MBA643 Project Management Report: North East Link Melbourne Project

This report provides a detailed analysis of the North East Link Melbourne project, focusing on project management principles, risk assessment, and mitigation strategies. The report begins with an overview of the project, including its scope, budget, social and economic rationale, key statistics, funding mechanisms, and stakeholders. It then delves into a comprehensive risk analysis, identifying potential risks such as schedule slippage, stakeholder involvement issues, communication barriers, and safety concerns. The risk matrix assesses the likelihood and impact of each identified risk. Finally, the report proposes a detailed risk mitigation plan, outlining specific strategies to address and minimize the impact of the identified risks, ensuring the project's successful execution. The report covers various aspects of the project life cycle, including planning, execution, and closure, and emphasizes the importance of effective communication and stakeholder management. The project's financial aspects, including the budget and funding mechanisms, are also thoroughly discussed, along with the environmental considerations and benefits.

Running head: PROJECT MANAGEMENT
Project management- North East link Melbourne
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author’s Note

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Table of Contents
Part A: Project overview..................................................................................................................2
A.1 Overview of the project........................................................................................................2
A.2 Budget of the project.............................................................................................................2
A.3 Social and economic rationale..............................................................................................2
A.4 Key statistics.........................................................................................................................3
A.5 Funding mechanism..............................................................................................................6
A.6 Key stakeholders of the project............................................................................................6
Part B: Risk analysis........................................................................................................................7
B.1 Potential risks that are associated with the project...............................................................7
B.2 Risk matrix reflecting likelihood and consequence of the identified risks...........................9
Part C: Risk mitigation plan..........................................................................................................10
References......................................................................................................................................20

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Part A: Project overview
A.1 Overview of the project
The main focus of the paper is to reflect on the Sydney Metro Northwest construction. It
is found that construction of the metro will be helpful in delivering 8 different stations and about
4000 car parking areas. The Sydney metro construction will be beneficial as the facility of metro
will be provided at the gap of four minutes and thus the passengers does not need to maintain a
timetable for travelling (Sydneymetro 2019). Moreover, the metro construction will be helpful in
giving proper reliable service to the region that has highest car ownership. The construction work
has commenced in February 2010 and it is expected that the construction work will be completed
successfully by May 2019 within the budget that is around $314 million.
A.2 Budget of the project
The construction work of Sydney metro will generally need budget of around $314
million. It is found that all the that are associated with the construction of the metro rail must be
selected with the budget that is assigned for each of the project activities and this is mainly done
for avoiding financial issues in the project.
A.3 Social and economic rationale
Due to the growth in the population of Sydney, the people of Sydney requires proper
experience of travelling which must be provided with the help of Metro rail. The government
took the initiative of construction and helps in providing proper travelling experience. It is
identified that the metro rail will provide service at the gap of four minutes and therefore there is
no need to maintain timetable for traveling (Sydneymetro 2019). In addition to this, it is found
that the Sydney metro northwest will have capacity of 4500 passengers at a time that is twice

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more than the public transport that it helps in reducing crowding on the road. Furthermore, it is
identified that the use of public transport will generally help in properly commuting for those
passengers who will generally select public transport.
On the other hand, construction of Sydney Metro will generally create a number of
issues in context to economic and social rationale. It is found that if more number of lines are
reclaimed as well as transferred within the metro then there a huge chance that large number of
staffs can lose job opportunity that further helps in reflecting negative economic impact.
Moreover, it is found that the construction work that is required to be done for the Sydney
Northwest metro is mainly considered to be very much incompatible within the present network.
A.4 Key statistics
Scope and Size
The Sydney metro northwest construction is considered as one of the large construction
project of Sydney that will generally deliver 8 new railways stations as well as around 4000
spaces for car parking. In addition to this, the scope of the project mainly includes:
 Tunnel construction
 Precincts and station construction
 Excavation for the construction of the site
 Installation of the high voltage of power supply
 Undertaking the work of soil removal as well as civil work for finishing the construction
work
 Upgradation of the footpath and road that are mainly associated with construction

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Budget and estimated cost
The budget that is generally required for constructing the Sydney metro Northwest will
be around $134 million. The amount of budget that is required for executing each of the project
activities are generally reflected in the figure that is provided below:
Figure 1: Project budget
(Source: Created by Author)

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Time needed for completing the project
The time that is mainly needed for completing the Sydney metro Northwest construction
will be around 9 years. It is found that the figure that is provided below mainly reflects on the
time that is required for executing each of the project activities with proper information related
with project initiation and completion date.
Figure 2: Project schedule
(Source: Created by Author)

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Key construction elements or phases
The key construction elements or phases that are mainly required for constructing the
metro rail project in Sydney northwest are generally reflected below:
 Planning phase of the project
 Initiation phase of the project
 Project execution phase
 Project closure phase
Environmental costs or benefits
It is identified that the project that was undertaken will generally have clear vision about
the delivery of the sustainable infrastructure of the project that further helps in demonstrating the
social, environmental, economic within the entire project. It is found that the sustainability will
generally be helpful in properly measuring the project which generally has been established for
achieving proper water efficiency, biodiversity conversation, waste management as well as for
use of integration as well as for future master planning within the project.
A.5 Funding mechanism
The project “Sydney metro Northwest construction” will generally need an amount $130
million in order to complete the work of the project. The entire amount of money that is assumed
for project will be analyzed and then funded by the government.
A.6 Key stakeholders of the project
In order to complete the construction of rail project, the following stakeholders are involved
with the project work.

