Abstract
Major transit infrastructure programs and large-scale mining developments share striking similarities: multi-billion-dollar capital commitments, complex multi-disciplinary scopes, demanding stakeholder and regulatory environments, and the constant pressure to deliver safely, on time, and on budget. Both sectors must navigate rigorous environmental and social permitting processes, balance engineering innovation with constructability, and prepare for decades of operational performance from day one.This keynote distills proven transit sector strategies into practical lessons for mining projects, including how robust environmental clearance processes can reduce permitting risk, how integrated front-end design improves constructability and minimizes costly changes, and how thoughtful collaborative delivery model selection optimizes risk allocation and contractor performance. It also explores the value of disciplined cost and schedule control, data-driven performance monitoring, and operations readiness planning to ensure assets, systems, and people are fully prepared for a reliable start-up. By applying these insights, mining projects can reduce execution risk, enhance capital efficiency, and build stakeholder confidence from concept through operations.