the Grand Paris Express driverless metro
(France)
In order to bid for this completely unprecedented project, we formed the Artemis consortium
with two other companies (Arcadis and BG). We set up an innovative form of partnership by
pooling our respective resources. We then formed a dedicated team that ultimately comprised
220 people, a hundred of whom were from Artelia. The challenge was to form a close-knit
group with colleagues ready to forget their original companies for a while in order to devote
themselves completely to the project. It is a source of great satisfaction that we succeeded in
creating a dynamic team spirit that enabled us to ride the storms and gain our client’s esteem.
For the Grand Paris Express is a complex project, and the pressure is high. In providing a
massive extension to the public transport network in the Paris region, it will make daily travel
easier for millions of people. And because of this, the many politicians and local authorities
involved are all the more impatient. It also represents an investment of several tens of billions of
euros of public money. It is therefore a politically sensitive project that generates considerable
media coverage and is closely scrutinised by the State and elected representatives. While there
is a general consensus over the need for the project, completion times are a legitimate source
of tension between those involved in its construction and the residents and local authorities
affected by the works. We are well aware of this pressure as we work alongside the Société du
Grand Paris, helping it to manage all the various aspects of the project and the myriad parties
involved.
From a technical standpoint, it is a matter of managing enormous works contracts, in particular
the civil engineering works. At present, there are nearly 300 construction sites spread over the
Greater Paris region, most of them in densely populated urban areas. As most of the metro
system is underground, some 20 tunnel boring machines are at work whereas in ordinary
circumstances only 4 or 5 are being used at any one time in the whole of France. Everything
is super-sized, including the quantity of materials and equipment required, the amount of
excavation, and the exceptionally deep and thick diaphragm walls. Even the huge fleet of HGVs
needed to meet the logistical requirements of the construction sites is not easy to mobilise.
Étienne Rousselet
Director of the Grand Paris Metro project management assignment | Mobility & Infrastructure