A brief, chatty resumé
A more comprehensive version can be found on my resumé page.
I went to University in University College Cork from 1986 to 1990. While there I studied Civil Engineering. This led to a Bachelor of Engineering Degree (B.E.) in 1990.
Sadly, my alma mater seems to be unable to code up a webpage and instead wants to have an 'under construction' on their site. 'Under Construction' labels used to be popular back in the mid 1990's, when the web was an unfamiliar thing. Now, they make you look like a bunch of luddites. I mean, for God's sake, the Amish have a web site, why can't a university department?
While in UCC I was active in the Live Music Society. I've just Googled for the page, and it's such an example of why whiny adolescents should never be allowed to make webpages, it's embarassing. I am not going to provide a link. I am embarassed to ever be associated with it. To think that any organisation would tolerate such a pile of crap as their public face is astounding. It's not 1993 any more. You can make a website which is style-free but content full, or vice versa, but making one which looks like you had your tastebuds shot off in the war is unacceptable.
Brown & Root Civil
I started work in consulting engineering in October 1990 when I
joined Brown & Root
Civil , previously known as Howard Humphreys &
Partners. After a brief period in the Highways Maintenance
department, I moved to the transport planning unit. I soon got
involved in transportation modelling, a specialism I have remained
in to this day. Some of the projects I worked on include the A406
North Circular Road, the M25 Widening Junction 12 to 15, the Ras
Tanurah Refinery Upgrade (in Saudi Arabia)
Mouchel
In December 1994, I moved to LG Mouchel and Partners as a transportation modeller. At Mouchel I worked on the M25 Widening Junction 10 to 12, the A30/A35 DBFO, the A417/A419 DBFO. Mainly I got to play with all sorts of hardware and software and I learned HTML writing hypertext manuals and buggering around with the network. I learned Visual Basic for Applications playing with Excel Word.
GIBB
Between January and November 1996, I worked for Sir Alexander Gibb & Partners in Reading as a Transport Planner in the Transportation Planning Discipline. Officially I was in the inter-urban highways team working on projects like the Polish A1 Motorway Traffic Study, the Kampala City bypass and the Witney Integrated Transport and Land Use Study (acronym: WITLUS).
Scott Wilson Kirkpatrick
From November 1996 to February 1997, I worked for Scott Wilson Kirkpatrick in Basingstoke.
In March 1997, I moved to the Hong Kong Office and stayed there until Dec 1998 When I left and became an independent consultant for a while.
I was mainly involved in traffic modelling for stock exchange listing of tolled expressways in the People's republic of China.
O'Brien Consulting
From Feb 1999 to April 2000, I was a self-employed consultant. I worked for a few local HK companies as well as being a photographer and musician.
Ove Arup and Partners
In May 2000, I joined Ove Arup and Partners in Hong Kong and did some pedestrian modelling as well as the BDTM studies and the Second Parking Demand Study.
I did the pedestrian modelling for Tsim Sha Tsui East station, the BDTM modelling for Hong Kong Island North, Second Parking Demand Modelling (PDM2) Interface programming and testing of PDM2, Transport Planning for a conceptual people mover system for CLK, benchmarking and extensive research for urban rails systems worldwide.
I left there in December 2001 and set up in business for myself.
O'Brien Consulting (Take 2)
In December 2001, I re-started OBC to become a freelance Linux Sysadmin. I've been setting up servers to make a non-windows production systems which interoperate seamlessly with the Windows environment. I now know more about RedHat than I ever did, although I'd like a better package management system sometimes. I was doing this for a Japanese bank. This was a very good learning experience and an intensely welcome break from Transport Planning in Hong Kong.
In July 2003, the Japanese head office decided that they wanted to shut down the Hong Kong branch, for no reason which was apparent to anyone there.
However, in November 2003, I notice that the web servers I set up are still going.
Back to Transport Planning...
So once again, I'm back in Transport Planning in Hong Kong. This time for a small company based on Hong Kong Island. In keeping with my standard practice of not naming my current employer unless it's me, I'll only say that any opinions expressed herein are mine and not those of my employer, even when it is me!