Highways England's regional control centre goes 'open house'
Highways England is throwing open the doors of its high-tech regional control centre at Newton-le-Willows
Highways England's North West regional control centre at Rob Lane, Newton, Merseyside
Highways England is throwing open the doors of its high-tech regional control centre at Newton-le-Willows in Merseyside as part of a campaign to encourage people to consider working for the organisation – including young people thinking of engineering as a rewarding career.
As part of the national Year of Engineering initiative, the government company – which operates England’s motorways and major A roads – is staging the open day at the North West Regional Control Centre on Saturday 15 September to let people take a closer look at what really goes on behind the scenes.
Some of the region's traffic officers who featured in this year's series of Winter Road Rescue
The ticketed event is open to anyone who is interested in working for Highways England. Visitors can find out how a motorway is run from the control room, meet the traffic officers - some who may be familiar faces from the Channel 5 documentary series Winter Road Rescue - meet some of the project teams who carry out the engineering schemes and find out what initiatives are being planned to improve road safety.
New tyre scanners will be among the road safety equipment on show at the open day
Highways England operations manager Louise Boothman said:
As well as the obvious civil and electronics engineering jobs and on road and control room traffic officer posts, Highways England provides job opportunities across may different disciplines and we have offices and outstations around the North West.
The theme of Year of Engineering is ‘take a closer look’ and our open day at the control centre is the perfect opportunity for anyone who is interested in applying for a job with us – including budding engineers - to find out more. There really is something for everyone at the event so I would encourage people to book onto 1 of the 2 sessions we are planning – and to book early, as tickets are limited.
During the open day, there will be a chance to look round one of the company’s high visibility traffic officer vehicles, see the impact protection vehicles that help protect road workers, and get a closer look of some of the portable signage.
Safer tyre scanners will be available to view as well as the opportunity to talk to some of Highways England’s road safety partners who will have various cars and motorbikes involved in road safety for visitors to take a look at.
There will be a guided tour and someone on hand to answer the various questions people may have.
The event will be staged across 2 sessions - between 10am and 12.30pm and between 1pm and 3.30pm. There will be spaces for 70 people on each session. A waiting list will be set up if any further tickets become available. Anyone wishing to book attendance at the event should visit this weblink at Eventbrite.
Although the RCC opened in September 2005 at the launch of the North West Traffic Officer Service, this will be its first ever public open day. The building is situated alongside the southbound M6 just south of Haydock Island at junction 23.
More information on Year of Engineering is available at: www.yearofengineering.gov.uk.
General enquiries
Members of the public should contact the Highways England customer contact centre on 0300 123 5000.
Media enquiries
Journalists should contact the Highways England press office on 0844 693 1448 and use the menu to speak to the most appropriate press officer.