The UK’s transport infrastructure is at a pivotal juncture, with the government’s recent unveiling of the Integrated National Transport Strategy (INTS) aiming to resolve longstanding fragmentation and inefficiencies.
This document represents Hadean’s submission of recommendations to the UK Government for the Infrastructure and Transport Strategy (INTS). It highlights our commitment to shaping policy discussions that we understand to be aligned with Hadean’s vision, mission and expertise. Through this submission, we seek to highlight the transformative impact that Hadean’s approach can have on the UK’s technological landscape, ensuring that our perspective serves as a valuable resource for upcoming policy decisions.
Achieving the UK’s ‘Joined-Up’ Transport Network Vision
The transport network in the UK is at a turning point. Recent publications, including the government’s 10-Year Infrastructure Strategy Working Paper and the accompanying letter (dated 24th November 2024) from Sir John Armitt, Chair of the National Infrastructure Commission, underline the need for resilient, data-enabled solutions that can meet policy objectives around growth, clean energy, and public service delivery. Against this backdrop, the Integrated National Transport Strategy (INTS) offers a prime opportunity to move beyond partial fixes toward an approach that joins every relevant factor – environment, infrastructure, operators, end users – into one harmonised and forward-looking system.
Resilient
From the standpoint of enabling more resilient growth, Hadean’s core proposition is to create advanced simulations that serve as a unifying thread through which different stakeholders can more collectively and effectively plan and operate their networks. Our capabilities extend well beyond traditional digital twins. We build large-scale synthetic environments that aggregate multiple existing twins, connect them to real data inputs, and let decision-makers explore “what if” scenarios in real time. In practical terms, this means that a major motorway project, a rail operator, and a local council can each rely on their own domain-specific twin while still interacting within one cohesive national-scale model. By integrating these assets, we can not only predict how a future housing development might affect traffic flows, but also project the downstream impacts on carbon emissions, noise levels, or local biodiversity. This crosscutting perspective is essential for addressing the challenges identified in the 10-Year Infrastructure Strategy Working Paper – particularly the imperative to deliver resilient growth through mission-oriented prioritisation, long-term confidence, and practicality around financing.
Sustainable
In terms of delivering the clean energy superpower mission, Hadean’s simulations allow a holistic view that aligns transport with wider energy infrastructure. Road freight decarbonisation, electric vehicle charging stations, and grid capacity planning can be integrated within the same analytical environment. Each scenario takes into account real-world complexities such as charging demand spikes or localised renewable generation, ensuring that decision-makers see both immediate impacts and systemic ripple effects. This is precisely the type of multi-lens insight that can advance the government’s net-zero goals, as well as the National Infrastructure Commission’s emphasis on climate resilience.
Integrated
Supporting the UK’s social infrastructure in transport requires a robust blend of hindsight, insight, foresight, and oversight – terms that reflect how Hadean technology can be applied across time horizons. Hindsight involves learning from past failures or performance metrics by drawing on historical data, allowing policymakers to interrogate why certain projects succeeded or stalled. Insight comes from evaluating real-time conditions so that operators can adapt to disruptions on the fly, whether due to signalling faults or severe weather events. Foresight entails predictive modelling for future demand, changing demographics, or the rise of autonomous vehicles and micromobility options. Finally, oversight establishes the governance structures needed to ensure that data-driven solutions are transparent, secure, and aligned with local and national priorities. By structuring these capabilities, Hadean’s simulations directly reinforce the government’s principle of mission-oriented prioritisation and the letter from Sir John Armitt, which highlights a clearer pipeline of infrastructure investment tied to planning evidence and adaptive capacity.
In answering the specific questions asked by transport policymakers, it becomes clear that an integrated system for planning and operations must address several layers: environmental context, physical infrastructure, operators and owners, users and communities, and the broader dimension of mobility optimisation. Hadean helps join these layers by weaving them together in a data-rich environment. When asked how the transport network could be better joined-up, our approach ensures that rail, road, and active travel networks interoperate as a single system rather than as isolated modes. Operators can see, for example, how rerouting heavy goods vehicles away from congested corridors might affect local air quality, while simultaneously predicting the knock-on effects for road maintenance costs.
The Role of Data in a Modern Transport Network
Data can transform the transport network by bridging fragmented sources of information – historical, live, and synthetic – into a single, secure, and interoperable framework. Rather than relying only on legacy records or real-time feeds, an integrated approach layers past travel patterns with the latest live data and predictive scenarios, creating a dynamic “common operating picture” for all transport modes. For example, historic information provides context on recurring congestion points, while current sensor readings reveal unfolding incidents that require immediate response. Synthetic data then goes one step further: it simulates unprecedented events, helping operators anticipate how the network might behave under never-before-seen disruptions such as extreme weather or infrastructure failures.
By aligning with the National Digital Twin agenda and the Gemini Principles, local authorities, train operating companies, and road freight services can feed all three data types – historical, real-time, and synthetic – into one shared ecosystem that updates continuously. This ecosystem highlights pinch points across different modes, ensuring that a rerouting decision by a regional bus network doesn’t inadvertently cause gridlock elsewhere. For transport users, the added visibility means more precise journey planning with fewer unforeseen delays. From the operator’s perspective, multiple data sets unlock predictive analytics that optimise resources, reduce operational costs, and synchronise timetables – especially crucial for multi-modal journeys that span rail, bus, micro-mobility, and e-hailing services.
