Civil Engineering September 2022 | Vol 30 No 8

20 September 2022 Civil Engineering S AICE and CESA presented semi- nars around the country following the release of SIPDM in 2017. FIDPM is similar in terms of the Gateway Review requirements, the key differences are in the administration of the process. The project process specifies that projects with a total value of over R100 million are subject to the Stage 2: Concept Design Regional Gateway Review. Details of the FIDPM are avail- able on the National Treasury website and not reproduced here, however the focus of the Stage 2 Gateway Review is to review concepts that provide “value for money”. A Gateway Review Team comprises a minimum of three people and is led by a registered professional with experience in the planning of infrastructure projects. The members of the team need to have expertise in the key technical areas of the project. The aim of the Stage 2 Gateway Review is to review the concept design options and assess the reasoning behind the recommended solution at an early stage of the design development. This is meant to provide a decisive direction for the ongoing work in preparing the preliminary and detailed designs. The aim of this article is to provide some insights, from a reviewer’s perspective, which in turn will hopefully give some food for thought for preparing documentation for submission to Stage 2 Gateway Reviews in the project process. My comments are based on project proposals submitted to a public sector agency for the Stage 2 Concept Design Gateway Review, where I have been a member of the Gateway Review Team. I must point out that there are some very good submissions. I have used the good qualities of these in making suggestions to make the reports and presentations easier for the reviewer to follow and understand the process through to the recommended solution. I do recognise that there are detailed engineering calculations involved, and for the most part, engineers are good at these. I do however get the impression that engi- neers seem to overlook the basics. Simply “stating the obvious” and explaining where the project fits into the big picture (a strategic overview) at the outset can put the project into context. FIDPM OVERVIEW The focus of FIDPM is on the govern- ance decision making points to ensure that value for money is obtained when spending taxpayers’ money and that an acceptable return is achieved on a socio- economic basis. At Stage 2 of the project process this is achieved through the selection of an appropriate concept design proposal that is a strategic fit and provides a balance between maximising the benefits to the road user and minimising the implementation cost. The full process is depicted in Figure 1, where gateway stage 2 (G2) is after the completion of the concept design. Alan Robinson Pr Eng Chair: SAICE Transport Division Specialist Traffic Engineer: SANRAL Member:SANRALNationalGatewayReviewTeam robinsona@sanral.co.za Recommendations for FIDPM Project Process Stage 2 reporting In 2019 the South African National Treasury issued Instruction Note No. 3 of 2019/2020, the Framework for Infrastructure Delivery and Procurement Management (FIDPM), which superseded the Standard for Infrastructure Procurement and Delivery Management (SIPDM), and has been effective since 1 October 2019.