ReCAP shares knowledge with a global audience at the 26th PIARC World Road Congress

In Abu Dhabi, on 6-10 October 2019, the ReCAP programme took the opportunity of the 26th PIARC World Road Congress to share some key outputs of its research with a global audience from the road sector. Some 5000 delegates attended the congress, themed “Connecting cultures, enabling economies”, which was accompanied by a large exhibition. 

Ten ReCAP supported conference papers were presented at the Congress. Three of them were recognised and awarded a prize:

⦁ The Rural Access Index (RAI) paper by TRL and the ReCAP Project Management Unit won the UK prize for Sustainable Development, by the UK National Committee of PIARC; 

⦁ The paper on Qingqi transport in Pakistan by IMC Worldwide and the University of Lahore, Pakistan, won the UK prize for Roads and Inter-modality by the UK National Committee of PIARC.

⦁ The paper on the Rural Road Asset Management project (GEM) was awarded the prize for Developing Countries in the international paper competition by PIARC, and will be published in the next issue of the Association’s magazine, Routes/Roads, as well as in the Congress proceedings.

ReCAP’s climate adaptation research for low volume road networks was presented by the deputy Team Leader and Infrastructure Research Manager Nkululeko Leta, during a PIARC foresight session on Road Infrastructure Resilience. In his presentation, Mr Leta highlighted the Sub-Sahara African perspective on climate change and the implications in particular for rural communities, bearing the majority of consequences following inaction. He explained the background to the ReCAP Climate Adaptation project, which looked to develop regional guidance on the development of climate resilient road infrastructure and stressed the critical need for embedment and mainstreaming in road engineering practices as well as national policies, information systems, thinking and local capacities. The presentation contained a summary of typical issues encountered in climate change adaptation in African countries and recommended actions for a way forward. A presentation by Michael Roux of CSIR, South Africa, on Embedment of Climatic Effects in the Road Asset Management Process during the technical session on adaptation strategies complemented this effort.

ReCap organised a workshop on the consolidation and improvement of the Rural Access Index (RAI) which was well attended and saw lively debate. The workshop is reported on separately elsewhere (click here) in this Newsletter. 

Furthermore, a number of ReCAP papers were presented during poster sessions, sparking good interest and debate. 

The participation in the UK Pavilion at the congress exhibition, in close collaboration with the DFID funded High Volume Transport (HVT) programme, was successful. It entailed two well-attended ReCAP presentations at the pavilion – on the topics of RAI and on the Sustainable Mobility for All (SuM4All) initiative respectively – and the dissemination of ReCAP project- and technical briefs as well as the ReCAP-branded USB keys. 

All ReCAP presented materials are available for download on the dedicated PIARC WRC webpage on the ReCAP website. 

For more information on ReCAP representation at international events and conferences, please contact Caroline Visser, ReCAP Knowledge & Communication manager, on caroline.visser@cardno.com.