Highways England has awarded a range of partners with work as part of its £4.5bn smart motorways delivery programme.

Costain has won the northern element of the programme with a range of companies making up the SMP alliance, with Bam Nuttall and Morgan Sindall appointed in the Midlands and Balfour Beatty awarded a contract in the south.

Costain has said it will use digital design techniques and would minimise the disruption for road users by undertaking a greater proportion of work off-site.

In a statement to the stock market, Alex Vaughan, Chief Executive of Costain said: “This strategic programme will deliver the much needed capacity and safety improvements across the strategic road network in England. This programme approach seeks a step change in delivery performance and Costain has been a long term partner for Highways England delivering a broad mix of services from consultancy and digital technology solutions through to programme delivery, demonstrating Costain’s strong breadth of capabilities that add value in shaping and delivering England’s future transport infrastructure.”