The fourth Cycling and Walking Innovations event will highlight why boosting cycling and walking is a win-win, because it is politically more supported than ever and the benefits are visible in quality of life, the environment and local economies. The 2017 DfT Innovation Challenge Fund was the catalyst for the first Cycling and Walking Innovations event in 2018, which was launched to celebrate the innovators – from the private and public sectors – who are driving the active travel s

Local Rail: do we need a new business model? When: 14.00-15.30 Friday 17 July The discussion will look at how local rail services can best be secured and developed in the light of the Covid-19 impacts and the legacy position from the pandemic and lockdown. Panellists: Malcolm Holmes, executive director, West Midlands Rail Executive Nicola Forsdike, rail consultant Nigel Harris, the Railway Consultancy Paul Salveson, rail commentator To attend, visit:

Public bodies and transport operators must do more to enable people with mental health conditions to make journeys, states a new report. An online survey by the UCL’s Centre for Transport Studies revealed the main barriers for people mental health issues. Of the 385 respondents, 90% have anxiety issues, 71% suffer from panic attacks, 68% have depression while 51% have difficulty communicating and 45% have memory loss. The survey was supported by a range of organisations including Sustrans

In creating safer street design for cycling and walking, junctions consistently prove to be the greatest challenge for many designers and engineers. Dutch transport consultancy Mobycon

The Landor LINKS Annual Survey of Mobility as a Service is now in its third year. Whatever sector of transport you work in, MaaS is now having an impact either as a planner, providing public transport, bike share, car hire, leasing, payments, operational support, TRANStech. We'd like to hear from you, so please complete the survey to gauge how MaaS – and our hopes and fears for it – are developing. Take part in the survey today Last year we had more interest from the automotive se

The Metropolitan Police is preparing to launch a huge programme of speed limit enforcement across London, which aims to catch a million offenders a year.  Councillors on borough association London Councils’ transport and environment committee heard about the proposal last week. Transport manager Andrew Luck told them of a “planned increase in speed enforcement activity, which will result in an increase in the number of offences processed from 160,000 to one million per annum&rd

Britain’s railways are going through a tumultuous period, with fundamental questions being asked about the way they are owned and managed. Further uncertainty is added by the political chaos of Brexit and the appointment of a new Prime Minister, who may have different priorities than his predecessor. And could a General Election be that far away?  The Rail Reform Group is a small network of rail professionals. We are non-party political and not linked to any corporate group. We&rsquo

Alleluia, alleluia, just when we thought that Brexit had virtually smothered our national capacity to think ‘other’, up pops a brave new incredible idea set within our little world of UK planning. Savour the moment: only once in a while does such a really worthwhile concept explode within our planning consciousness. Over a hundred years ago there was the commercially improbable garden city concept. Then there was the Abercrombie plan for London of 1944 offering a ‘ring’ o

Oxfordshire County Council has published cost estimates for 12 priority transport projects to support the huge housing and employment growth proposed for the county.  The total estimated cost of the projects is £1.610bn with the  most expensive being the  £570m Didcot to Oxford rail capacity improvement. Major works to increase the capacity of Oxford rail station and replace the Botley Road bridge immediately south of the station have a price tag of £291m. The

Sophie Howe, the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales, has organised a meeting with the Welsh Government to discuss fundamental differences that the M4 Relief Road scheme has exposed in their respective interpretations of legislation. The Welsh Government appointed Howe as “guardian of the ability of future generations to meet their needs” after it passed the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015. The Act defines four pillars of well-being – economic, social,

Shropshire Council has reduced planned cuts to its bus support budget following a public consultation.   Shropshire currently spends £1,809,955 on supporting conventional bus services and £258,456 on Shrewsbury park-and-ride services, which operate into the town from three sites to the north, west and south.  The council’s 2019/20 budget included a proposed reduction to the budgets of £405,000 and £50,000 respectively. Following a public consultation, ho

The DfT is consulting on changes to the design of the HS2 phase 2b route in Cheshire that would facilitate the operation of HS2 and Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR) services to/from Liverpool. The consultation proposes allowing for the passive provision of two junctions on the HS2 line at High Leigh in Cheshire. If built, one would allow future Liverpool-Manchester NPR trains to use the HS2 line to access Manchester. The other would allow future London-Liverpool HS2 trains to access a new NPR rou

A new guide packed with useful information about the Mini-Hollands and Liveable Neighbourhoods programmes has been published. The 64-page guide, published by Landor LINKS in partnership with Transport for London, includes a round-up of all the Liveable Neighbourhoods projects being developed across the capital. Building on the success of Mini-Hollands, the Liveable Neighbourhoods Programme will use the Healthy Streets Approach to deliver attractive, healthy, accessible and safe neighbourhoods.

