Edkins, A; Jeffrey, P; Nightingale, P; Brady, T; Davies, A; (2018) The potential benefits of outcome based assessments of infrastructure performance. (ICIF White Paper Collection ). International Centre for Infrastructure Futures (ICIF): London, UK.

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Abstract

The human race’s progress as a species has involved the creation of many types of artefact with arguably one of the most important being the construction of physical infrastructures. From working out how to build our own shelters and securing water supplies, we have identified and pursued the creation of the technologies and networks that we need to allow us to function in ever larger groups and communities. Thus, as a society we have generated a paradigm comprising both players and principles for assessing which infrastructure to invest in based on a combination of political decision making and a rationalist economic assessment, where measurable estimates of both the benefits and costs are evaluated. The traditional focus of regulators on the magnitude and quality of resources needed (inputs) to deliver a particular level of service or improvements to services (outputs) is now being challenged by an alternative view which assesses higher-level objectives that infrastructure investments seek to achieve, often in terms of customer experience and utility. Such Outcome based evaluations specify the outcome required but leaves the specific measures to achieve that outcome up to the discretion of the infrastructure builder and operator. Through the use of cases and examples from a number of sectors we review the different forms of benefit which infrastructure provides to our communities and examine what performance might mean in the context of such physical systems. This narrative prefaces an analysis of three particularly challenging aspects of outcomes based infrastructure evaluation: Who’s outcomes are to be valued? What constitutes an outcome? and How are we to deal with the temporality of outcome realisation? The nuances around these debates will shape both the nature of outcome metrics and arrangements for their auditing.

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