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 Project planner
 Project contractor
 Project manager
 Worker
 Sub-contractor
 Construction team
 Human resource manager
 Financial manager
 Architectural design
 Civil engineers
Part B: Risk analysis
B.1 Potential risks that are associated with the project
There are a number of potential risks that are generally determined by using both
qualitative as well as quantitative risk measures while undertaking the Sydney rail Northwest
construction project in context to the framework of PMBOK.
Slippage of schedule: The political issue that occur in Sydney generally creates tension
which raise a number of challenges and due to which the project manager faces difficulty in
initiating with the project initial phase (Sydneymetro 2019). Due to failure in starting the project
at right time, it is found that the project faces schedule slippage that further causes delay within
the project execution. Moreover, the delay related with the project schedule also occurs due to
span cracks buckling risk.

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Improper stakeholder’s involvement: Due to inappropriate involvement of the project
stakeholders in the project, it will be quite difficult to complete the project within the expected
deadline and because of improper involvement it will be quite difficult for the project team
members to give their contribution within the project. It is found that for avoiding such type of
challenges as well as issues, it is necessary for the project team to get involved within the project
quite effectively (Bakke et al. 2016).
Improper information about the responsibilities of stakeholders: The project team
members who are associated within the construction work does not have proper idea about the
project roles and responsibilities and it is found that due to improper knowledge about roles and
responsibilities, it is quite difficult for the project team members to complete the work of the
project effectively within the project team (Bommer, Crowley and Pinho 2015). Due to this, the
project team members are unable to meet the goals as well as objectives of the project quite
efficiently.
Communication barrier: It is found that if the project team are unable to communicate
with the project leaders then the leaders will not be able to know about various events that took
place within the project and take decisions for further progress in the project. Thus, it is found
that lack of information due to communication barrier is considered as one of the major risks that
needs to be resolved effectively.
Inappropriate reporting: It is found that if the project team are unable to report about
the project cost, schedule as well as time of the project then it will be quite difficult for the
project team to take proper decision related with the project that can further create obstruction
within the progress of the project (Cole et al. 2017). Thus, it is found that inappropriate reporting
can cause delay within the construction of Sydney rail Northwest.

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Safety risk: It is found that the construction project that was undertaken by the project
team is risky due to the dangerous corner of the metro rail (Bromiley et al. 2015). This further
can cause risks for the passengers. Therefore, in order to avoid this type of risks, it is quite
necessary for the project team to implement proper safety measurement within the project.
B.2 Risk matrix reflecting likelihood and consequence of the identified risks
It is stated by Todorovic et al. (2015) that a risk matrix is one of the technique that is
mainly used during the procedure of risk assessment in order to define the different level of risks
by taking into account both the consequences as well as likelihood of the project. This is
generally considered as one of the simple mechanism in order to enhance visibility related with
the risk that further helps in making proper decision that is mainly associated with the project
(Tupa, Simota and Steiner 2017). After successfully undertaking the project, it is found that there
are a number of challenges as well as risks which generally can occur within the project. The
table that is provided below mainly analyses the priority of risks by properly considering the
likelihood as well as probability of the risk
Risk Impact Likelihood Level of risk
Slippage of schedule High Likely High
Improper
involvement of the
stakeholders
Moderate Possible Medium
Communication
barriers
High Very likely High

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Improper reporting
facility
Moderate Likely Medium
Improper
Inappropriate
reporting
High Unlikely Medium
Safety risk High Very likely High
Impact
Likelihood
Very
low
Low Moderate High Very
high
Rare
Unlikely Improper
understanding
of roles and
responsibilities
Possible Improper
involvemen
t of the
stakeholder
s
Likely Improper
reporting
Schedule
slipapge
Very likely Barriers of
communication
Safety risk
Budget
shortfall
Part C: Risk mitigation plan
According to Yoon et al. (2018) risk mitigation is referred as one of the plan that
generally assists in properly reflecting various types of ways in order to deal with various risks
that mainly arises during the metro construction. The various types of strategies that are mainly
used in order to mitigate the project risk include risk transfer, risk avoidance, risk elimination as

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well as risk acceptance. The mitigation plan that is developed for resolving the risks that
generally occurs during the construction of Sydney rail Northwest are generally reflected in the
table that is mainly provided in the below table:
Risk Description Impact Probabili
ty
Person
responsibl
e
Risk
mitigati
on
strategie
s
Mitigation
plan
Schedule
slippage
It is
analyzed
that due to
political
issue during
the time of
project
initiation, it
is found that
the project
manager
face issues
in
completing
the project
High High Project
manager
Mitigate It is found that
in order to
mitigate the
risks as well
as challenges
that occur due
to slippage of
schedule, it is
quite
important to
track the
schedule of
the project on
a weekly
basis. It is