Barra Mac Ruairí

Chief Operating Officer
YTL Developments (UK) Ltd

Barra is the Chief Operating Officer at YTL Developments (UK) Ltd. He is an Architect and City Planner. His role is to grow YTL Developments in the UK and deliver its first major scheme at Filton Airfield, to the north of Bristol.  Barra was appointed to this role because of his expertise and track record of successful placemaking at a large scale. Prior to joining YTL, Barra spent a decade, leading, in two cities; Bristol & Bradford. He has a reputation for delivery in difficult conditions and was instrumental in seeing and securing big shifts in both city’s trajectories such as the Bristol University Campus at Temple Meads and City Park in Bradford. He has used an entrepreneurial recipe of creativity, partnering, prioritisation and above all placemaking to unlock social, economic and environmental value.  Prior to these roles he led the Urban Programme at the Regional Development Agency in Leeds, worked for Urban Splash in Manchester and Liverpool, and as an architect in practice through the nineties.

Barra is a chartered member of the Royal Institute of British Architects and the Royal Town Planning Institute, a distinguished fellow of the Cabot Institute, a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts & Commerce and a past visiting professor at the University of Sheffield. His academic area of interest is Urbanism - the Physical, Economic, Political and Social development of urban areas specifically the post-industrialised landscapes and cities of the UK.

David Biggs

Managing Director, Property
Network Rail

With over 25 years’ experience operating as a senior executive for major companies, David is the Managing Director for Network Rail’s property division. He has established a new strategic direction for the business based on a strong customer centric philosophy applied across all commercial activities including Retail, the Commercial Estate and Development. David has also been instrumental in the adoption of a partnering approach with developers to drive commercial value from the railway estate and releasing land for housing as well as leading on the Network Rail property disposal programme.

Jackie Sadek

Specialist Regeneration Adviser
Communities and Local Government

Jackie Sadek has over 25 years’ experience in property development, managing large-scale urban regeneration projects and public-private sector partnerships.  She is a national spokesperson on regeneration matters, a speaker and broadcaster on regeneration issues.  In 2010, Jackie was founder and Chief Executive of UK Regeneration (UKR), an organization developing new models of delivery of regeneration projects with a number of mixed use development pilots in regional cities.  

The UKR team continues to run the business, in Jackie’s absence, as she currently holds the position of Specialist Regeneration Adviser in the Extended Ministerial Office of Greg Clark, the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government.    

Rorie Henderson

Development Director
Salmon Harvester

Director at Salmon Developments Ltd and Salmon Harvester Properties Ltd (SHP) Salmons joint venture company with NFU Mutual which was set up in 1994.

Rorie is Director responsible for SHP / NFU Mutuals development programme at Temple Meads, Bristol:

Phase I   2 Glass Wharf – 100,000 sq. ft. HQ Office

Phase II 3 Glass Wharf – 110,000 sq. ft. HQ Office

Phase III ND9 Development site

Duncan Cumberland

Residential Development Director, South
Muse Developments

Duncan joined Muse Developments in June 2009 as Residential Development Director. He brings a wealth of residential experience to the company and is advising on new and existing schemes across the Muse portfolio as well as running the day to day development management of the English Cities Fund schemes at Canning Town and Plymouth and is a Director of the Joint Venture vehicles that are developing out Wapping Wharf in Bristol. To date, Duncan has overseen delivery of over 1,200 homes alongside all the commercial and community uses on these important schemes.

Previously development director at Crest Nicholson, Duncan led a development team ultimately responsible for the identification and acquisition of opportunities through the submission of planning applications to delivery of planning consents and handover to the construction team.

The team increased acquisition targets from 230 units in 2003 to 520 units in 2007. The portfolio was a mix of brown and green field land and ranged from the CABE gold standard award winning 1,300 unit Ingress Park scheme near Dartford, Kent to four large detached houses in Coulsden, South London.

Other projects include successfully leading a Crest Nicholson project team in a design competition set up by English Partnerships on their Sixty K House project. This resulted in one of the country’s first applications of off-site manufactured SIPs panels in an EcoHomes ‘Excellent’ scheme. He also helped set up, and held a directorship of, a joint venture company between Crest Nicholson and Bioregional Quintain to develop a trailblazing scheme in central Brighton to promote sustainable good practice and with ambitions to be one of the UK’s first truly Carbon Neutral schemes. Duncan led large consultant teams from project inception and throughout the development process.