In September 2020, the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) carried out a survey of its members to learn more about civil engineers’ awareness and understanding of good design.
Questions in the survey were based on the UK National Infrastructure Commission (NIC)’s Design Principles for National Infrastructure. This guide emphasises the need for everyone involved in the procurement, development, design, construction, operation, maintenance and decommissioning of infrastructure to understand that they have a role to play in good design.
Based on the findings from the survey, and input from the NIC Design Group, ICE has identified recommendations to pursue for ICE and for ICE working collaboratively with other bodies.
The climate needs to be higher up the agenda for all institution activities to help create the right environment to support the implementation of low carbon solutions. More widely, best practice
examples of design for climate, people, places and value, gathered from across built environment institutions, need to be showcased to help the profession to upskill and for all people involved in a project to identify as ‘designers’ wherever they are in its lifecycle. From this, design champions can naturally emerge.