signalling in particular is a hard
sell.
‘Train signalling used to be a black
art, but it actually isn’t like that any
more,’ he said.
‘More and more, our best product in
the area is a computer-based control
system. It’s all about IT, it’s very
hi-tech. People can come into this area as
electrical engineers and acquire a whole
range of new skills, which are very
transferable.’
This means that Thales is looking for
specific types of people in its recruitment
activities. ‘You do need people who can
look strategically across the issues and
engineering problems and solutions, but
you also need your experts.
‘The type of graduates we’re after are
the ones that are excited by looking at
very complex problems; give them a
problem and they will work on it and
focus on it, and that’s their motivation.
They don’t necessarily want to see
that interfacing work; they want to move
on to the next critical and challenging
problem.’
When it comes to the critical moments
for London’s new infrastructure, there is
a definite air of challenge, he said.
‘Everyone has to be prepared, by then, to
‘When people see the benefit of the investment
they’ll forget they were inconvenienced because
the Victoria Line shut early one weekend’
make certain that the engineering
resource is available to London to
deliver these massive projects.’
Meanwhile, Thales is also looking
into other IT-related transport projects.
‘A lot of our activity has been around
what a lot of people believe is politi-
cally unacceptable, which is road user
charging,’ Batley said.
Thales has recently worked with a
consortium including Halliburton
Brown & Root, and Atkins, looking at
different technologies for road
charging, he said.
One area where this could bear fruit
is in Manchester, he said, where an
extension of the current tram network
could be funded by a road charging
scheme. ‘It’s the sort of scheme that
will allow organisations to start
ploughing money back into infrastruc-
ture, but it has to be done the right
way,’ he added.
the EnGIneeR 19 MAY–1 JUNE 2008 31
Electronic communications can also
be used in other ways, he said. Thales
is in a partnership with Alcatel to build
a high-bandwidth broadband network,
called the South Yorkshire Digital
Region, covering the Sheffield,
Barnsley, Doncaster and Rotherham
regions. It is funded by the EU, the
local authorities and the Yorkshire
Forward RDA and Batley believes it
could provide a range of advantages for
the region.
‘It’s a massive network, and it’s
going to provide infrastructure for so
many things that require high
bandwidth.
‘We can talk about video on demand
and all that sort of thing, but there’s
also e-monitoring of the health of the
elderly, linking libraries and schools
together, giving people more direct
access to local services and pulling
businesses together.’
INTERVIEW
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