The winners of the 2019 everywoman in Transport & Logistics Awards have been revealed. Over the past 12 years the everywoman awards have championed women in the transport and logistics industries, showcasing and celebrating the sectors’ most exceptional role models. The winners were announced at Grosvenor House in London on 13 June. While many of the winners were drawn from the passenger transport, infrastructure and freight sectors, the world of walking was also recognised at this y

The Annual Survey of Mobility as a Service is now in its third year. Whatever your work in transport, either as a planner, providing public transport, bike share, car hire, leasing, payments, operational support, TRANStech please complete the survey to gauge how MaaS – and our hopes and fears for it – are developing. Take part in the survey today Last year we had more interest from the automotive sector than public transport – but there are developments coming through now whi

Our contributors to Data & Modelling 2019, and this year’s cohort of speakers at Modelling World, all agree that as technological advances and evolving social trends intersect to drive a period of unprecedented change, data and modelling professionals must raise their game in order to take advantage of new opportunities.  Modellers and data professionals will play a key role in ‘Deciding and Providing’ for our mobility futures. As predatory tech an

The Welsh Government has still not concluded funding negotiations for Cardiff’s long-delayed bus station and does not know when the facility will open. Construction has yet to begin at the site near Cardiff Central railway station, more than a year after the Welsh Government announced it would take the leasehold on the site and reduce Cardiff Council’s financial exposure by £15m to £20m.  In April 2018, the Government said the new bus station was scheduled to open

On 26 May Sunday Times columnist Gillian Bowditch was strongly critical of plans to give Scottish councils powers to introduce workplace parking levies. “At the risk of sounding like a poor girl’s Jeremy Clarkson, the newly proposed workplace parking levy, whereby tens of thousands of Scots may end up having to pay hundreds of pounds a year extra to get to their place of work, is third-form economics,” she began. “Even the most dedicated petrolhead would have a job defen

The Government should take a lead from Scotland and Wales and adopt road safety targets across England to push down the number of deaths and casualties, according to the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA). In 2017, 1,544 people were killed on England’s roads – the most since 2011 – and the number of people killed and seriously injured stood at 23,825, which is way above the 2010-2014 average of 21,283. Yet in Scotland the figures are falling, and while in W

The government has launched a competition for 7 to 19 year olds to design the electric vehicle chargepoints of the future, inspiring the next generation of engineers — a key aim of the modern Industrial Strategy. The ‘Eco Innovators’ competition aims to inspire young people to use their creative and engineering skills. Winners will have their designs made into real-life prototypes supported by industry experts. The ‘Eco Innovators’ competition — announced by

Right from the moment Enfield became one of TfL’s Mini-Holland boroughs back in 2014, the rumbles of dissent began. Cllr Daniel Anderson, who until recently was the council’s deputy leader, recalls being verbally abused at public meetings: “It’s fair to say we faced considerable opposition. People referred to me - and still do - as the idiot who built the cycle lanes. But I can live with that. If I didn’t believe that it was the right thing to do I wouldn’t ha

Projects submitted by local authorities were among the winning entries in a competition to identify transport schemes that should be funded if HS2 were scrapped. The ‘Great British Transport Competition’ was organised by pressure group the Taxpayers’ Alliance (TPA) in conjunction with prominent critics of HS2, including the Labour peer Lord Berkeley and quantity surveyor Michael Byng. Former rail industry manager Chris Stokes, who is also a vehement critic of the Government&rs

There have been plenty of transport project delivery disasters in recent years. Most of the really big ones have affected rail schemes, for instance: the delay and cost overruns to Crossrail; last year’s new timetable meltdowns on Northern and Thameslink; the mushrooming cost and delays to Great Western railway electrification; the unravelling of Network Rail’s enhancement programme; and, going back a little further to 2012, the collapse of the DfT’s West Coast Main Line franch

London mayor Sadiq Khan’s plan to tighten the amount of car parking that can be provided in new developments came under the spotlight at the public examination into the new draft London Plan this week. The mayor says the restrictions are necessary to deliver his objectives of reduced car trips and more walking, cycling and public transport use. But some of the restrictions on new residential development have not gone down well with outer London boroughs or the Ministry of Housing, Communi

Transport planners spend a lot of time looking forwards, forecasting change and working out ways to mitigate future-year scenarios. We have all attended events on the future of mobility and on the disruption of emerging trends and technologies. This is all vital to the profession and the civic role that transport planners play in land development and infrastructure design. However, we suggest that a good way of dealing with new challenges is to learn lessons from the past. To paraphrase one reno

