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Heriot-Watt's Malaysia Campus has welcomed Sir Terry Morgan, Chairman of Crossrail, as part of the Vice-Chancellor's Distinguished Lecture series 2017.
Crossrail, which is Europe's largest infrastructure project, will provide a new high frequency, high capacity railway for London and the South East.
Sir Terry shared some of his insights and experiences from the project in one of the world's busiest capital cities, as well as the challenges and lessons learned. Crossrail, a £14.9 billion project sponsored by the UK Department for Transport and Transport for London, was implemented to deliver a world-class, affordable railway that will ease travelling in the capital.
Promoting the value of our industry relations, enterprise and business and forging innovative links between these and the academic world is what we're all about here at Heriot-Watt University.
It stretches nearly 120km across London and includes 42km of brand new tunnels plus 10 new stations. The insights gleaned from the lecture are timely as Malaysia looks to increase its connectivity within the Klang Valley through the expansion of the Light Rail Transit (LRT) and Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) lines.
Sir Terry's lecture was attended by Heriot-Watt's Principal and Vice-Chancellor, Professor Richard A. Williams OBE, captains of industry, including representatives from major Malaysian public and private organisations as well as staff and students from the Malaysia campus.
In his welcome speech, Professor Williams expressed his pleasure in hosting Sir Terry, and how such opportunities are in line with Heriot-Watt's global outlook. He said: “Promoting the value of our industry relations, enterprise and business and forging innovative links between these and the academic world is what we're all about here at Heriot-Watt University.
“We have a long tradition of working closely with business and industry in areas of strategic alliances with international companies, small knowledge transfer partnerships with SMEs, and events such as today's where we bring together leading global figures from industry to share their knowledge and experience and to inspire others to follow in their footsteps.”
Given Heriot-Watt's prowess in the engineering and built environment fields, this lecture also popular with students.
Mohd Naqeeb Zahiedin a, second year Civil Engineering student and the student Council President of Heriot-Watt University Malaysia, said: “Having Sir Terry on campus has definitely enabled us to understand the challenges and differences between Malaysia and the UK. London's Crossrail is a major step forward in transportation engineering, and I hope to one day learn more from similar lectures that will inspire me to be a great engineer.”