Francois Heyns is a Chartered Professional Engineer with extensive experience in the development, implementation and maintenance of railway projects. He has been in the Consulting Engineering industry for the last 25 years and is currently a Principal Rail Engineer at Jacobs in Perth. He holds PhD in Rail Engineering from the University of Massachusetts in the USA and published more than thirty technical papers in rail engineering. He has a passion for track substructure design and maintenance management and the optimal use of maintenance equipment to maintain the track substructure. Clients have included Transnet, Vale, Rio Tinto, BHP Billiton and various junior miners.