The first of a fleet of rebuilt London Underground trains has entered service on the national rail network. A two-car VivaRail’s Class 230 ‘D Train’ began operating this week for London North Western Railways (part of West Midlands Trains) on the Bedford to Bletchley line. The former District Line stock has been refurbished and fitted with a diesel engine

The DfT’s new document, Appraisal and modelling strategy: informing future decisions, outlines the Department’s priority areas of work to improve the quality of transport analysis for decision-making. The work is grouped under five themes as follows: People and place  Quick wins: Locational attractiveness and urban realm: a scoping study will explore options for new guidance on incorporating locational attractiveness and urban realm into appraisal. The DfT says the consultati

This year more major road schemes will be considered by the national infrastructure consenting process than ever before. They will be judged against the not-so-snappily-titled National Policy Statement (NPS) for national networks, which supports a major road-building programme to tackle congestion. With transport innovations making the news almost every week, how up-to-date is this? Let’s hope more so than the 2011 Energy NPS that still gives outline policy approval, immune from direct leg

A software tool has been developed for estimating the  impact road and public transport investments have on property values.  The Government’s National Infrastructure Commission commissioned the Institute for Fiscal Studies to develop the Property Value Uplift (PVU) tool. The IFS says the tool’s results  “can be considered the best short-run estimates available given existing data and the timescale of the project, and an excellent starting point for future anal

The opening of Newport’s rebuilt bus station in 2015 has failed to boost passenger numbers, according to Newport Transport, the city’s dominant bus operator. The central bus station was rebuilt by Newport City Council, which owns Newport Transport. In the company’s annual report for 2017/18, filed last month, company secretary David Jenkins said on behalf of the board: “Disappointingly the opening of a new central bus station in Newport in December 2015 has failed to pro

Transport for London has  made a new pitch for the ‘metroisation’ of commuter services in south and south-east London, with turn up and go frequencies and higher capacity trains. TfL already manages much of the capital’s rail services through the London Overground concession held by Arriva, and the Crossrail concession held by MTR. But most rail services in south London remain part of rail franchises managed by the DfT.  TfL’s strategic case for metroisation s

On 24 March The Manchester Evening News published a lengthy analysis of the allegedly parlous state of the bus network in the Greater Manchester conurbation, describing it in the article’s headline as “patchy, expensive and nonsensical”. “The choice between walking a long or risky route in the dark, getting a taxi, being late or not going out at all will ring true for thousands of Greater Manchester bus passengers,” the paper said after detailing the travails suffe

We’re seeing these developments on the ground now, changing the way people travel. Sometimes it’s trial on a small scale with local introductions of new services across a limited area. The flexible on demand driven bus service in launched by Arriva started in an area of Sittingbourne just 4 miles wide and 6 miles long. A single bus route converted by TransDev to ‘pay for how far you travel’ measured by Bluetooth beacons. One Royal Mail depot trialling electric cargo trike

Cardiff Council is at odds with the Cardiff Capital Region Transport Authority (CCRTA) over the future of regional transport governance in Wales. The Welsh Government’s transport White Paper, Improving public transport (LTT 14 Dec 18), put forward two options for new statutory bodies to oversee public transport: a national Joint Transport Authority (JTA) with regional delivery boards, or a national JTA and three regional JTAs (LTT 14 Dec 18). The possible bus powers of the JTAs are listed

Tributes have been paid to the architect and street designer Ben Hamilton-Baillie who has died from cancer at the age of 63. After studying architecture, Hamilton-Baillie spent the early part of his career in the social housing sector before joining Sustrans in 1995 to work on designing parts of the National Cycle Network. Subsequently, while travelling on a Churchill fellowship, he came to know the Dutch traffic engineer Hans Monderman. Monderman, who died in 2008, was critical of traditional t

Swindon Borough Council is to bid to the Government’s £675m Future High Street fund for cash to turn a dual carriageway road between the rail station and town centre into a ‘bus boulevard’.  The council wants £25m to help turn Fleming Way into a bus interchange, which would allow the nearby “tired, poor quality” existing bus station to be redeveloped as part of the larger mixed use Kimmerfields development. Swindon says the proposal would “c

Shadow sub-national transport body Transport for the South East (TfSE) still looks set to seek bus franchising powers from the Government, despite an indication from DfT civil servants that the power crosses a ‘red line’.  TfSE recently consulted member authorities about the proposed set of powers it should acquire when it gains statutory status (LTT 18 Jan).  The matter was also discussed at TfSE’s December meeting attended by Tricia Hayes, the DfT’s director

Five new garden towns have been unveiled, unlocking potential for up to 64,000 new homes across England, the Minister of State for Housing announced. The locally-led new communities, from Hertfordshire to Gloucestershire, will receive a share of £3.7 million of funding to fast-track specialist survey work and planning works necessary for each new town’s development. The funds will be spent by councils to help to deliver the homes and infrastructure needed for both neighbouring