Critically, this integrated data environment also allows for robust scenario testing. Decision-makers aren’t just reacting to real-time data – they can run simulations based on potential future situations, from seasonal spikes in freight traffic to once-in-a-generation events. That proactive insight reduces the risk of single-region or single-operator decisions that unintentionally push problems onto adjacent networks. Ultimately, weaving historical, live, and synthetic data into a common framework enables rapid and informed responses to disruptions, fosters collaboration across regional and national transport bodies, and paves the way for a truly adaptive, low-carbon transport system.
Exploiting Technology and Innovation to Improve UK Transport
Technology has an equally powerful role to play in real-world operations. Although many organisations already have localised digital twins – say, for a major motorway interchange or rail signalling system upgrade – Hadean’s unique capability is aggregating these twins into a wider synthetic environment. This broader view can incorporate advanced mobility technologies including autonomous vehicles and micro-mobility options (ebikes, scooters, etc). Since Hadean synthetic environments scale to handle massive amounts of data and computational complexity, they can model how these new transport modes integrate into established frameworks. By stress-testing different uptake rates, route constraints, and usage patterns, Hadean empowers policy teams and industry alike to forecast where these newer modes might have the biggest impact or pose the greatest challenges.
Hadean can enable infrastructure owners to navigate the landscape of existing technologies by not only extending the operational lifespan of current investments but also by providing a dynamic platform to integrate emerging, cutting-edge technologies and AI. This approach allows maximum utility of established infrastructure and legacy investments while evolving at the speed of innovation. Operators can ensure that each component of their ecosystem contributes in synergy to drive operational excellence and resilience.
Enhancing Decision-Making throughout Transport Networks
Improving decision-making about the transport network demands a culture shift toward data-informed governance in which local authorities and central government alike can draw on actionable insights “at the speed of relevance.” In practice, this means equipping regional operators to respond quickly to local incidents or disruptions, while simultaneously assessing the knock-on effects on other regions, different transport modes, and the network as a whole. Instead of waiting weeks for data collation or manual scenario-planning, officials should have real-time analytics and predictive models at their fingertips so they can weigh short-term operational fixes against broader strategic objectives – everything from traffic diversion impacts on adjoining areas to net-zero targets.
Drawing on the letter by Sir John Armitt, the Annex policy areas, and the crosscutting principles in the 10-Year Infrastructure Strategy, these rapid-fire insights require consistent data standards, robust digital skills, and reliable communications infrastructure. Crucially, local operators need the authority to make decisions promptly, underpinned by a transparent framework so that neighbouring regions or central governments can see the rationale and anticipate potential spill-over effects. By partnering with SMEs such as Hadean, public-sector bodies and private operators can make advanced analytics less intimidating and more results-oriented, allowing leaders to stay focused on sustainability, user satisfaction, and cost-effectiveness – without sacrificing the speed needed for incident response or day-to-day adjustments.
Final Thoughts
Finally, the question of any other comments invites reflection on how we align with the government’s overarching objectives. Hadean’s approach is consistent with the government’s pursuit of resilient growth, the clean energy superpower mission, and the support of social infrastructure.
We already partner with the Ministry of Defence on mission-critical simulation exercises and scenario planning, a proven track record that underscores our ability to handle complex, large-scale challenges. This expertise can now be directed toward transport operations, enabling integrated, secure simulations that reinforce national security and crisis-readiness while simultaneously delivering civilian benefits.
Under the principle of mission-oriented prioritisation, Hadean’s technology ensures that investment is steered to projects most likely to yield significant benefits, whether in sustainability, capacity building, or service quality. By offering dynamic, scalable, and user-friendly simulations, we contribute to the sense of long-term confidence that industry needs in order to invest in new skills and methods. We also help address crosscutting challenges such as uncertain funding streams, public trust, and complex multi-modal coordination. Ultimately, we deliver solutions that are more affordable to maintain, adapt, and scale over time.
In summary, the Hadean proposition focuses on strategic outcomes that transcend the standard conversation about individual digital twins. By enabling large-scale aggregation of data across multiple modes and stakeholders, our platform builds an environment where hindsight, insight, foresight, and oversight continually inform each other. This is how the UK’s transport network can become genuinely joined-up – through a data-led paradigm that respects local nuances, encourages innovation, and systematically checks its outcomes against environmental and societal metrics. Through practical collaboration with government, operators, communities, and – in many cases – the defence customers we already serve, we see a compelling path forward for transforming today’s stressed and fragmented network into a system that delivers prosperity, resilience, and genuine public value.
Crucially, the interoperable and future-proof nature of Hadean technology ensures that as new data sources, mobility solutions, and digital standards emerge, our simulations can evolve in lockstep. Built from the ground up for scalability and secure integrations, our platform is engineered to adapt to both immediate priorities and longer-term shifts in policy or technology – making it an enduring partner for the UK’s journey toward a smarter, more sustainable transport ecosystem.
