Cristina Costa

Cristina is a Chartered Structural Engineer, with over 12 years of international experience in structural design and design and project management on a variety of mixed-use high-profile building and infrastructure projects. She is a team player, promoting a collaborative approach to deliver the best value and quality in the projects she leads. She has a strong focus on delivery and providing the most efficient solutions, thanks to in-depth understanding of projects requirements and problem-solving attitude. Her combination of technical expertise and management skills, linked to her excellent communication abilities make her a natural leader and ensure the perfect engagement with the client, stakeholders and other relevant parties.

Cristina is an Associate Director in Robert Bird, joining in 2017. Originally from Spain, Cristina has worked in London since 2015, mainly at Heathrow Airport, Battersea and the infrastructure sector more recently.  Cristina started her career in a consultancy in Spain, specialized in structures, where she worked within the Building department. Among her first projects as an Engineer are the Satellite Terminal for the Airport of Barcelona (detailed design) and the Stadium of Itaquera-Corinthians (detailed design and construction). These projects exposed her to complex detailing and calculations in RC and precast concrete. She also participated in varied optimization projects for structures in the Middle East.

After that, Cristina changed to an international company to develop her civil experience by working on projects like the Qatar North Road and the Riyadh Metro. This expanded her knowledge of concrete structures, exposed her to an international office environment and put her in a leadership role, as she oversaw her own structures. Thanks to this experience, Cristina moved to the UK and found a new challenging role at Heathrow Airport where she led the structures team responsible to deliver the Q6 T1,T2 & T4 Upgrade Baggage System and T5 First Direct Access. Her work at Heathrow contributed to implement site experience to her skills, alongside with client and stakeholder management and the understanding of how working in a constraint live environment is. This exposure proved to be valuable for her following role at Battersea, both in Phase 2 and Future Phases where she demonstrated both her leadership abilities and her strengths as a team player. Through her collaborative approach she added value developing solutions which have directly contributed to cost and programme betterment.

Currently, she is working as Framework Manager in rail projects that involve asset protection mainly (High Speed 2 and Network Rail Design Services Framework). Cristina is leading a multi-disciplinary team that delivers innovative solutions while engaging with the relevant stakeholders to ensure their requirements are fulfilled. Thanks to her career experience she is taking ownership of the relationship with the client and broader team, managing any issues around project delivery with a resolutive an open attitude, helping to project efficient performance both technically and commercially.