Transport for New Homes is asking transport and housing practitioners to help it develop a checklist for avoiding car-dependency in new housing developments. It aims to outline the the various elements that make up a good housing development. Some are obvious: the development should have easy access to direct and frequent bus routes, for instance. Others are often forgotten: cycle routes should not end at the site boundary but should join up with a wider network. Homes should have secure, e

Communities Secretary Rt Hon James Brokenshire MP has announced millions of pounds in extra housing funding, along with new planning measures to build thousands of homes, rejuvenate high streets, create jobs and deliver economic growth. The measures are part of a wider strategy to deliver 300,000 homes a year by the mid-2020s. The package will unlock large housing sites with targeted £717 million infrastructure funding, reform parts of the planning system and ensure new-builds are more e

The biggest review into transport in a generation will pave the way for transforming the way people and goods move around our cities, the government has announced in its Future of mobility: urban strategy. Also, in a boost for sustainable transport, the government has announced the first winners of the Transforming Cities Fund and awarded £60 million to 10 city regions for schemes supporting low-carbon vehicles, cycling and walking projects, and smart traffic controls. The Transforming Cit

Councils in southeast Wales have criticised the Welsh Government’s plan to introduce new bus powers of enhanced partnerships and franchising, saying existing bus powers are adequate.  The Government’s Improving public transport White Paper (LTT 14 Dec 18) proposes giving Welsh councils enhanced partnership and franchising powers that English authorities already have access to via the Bus Services Act 2017. A Public Transport Bill is expected to be published by the Welsh Governm

The removal of a large roundabout in Waltham Forest, north-east London, marks the final phase of the borough’s Mini Holland programme. Waltham Forest was one of three outer London boroughs – along with Kingston upon Thames and Enfield – to receive funding from the then Mayor of London Boris Johnson in 2014 to create cyclist and pedestrian friendly routes. A new T-junction, with signalled crossings for pedestrians and cyclists, and bus interchange (pictured above) has replaced

The estimated outturn cost of the Wednesbury to Brierley Hill Midland Metro extension has jumped by £47m to £449.5m, the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) has said. The 6.7-mile light rail line will run from the existing Wolverhampton-Birmingham line at Wednesbury to Brierley Hill in the south, via Dudley town centre and the Waterfront/Merry Hill retail/business area. Just over four miles of the route will be on a disused rail alignment and about two-and-a-half miles will be o

Peninsula Transport,  the shadow sub-national transport body (STB) for the south-west of England, has outlined the road projects being considered for submission to the Government’s Major Road Network and Large Local Majors funding streams. The Government has asked STBs to submit their investment priorities this summer for the first five-year period of the National Road Fund (2020/21-2024/25).   Peninsula Transport covers five  local transport authorities: Somerset, Devon,

Road traffic in Scotland grew 3.3 per cent to a new record in 2017, according to Transport Scotland’s annual compendium of transport statistics. The growth was more than double the 1.3 per cent recorded in Great Britain as a whole.   An estimated 48.0 billion vehicle kilometres were driven on Scotland’s roads in 2017, up 36 per cent on the 35.2 billion in 1993, the first year that estimates were made for all roads. Estimated traffic levels on local authority roads in 2017 were

The outcome of a hearing into a community transport provider’s use of Section 19 and Section 22 permits will hinge on whether the services provided are “exclusively” non-commercial. The decision by Welsh traffic commissioner Nick Jones will be of interest to community transport organisations and bus operators around Britain eager for greater clarity on how the permits can and cannot be used. At the end of the one-day hearing this week, Jones reserved judgment on Accessible Ca

Bristol City Council has gone back to the drawing board in its efforts to comply with legal limits of nitrogen dioxide, after concluding that a clean air zone (CAZ) covering vans and possibly cars would have an unacceptable impact on the city’s residents and businesses. News of the rethink comes in a letter sent by the city’s Labour mayor Marvin Rees to environment minister Thérèse Coffey, explaining why the council has missed a second deadline to submit an outline bus

Last year, MTR Corporation signalled its clear intention to develop opportunities under its Rail + Property model with the appointment of John Robinson, a speaker at the Rail Stations and Property Summit on February 27, as Head of Property for the European business. MTR Europe already runs rail services in Sweden through MTR Nordic, and has set the tone of its ambition by launching MYHeadsapp this week, a new travel app that sends personalised public transport updates to travellers in Stockholm

A six-week consultation to discuss possible developments around Crewe railway station has been launched by Cheshire East Council.  An action plan is being drawn up to manage development and support the regeneration of the site around the station ahead of HS2’s arrival, scheduled for 2027. This will help identify the most immediate opportunities around the railway station, and ensure that related growth and development is ‘plan-led’, says the council.  The action pl

