Megaprojects

Do you know the story of the secret airplane squadron that helped to defeat the Nazis? Listen to Megan Nollet and Patrick Woodward talk about the brave deeds of the Night Witches of World War Two.https://spotlightenglish.com/uncategorized/the-night-witches/Download our app for An ... Show More

A famous art museum, an unsolved crime, a ten-million-dollar reward, and decades later, Andrew Devis and Megan Nollet discuss the theft of multiple paintings on St. Patrick’s Day in Boston.https://spotlightenglish.com/uncategorized/stealing-rembrandt/Download our app for Android ... Show More

Gillian Woodward and Rob Quiring talk about a material that is can be useful but very damaging at the same time.https://spotlightenglish.com/uncategorized/the-plastic-problem/Download our app for Android at http://bit.ly/spotlight-androidDownload our app for iOS at http://bit.ly/ ... Show More

From the Sydney Opera House to a basic kitchen renovation there are thousands of examples of construction projects large and small which go horribly over budget.Professor Bent Flyvbjerg has compiled a database of 16,000 projects, and by his reckoning only 8.5% them meet their ini ... Show More

A big problem, a great solution 

From reliable water supplies to large-scale electricity generation, the benefits brought by dams can be huge. But so can the problems. Tim Harford explains how these massive structures have changed the world for many, but led to catastrophe for others. 

<p>Over its more than 40 year journey from conception to completion, Boston’s <a href="https://www.wgbh.org/podcasts/the-big-dig">Big Dig</a> massive infrastructure project, which rerouted the central highway in the heart of the city, encountered every hurdle imaginable: ruthless ... Show More

<p>With disruption a near constant, project leaders must be able to solve complex problems in uncertain situations. We discuss this with: <br/><br/>Raquel Selem Moreira, design and innovation project manager at Pierre Fabre Group, Rio de Janeiro: Selem Moreira talks about breakin ... Show More

There’s this idea out in the world that if you want to make a real difference, to make meaning, you have to go big. Be massively public. Take the giant risk. Build something vast and complex. You’ve got to be the wave that crashes on the shore. That is, indeed, one approach to le ... Show More

What defines a megaproject? And why do they so often go over both budget and schedule? Denmark has earned a reputation for successfully completing large-scale construction projects – whether they are bridges, tunnels, land reclamation or offshore wind farms. The latest Danish meg ... Show More