Emerging Leaders Breakfast | Adelaide | 2026

From South Road to the System: Whole-of-Life Lessons for Emerging Transport Leaders.

Transport Australia’s Emerging Leaders Breakfast brings early-career transport and infrastructure professionals together to build connections and learn from industry leaders.

Using South Road and Adelaide’s wider transport system as a starting point, this conversation will examine how decisions made during planning, design and construction shape infrastructure performance for decades.

Attendees will hear how technical, commercial and operational choices influence constructability, maintenance, network reliability and public value long after a project is completed. The discussion will offer practical lessons for professionals working across every stage of the infrastructure lifecycle.

With no assigned seating, the breakfast offers a relaxed setting to meet peers, expand your professional network and make valuable industry connections.

Transport Australia’s Emerging Leaders program is proudly sponsored by CPB Contractors.

Our Speakers:

Chloe Williams, Design Director, Aurecon

Based in Aurecon’s Transport team leading significant transport infrastructure projects in design management and technical leadership roles, Chloe leads technical excellence, quality and safety outcomes. She drives innovation by implementing emerging technologies and industry trends, while managing large multidisciplinary engineering teams.

Her career includes complex major infrastructure projects across Australia, including recently Sydney’s Western Harbour Tunnel D&C with Acciona, and the massive New England Renewable Energy Zone with the NSW Government’s Energy Corporation. A recent career highlight was working with Mark Skaife’s company to design a new supercar race track in Perth with Seymour Whyte and CivMEC.

Chloe is an Alumni of the Roads Australia Fellowship program in 2022 . She relocated from Sydney to Adelaide in 2025 with her family, and is embracing the current infrastructure boom in South Australia.

Mark Elms, Manager, Delivery Strategy, Road Maintenance

Department for Infrastructure and Transport

Mark Elms is Manager, Delivery Strategy at South Australia’s Department for Infrastructure and Transport, where he leads statewide road maintenance reform and the development of future service-delivery arrangements.

Mark has almost 20 years’ experience across commercial management, finance, asset management and infrastructure operations. His career includes senior oversight of South Australia’s long-term road maintenance contracts, leadership of large field-service teams, major service transitions and the coordination of transport responses during emergencies.

His work focuses on connecting strategic intent with practical delivery, bringing together asset performance, operational capability, commercial settings, risk and whole-of-life value. Mark is particularly interested in how decisions made during planning, design and procurement shape the safety, resilience and maintainability of public infrastructure long after construction is complete.

Mark holds an honours degree in Business Administration, a Postgraduate Certificate in Public Sector Leadership and he is also a graduate of the Roads Australia Fellowship Program.

Dietary requirements: Please inform us of any dietary requirements at least 2 weeks prior to the event.

The TA Emerging Leaders target audience is those under 35 or with 0-10 years of industry experience.

Please ensure you make your booking using the appropriate rate. Bookings from non-member companies that book at a member rate will be contacted and asked to rebook at the correct price. If you are unsure of your organisation's membership status with TA, please contact events@transportaustralia.org.au


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