A rail chord could be built in Medway, Kent, as part of a plan for a passenger service to a new town. The track could also enable some freight traffic to bypass lines in south London.  The chord would connect the freight-only branch serving the Isle of Grain on the Hoo Peninsula with the Gravesend-Strood line at Higham, enabling trains to access the branch from the east. Currently, the branch can only be accessed from the west via Hoo Junction. Medway Council wants to introduce a passenge

A flyover on a major radial road in the north of Birmingham looks set to be demolished as part of a redevelopment plan.  The city council is to consult on demolishing the A34 Perry Barr flyover as part of proposals to build a Commonwealth Games athletes village – Birmingham is the host city in 2022 – and make wider improvements for active travel in the area.  The flyover carries traffic  between Walsall and Birmingham over the intersection with the A453 from Sutton C

Planning policy should be rewritten to limit car-based housing and promote high density city living, says consultant Transport for Quality of Life in another report for Friends of the Earth. Outlining their vision for the future of urban living, Lisa Hopkinson and Lynn Sloman say: “People in compact, dense towns and cities will live in well designed, high-quality homes, the majority in 3-6 storey buildings, giving neighbourhoods a human scale. “Everything will be easily accessible

A look at viability, funding and investment in railway stations and station-led development. By Michael Bray, Senior Associate in the real estate team, Burges Salmon There is an increasing trend to refurbish and redevelop our railway stations, ranging from the restoration of historical stations such as Wakefield Kirkgate, to landmark regional hubs and international gateways such as Birmingham New Street and King’s Cross St Pancras. Railway stations can be destinations in their o

It’s clear that the auto industry has its sights on shared mobility, but in a model that is much closer to Uber and Lyft’s taxi-alternative than true co-mobility or shared modes such as Uber Pool or Lyft Line, which connect potential clients with other passengers with the same route or location. BMW and Daimler have launched a combined car-sharing venture called  ‘Jurbey’ and, under the terms of their deal, reports Automotive News, which includes Daimler's Car2Go and

Local authorities can radically improve their transport system by increasing the use of shared modes, especially active ones, but need operational and regulatory guidance. CoMoUK is supporting local authorities by bringing together stakeholders, including the DfT, to help deliver shared mobility goals, a process that will kick off at the Shared Transport Masterclass in Leicester on 22 February Cities in the UK are on the precipice of an upcoming revolution in the way we provide transport. The p

Advances in technology may provide new opportunities in metropolitan railway finance, says Joseph Potvin, Executive Director, Xalgorithms Foundation It is common knowledge that commercial and residential properties within an easy walk of metropolitan train stations are in relatively greater demand, which tends to be reflected in their significantly higher lease and sale values. This mobility premium has long been the basis for so-called Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) initiatives.&nbs

Campaign for Better Transport has called on the Government to invest £4.8 billion in expanding the railway network to reach the most disconnected and disadvantaged communities. In a new report, The case for expanding the rail network, it outlines how a national reopening programme would initially create 33 new rail lines with 72 new stations, allowing an additional 20 million rail passenger journeys a year by bringing over 500,000 people within walking distance of a train station. It

Zipcar, a company that helped define the sharing economy, has released the findings of its 2018 Impact Report. For the first time, the report comprehensively captures key findings gathered over Zipcar’s eighteen years of mobility leadership. The findings, combined with objective third-party research, offer tangible evidence that car sharing continues to provide both members, and the cities they live in, with significant and distinct social and environmental benefits, at a time when new mob

Shared mobility modes have great potential to address congestion and poor air quality challenges, but the practical delivery of an integrated shared mobility strategy is complex. The Shared Transport Masterclass on February 22 will bring together operators, local authorities and potential mobility users to take the first steps in creating a practical framework, based on 'mobility pledges', that can guide the set-up for successful shared mobility. The mobility pledges are rooted in work tha

UNICEF UK has launched a report into air pollution, including a national call to action and recommended measures for government, in order to urgently reduce levels of air pollutants in areas populated by children. Notes the UK Health Alliance on Climate Change, responding to the report: 'Around a third of UK children are growing up in areas with unsafe levels of air pollution and without urgent intervention, toxic levels of air pollution are expected to persist fo

As Unicef published its latest briefing on air pollution, stating that across 86% of the UK, children are breathing in harmful levels of toxic air that can harm their lungs, damage the development of their brains and stunt their growth, new figures from Close Brothers Asset Finance’s quarterly survey of businesses in the UK and Ireland suggest that traffic congestion is reaching crisis point across the UK, affecting both productivi

