Miles Ashley was installed as Master of the Worshipful Company of Paviors at a ceremony in St Martin-within-Ludgate on Wednesday 8 March 2017. He succeeded Immediate Past Master Ian Lumsden.
Miles Ashley was born in Lincolnshire, but grew up in Oxfordshire. He is a civil engineer who spent the first day of his career setting out the centre-line of the M25 Motorway near Leatherhead. Over a 33-year career, he has worked in contracting for Balfour Beatty and Lovell, in construction project management as a Director of Clarson Goff, and in property development as the Managing Director of Heritage Property Group. Until September 2106, he was the Director responsible for Construction at London Underground, responsible for a £7- billion programme, which encompassed redevelopments such as Tottenham Court Road, Victoria and Bond Street tube stations; plus the line extensions to the Northern and Metropolitan.
During his year of office, Miles was running Wessex Advisory Ltd, a consultancy business helping clients with infrastructure challenges, mainly in the highways and transportation sectors. He also worked for the Infrastructure Client Group, part of the Treasury’s Infrastructure and Projects Authority, and led their work on new delivery models for infrastructure. He is a Fellow of the Institution of Civil Engineers, The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and the Royal Society of Arts. Miles believes that encouraging younger people and improving diversity in the infrastructure industry is a key part of his role.
He now lives near Salisbury with his wife Judy and their four children: Jack, Phoebe, Alice and Harry. He enjoys voyaging with them in a small sailing yacht based on the south coast, but has also competed in single-handed races around Fastnet and to the Azores. He also participates in fly-fishing, shooting and, more recently, flying. His favourite room is his workshop and he just can’t help tinkering with buildings or anything mechanical. The year’s Master’s charities were the RNLI and War Child.