The Design and Construct is suitable for high value-risk-innovation and complex projects, as there is generally:

· Maximisation of innovation from a cohesive design and construction method;

· High costs associated with tendering and tender evaluation; and

· Tight budgets and time restrictions.

Examples of suitable projects include:

· Projects that need to be fast-tracked for public safety, political reasons or where time is critical, however desired outcomes are well defined;

· Greenfield sites to enable innovation, flexibility and cost savings; and

· Projects where in-house resources can not meet project demands.

The benefit of the Design and Construct is the Contractor bears majority of the design and all construction responsibilities and phase interface risks for a fixed price. The main disadvantage is that the risks transferred to the contractor result in an increase in the contract value, irrespective of the occurrence of the risk. Other advantages and disadvantages for Main Roads are listed in Table 2.

Enhancements to identify and reduce risk exposure include:

Encouragement of duplication and prefabrication to develop the market, the product and to reduce production costs;
Priced Options where one or more project elements (eg: smaller projects) can be embedded into a larger project as an option and forms part of the tender submission or proposal. Contractors can choose to include the optional project elements in their proposal. If the tender submission or proposal exceeds the budget, the optional project elements are not included in the contract.