Engineering her way to the top - London woman wins prestigious engineering award

10 January 2008

The IET (Institution of Engineering and Technology) has today announced that Kamlah Kew, age 28 from London has won a special merit prize for her engineering skills at the prestigious 2007 IET Young Woman Engineer of the Year Awards.

A traffic control engineer with Transport for London (TFL), Kamlah’s responsibilities combine technical duties with project and business management.

The technical aspect to her role within the Traffic Infrastructure Department involves the vital task of keeping London’s transport system running smoothly by carrying out junction surveys, designing traffic signal junctions, advising on design solutions and ensuring that installations meet all the necessary safety standards and specifications. In addition to her technical duties, Kamlah project manages a variety of schemes for TFL to ensure that schemes are delivered on time, within budget and meet quality standards.

Robin McGill, chief executive of the IET said: “The special merit prize is only given in rare circumstances. This year we have had a very high standard of applicants and judges had a particularly difficult decision in choosing a winner. The special merit prize is recognition of Kamlah’s talent and ambition as an engineer and her enthusiasm to be a role model and encourage other women into the profession.”

Kamlah’s recent achievements include setting up an internal planning and tracking system to allow the chief engineer at TFL to more easily monitor and report on the 800 schemes that the department runs. This tool ultimately helped TFL to work more effectively and improved efficiency with which they have to deliver schemes on the streets of London.

Most recently Kamlah has been responsible for managing the signals timing review programme which is aimed at delivering enhanced performance to 150 remotely monitored signal sites across London. This will reduce queuing and delays at these sites which will also have a positive impact of the environment as reduced traffic delays leads to less carbon emissions.

Encouraging others to become engineers is also something that Kamlah takes seriously and has delivered a variety of talks to sixth form colleges on what it is like to work in engineering.

Kamlah will receive an engraved trophy and a cheque for £400 at the BT Centre, London presented by scientist and TV personality Dr Maggie Aderin.

The Young Woman Engineer of the Year Awards are the most prestigious honours of their kind in the UK and attracts prominent supporters and sponsors including BT, Women’s Engineering Society, Shell and Arup. The awards are this year celebrating their 30th anniversary. To mark this special milestone some of the previous winners from the past 30 years will be attending the event.

All media enquiries to:

Jenny Bond

T: 020 7344 5445

E: jennybond@theiet.org