Between 31 May 2018 and 31 July 2018, the Department for Transport held a 'Call for ideas' in respect of rail market-led proposals (MLPs); essentially a call for proposals that were 'financially credible without government support'. There was a strong response to this call for ideas, with the department receiving 30 submissions, although DfT has not yet commented on the relative merits of these. An MLP is defined as 'a project promoted by the private sector which addresses an opportunity not ne

Shadow transport secretary Andy McDonald has appointed transport academic Phil Goodwin to advise on reforming how UK transport provision is paid for and funded.  Goodwin’s recommendations are likely to inform what McDonald calls a “new social contract for transport” that will be a key plank of Labour’s next General Election manifesto. The work will look at “who benefits from transport provision, including indirect beneficiaries as well as travellers themselve

Transport for the North has published the final version of its strategic transport plan (STP), setting out proposals for tens of billions of pounds of investment in the North’s transport infrastructure over 30 years. But it admits the plan’s vision will not be realised without major reforms to how transport is funded.  The STP identifies a funding requirement for strategic transport of around £60bn-70bn (current prices) during the period to 2050. TfN describes this as &ld

The Traffic Commissioner for Wales still has no office, more than two years on from when it was formed, with commissioner Nick Jones having to work from home and rely on support staff from traffic areas in England. The UK Government agreed to the creation of a separate Welsh traffic area following years of pressure from the Welsh Government. Previously Wales was managed from Birmingham as an adjunct of the West Midlands traffic area. The separate Welsh area was created in September 2016 but no

Your feature on Manchester’s spatial masterplan is of necessity a summary (‘Greater Manchester’s spatial plan sets transport agenda’ LTT 18 Jan). However, in a quick skim through the document’s 443 pages I could see no reference to one of the city’s biggest problems – Platforms 13 and 14 at Piccadilly station, which are the only through platforms, one in each direction. This affects us here in the North-East because TransPennine Express (TPE) trains run

The end of 2018 and beginning of 2019 have seen a host of consultations, reports and inquiries into why it’s so necessary to boost walking and cycling levels; both through securing long-term investment and fully integrating quality cycling and walking infrastructure with public transport, homes and work. First, the Department of Health and Social Care launched its ‘Prevention is better than cure' vision, which specifically mentions the need to 'coordinate transport, housing, educat

EU partners will continue to work over the next three years to raise the profile of shared transport solutions as part of the SHARE-North project. Speakers from project members CoMoUK and SHARE-North will be speaking at the Shared Transport Masterclass on February 22 in Leicester. The aim of the SHARE-North project is to develop, implement, promote and assess shared transport options such as car clubs, bike share, ride sharing and other shared transport options. CoMoUK will focus on engagi

The NHS will save £319m if cycling doubles in seven UK cities every eight years by 2040, according a new report from Sustrans. The charity calculates that 34,000 life-threatening illnesses - including Type 2 diabetes, stroke, breast cancer and depression - would be prevented, along with 628 early deaths. Transforming Cities: The potential of everyday cycling uses data from Sustrans’ 2017 Bike Life studies of B

A few years ago, Future Systems Catapult and Grimshaw Architects ran a competition to ask ‘What new civic function might a rail transportation hub play in the next 10-25 years?’ Participants were asked how station operators could dynamically re-direct travellers around disruption, how neighbouring businesses could be increasingly integrated with station environments, and what the service function around urban, suburban and community rail stations would be. Such is the time lag betwe

Since Bolloré’s pioneering Autolib car share service pulled out of Paris last year, Daimler’s Car2Go has delivered on its plan to offer 400 electric cars for free-floating sharing across the French capital. The service is simple: all you need is the app to grab a car2go anywhere in the home area of Paris. Parking is free in the designated zone.  More cars are to follow over the course of this year, says Car2Go's CEO Olivier Reppert, who considers Paris an ideal ground fo

HERE Mobility, the mobility unit of HERE Technologies, has announced the launch of their new all-in-one mobility app. Just as platforms like LinkedIn, Airbnb, and Facebook have leveraged social connectivity,?SoMo (based on Social Mobility),?taps into the power of social networks to reimagine the future of transportation. SoMo?merges mobility and sociability and enables users to plan, share, and ride in a way that’s simple, hassle-free, and?good for the planet. SoMo is a first-of-its-kind m

A new national planning framework is urgently needed to place public transport, rather than car-based “low density sprawl”, at the heart of policy for new developments, says a new report by the Urban Transport Group. This would enable the “agglomeration” of economies – where firms benefit from close proximity to each other – and meet housing demand without making congestion and air quality worse, according to The Place To

