Enabling Better Infrastructure in the South West

Prof Jim Hall

The ICE’s 160th President, Jim Hall is professor of climate and environmental risks at the University of Oxford. He is internationally recognised for his research on risk analysis in water resource systems, flooding and coastal engineering, infrastructure systems and climate change adaptation.  

Hall is a member of the prime minister’s Council for Science and Technology and a commissioner on the National Infrastructure Commission (NIC). He also served on the adaptation committee of the independent Climate Change Committee from 2009 to 2019.  

Hall led the development of the national infrastructure systems model the NIC used in producing its first National Infrastructure Assessment. He invented the Data & Analytics Facility for National Infrastructure in 2017 and remains chair of its strategy board.  

Among his many accolades, Hall was awarded the ICE’s George Stephenson Medal in 2001 and the Prince Sultan Bin Abdulaziz International Prize for Water in 2018. He also contributed to the Fourth Assessment Report of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. 

Dr Stephen Allen

Dr Stephen Allen is an associate professor in the Department of Architecture and Civil Engineering at the University of Bath.  His research and teachings focus on measuring sustainability in design and engineering, particularly use of life cycle assessment (LCA) in the development of construction products. He joined the University of Bath in 2018, having previously worked as the scientific adviser on energy at the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, and as a senior consultant and then director of energy and environmental consultancies in industry. He is also a recipient of the George Stephenson Prize (IMechE, 2008) for LCA of wind power. 

Sophie Broadfield

Sophie is responsible for ensuring the council’s policies improve places, support delivery of net zero and address inequality. This includes managing the following service teams: transport strategy, sustainable economy, planning and building control, culture and heritage. She also oversees the director of capital and housing.

Nick Cooper

Nick has extensive experience in infrastructure communications, working on projects with National Highways, Costain, Network Rail and Crossrail, to name just a few.

He started his career in the civil service before moving to housing and strategic land promotion, and then into infrastructure. 

He recently spent two years on the A30 Chiverton to Carland Cross upgrade in Cornwall and now leads local communications and engagement for the Agratas gigafactory project in Bridgwater, Somerset.

Livvy Drake

Livvy works with organisations to achieve their sustainability goals. She uses the principles of behavioural science to empower changemakers to achieve greater behaviour change outside of the green echo chamber. She has practical sustainability and behaviour change experience spanning local authorities, corporate organisations and campaigns. 

Paula Hewitt

Paula was deputy chief executive and lead director at Somerset County Council, where she was responsible for a diverse mix of services ranging from highways and waste to economic development, property and libraries. She also served as president of the Association of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning & Transport (ADEPT).

While at Somerset County Council, she led a number of high-profile service transformation programmes, addressing climate change and introducing innovative ways of delivering services, customer benefits and financial savings.

Paula was heavily involved in co-ordinating the local authority response to the devastating Somerset floods in 2014 and led the work to minimise the effect of future flooding through the creation of the Somerset Rivers Authority.  As a result, Paula was appointed as an expert adviser to the EU Committee of the Regions in relation to disaster resilience.

Paula was appointed by DEFRA as chair of the Thames Regional Flood and Coastal Committee (RFCC) in September 2024. She is also a member of the board of the South West Business Council.

Jason Hones

Starting in the Royal Engineers as a Troop Commander in the 1990s, Jason deployed on operations to the Falkland Islands, Saudi Arabia, Balkans, Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria.

Jason led his squadron of 220 soldiers to Afghanistan in 2008 to undertaken combat and military engineering operations in Helmand province. In 2012, Jason became the Commanding Officer of 23 Engineer Regiment (Air Assault) – consisting of over 700 military engineers – which was held at 24 hours’ notice to move to deploy globally. 

Jason started in Highways England in 2018 as the Head of Strategy and Transformation. In 2020, he was the Midlands’ Regional Delivery Director for Major Projects. He started as Regional Director South West in August 2022.

Miranda Housden

As the South West director at the ICE, Miranda is responsible for raising the profile of civil engineering in the region, maintaining professional standards, encouraging a diverse future workforce and providing leadership and direction to the ICE South West team and more than 6,000 ICE members.

Prior to moving to the South West, she was the ICE director for London and South East England, having previously been the London director for the Royal Institute of British Architects. Miranda has produced a number of films including Engineering the London Underground, Engineering Plymouth and Engineering Happiness for which she was awarded the Institution of Civil Engineers Garth Watson medal.

Alongside her ICE role, Miranda is chief executive officer for the South West Infrastructure Partnership.

Peter Kydd

Peter is an ICE Fellow with more than 45 years’ professional experience. He specialises as a consultant engineer in carbon reduction, renewable energy, water and transport. Although he’s retired, he continues to advise national and local governments.

He’s also a strategic consultant to WSP, undertaking due diligence in areas such as climate change action planning, decarbonisation and tidal power.

Peter won the Gold Medal for his contributions to renewable energy use and decarbonisation across the transport and water sectors, along with his work to support economic growth in South West England.

Professor Colin Taylor

Colin is emeritus professor of earthquake engineering at the University of Bristol. He is an ICE policy Fellow for sub-national infrastructure decarbonisation, and is champion of the South West Infrastructure Partnership’s net zero route mapping activities. He has over 40 years' research and practice experience on the impacts of natural hazards on all kinds of infrastructure systems.