Birmingham City Council’s decision to delay the likely date for achieving compliance with EU nitrogen dioxide limit values could be illegal, the lawyers who dragged the Government through the courts on air quality said this week.  Birmingham is planning to introduce a Class D charging Clean Air Zone (CAZ) in January 2020 covering roads within the ring road, and applying to cars, taxis, vans, buses and lorries (LTT 04 Jan). Cars, taxis, private hire vehicles and vans that fail to mee

Major improvements to Greater Manchester’s transport networks will play a vital role in supporting the conurbation’s spatial development over the next 20 years, according to the area’s new draft spatial plan. The revised draft Greater Manchester Spatial Framework includes two major ‘development corridors’ to improve the north of the conurbation’s socio-economic fortunes. These will require hundreds of millions of pounds of investment in roads and public trans

New roads, bus rapid transit corridors, tram-trains, and light rail extensions all feature in the list of projects to be developed over the next five years to support Greater Manchester’s growth.   Transport for Greater Manchester’s draft delivery plan for 2020-2025 says business cases will be prepared for projects including:  • extending the Atherton branch of the Leigh-Salford-Manchester busway westwards to Wigan • a new road linking the M61 to the new A49 li

Rail stations are changing, as any traveller who uses Birmingham, Sheffield, London St Pancras or London Bridge stations, will clearly see. They don't feel like stations. They feel like upmarket retail malls and grand food courts with trains (and buses, bikes and taxis) added, imposing city gateways, art exhibits, pianos and, increasingly, the centrepieces of new communities and developments. Stations' evolving role as new 'city centres' is driving development activity, growth and revenue. Gl

The action plan to turn Crewe railway station into an ‘HS2 hub’ is being refined by Cheshire East Council following a consultation with local residents, landowners and businesses. The hub station will support regeneration for the town and wider region, says the council. The consultation, which ended last month, was carried out to help develop the key planning document for the hub.   As part of the government’s high-speed rail line (HS2) plans, Crewe would link with Greate

The DfT has invited local authorities in England to prepare bids to two funding streams for major road improvements.   The Government has earmarked £3.5bn over the first five years of the new National Roads Fund, commencing in April 2020, for improving local roads.  Much of the funding will be awarded to schemes on the newly designated Major Road Network. A dedicated MRN fund will be set up for schemes requiring between £20m and £50m of DfT grant. A second funding s

I recently attended a course on behavioural economics (run by Anthony Tasgal on behalf of the Chartered Institute of Marketing) and of all the principles discussed the one that stuck in my mind was the ‘power of context’. What occurred to me was that while we are aware that context is important in the transport world, this is not acted upon as a matter of course, with the key considerations being journey time, cost, maybe comfort and perhaps personal characteristics such as age, gend

Plans have been unveiled for a new entrance at Birmingham’s Snow Hill Station, which will make it easier for passengers to switch between local rail and tram services. An image of the new eastern entrance (left) has been released by Transport for West Midlands (TfWM), part of the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA). Independent infrastructure specialist Barhale has been appointed by TfWM to build the £1.5m project. Barhale will construct the entrance beneath the existing brick

A top DfT civil servant has refuted claims that many strategic cases for transport schemes are poorly prepared by project promoters.    The Transport Planning Society was one organisation to criticise strategic cases in its submission to the DfT’s appraisal and modelling strategy consultation (LTT 22 Jun). It said they were too often written as an “afterthought tailored to support the scheme being assessed” (LTT 09 Nov).   At the Local Transport Summit, Patrici

Transport spending in Bristol and the surrounding area would have to more than double over the next 17 years to deliver a new transport plan prepared by the West of England Combined Authority (WECA) and the area’s four unitary authorities. The most expensive part of the £10bn estimated cost of the plan is a rail-based mass transit system, requiring underground running in places and with a price tag of £3bn-£5bn. David Carter, the West of England Combined Authority&rsquo

Transport for London this week put back the date for achieving an operating surplus by a year, to 2022/23, blaming the delayed opening of the Elizabeth line (Crossrail) and a  decline in bus passenger numbers.   The new business plan assumes that the delay to Crossrail opening will have a net operating impact (income and cost) of £600m over the next three years – £200m in 2019/20,  £300m in 2020/21, and £100m in 2021/22. The major impact is delayed p

Bus operator Stagecoach says the outside lanes of motorways in Strathclyde should be reserved for buses and coaches. Transport Scotland’s current Managed Motorways study is considering the possibility of dedicating the hard shoulder of the M8 in Glasgow to buses (LTT 26 Oct). This, however, would see buses interrupted at each junction by other traffic crossing their path to join or leave the motorway. Robert Andrew, managing director of Stagecoach Scotland, told LTT: “We see potent

This has been a year of historical landmarks: 100 years since the armistice that ended the Great War and 100 years since women in the UK were first given the vote. While not quite as momentous on a global scale, 2018 also marked 50 years since SYSTRA began delivering transport planning in the UK. Big anniversaries of all kinds invite us to take stock, to look at how the world has changed around us, what we have learned, and to speculate about what it all means for the future. And for transport

New rail minister Andrew Jones has challenged train operators to step up their support for community rail projects across the UK as he launches the 2018 Community Rail Strategy. Last week Jones returned as the transport minister responsible for rail after the departure of ‘remainer’ Jo Johnson, who resigned over the proposed Brexit deal. Jones was previously parliamentary under secretary at the DFT between May 2015 and June 2017. Train operators should support community rail organ

The Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority is drawing up plans to reorganise transport delivery arrangements in the area. A reorganisation is seen as necessary to support Conservative mayor James Palmer’s ambitions for a number of big transport investments, including the bus-based CAM system (see opposite) and road and rail improvements. Combined authority transport director Chris Twigg said a review of the area’s client-side transport capabilities by consultant Arup ha

Transport Scotland has published its first Scotland-specific forecasts of road, bus and rail demand. The forecasts present a ‘primary forecast’, which represents “what is considered to be the most probable future based on what we currently know”. Assumptions on future population, economic growth and fuel prices were also combined to create ‘high’ and ‘low’ alternative growth scenarios for road traffic.  The primary road traffic forecasts for

Oxford Street in central London will remain an important corridor for motorised vehicles under new plans for the street and the surrounding area published  for consultation by Westminster City Council.  The proposals come four months after the collapse of a plan for the partial pedestrianisation of the street (LTT 22 Jun). It was drawn up by a partnership including Westminster and London mayor Sadiq Khan, but Westminster withdrew support amid pressure from local residents who feared t

My title this month is the conflation of two matters arising from events over the past two days. The first of these was a talk on road pricing by a chap called Paul Buchanan. The second will take me a little longer to explain. But here goes… The Tuesday after this episode of Local Transport Today is published will be the first ever Transport Planning Day (13 November). Great credit for the initiative is due to Lynda Addison, chair of the Transport Planning Society. The core purpose of TP

An innovative physical activity programme which uses the technology found in high street reward cards to turn cities and towns into giant, mass participation games, is rolling out across the country, thanks to a new £3.32 million National Lottery grant from Sport England. The unique family game, called Beat the Street, rewards players who cycle, run or walk with points and prizes, encouraging families to get out and about and increase their physical activity.  Fifty-nine towns and ci

Prevention is a vital health topic for government and the health sector – and it’s also the focus of a new public health vision document, launched this week by Health Secretary Matt Hancock. The 'Prevention is better than cure' vision, which sets out how we can use policy, new technology, workplace strategies and the power of local communities to prevent worsening health, will also be a key focus for the Public Health & Sustainable Transport Summit to be held on 27 March 2019 in

Mayor of Liverpool City Region Steve Rotheram and Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham addressed a full house at Smarter Travel LIVE! hosted by Merseytravel and Liverpool City Region and organised by Landor LINKS. They said that radical change is needed across the North if mayors are to be allowed to deliver for their regions. “The economic growth of our city region is asking questions of the transport system it can’t answer,” said Burnham. More than 500 people attended t

A new European cycling industry association has been formed in a bid to influence government transport policy. Cycling Industries Europe (CIE) will supersede the European Cyclists Federation’s Cycling Industry Club. The CIE will be led by Tony Grimaldi, chief executive of bike company Cycleurope, and the Cycling Industry Club’s Kevin Mayne. The new association will bring together cycle and accessory suppliers with bike share operators, cycle delivery firms, consultancies and digital

Police forces in England and Wales are intensifying their use of HGV tractor units to enforce the law on major roads, with drivers of commercial vehicles being targeted in particular. Highways England acquired a derestricted tractor unit in 2015 ago for “Operation Tramline”. The unit was fitted with cameras that recorded the all-round view and could exceed the normal speed limit for HGVs on dual carriageways. The unit’s deployment by police forces around England resulted in ab

The 6th Annual Smarter Travel LIVE! Conference, hosted by Merseytravel & Liverpool City Region (LCR) on October 16 and 17, attracted more than 600 delegates from across the UK and beyond. Steve Rotheram, Metro Mayor of Liverpool City Region, and Andy Burnham, Greater Manchester Mayor, both gave keynotes, stressing their commitment to ongoing devolution and the delivery of a fully integrated, accessible and clean transport network linking key towns and cities across the North (see news pages)

In the run-up to the publication of expressions of interest for the future Oxfordshire Strategic Traffic Model (OSM) on October 23, Smarter Travel LIVE! hosted a workshop session with Oxfordshire County Council, innovation hub MoBox and Oxford-based im23, the smarter mobility agency, to outline new ways for local authorities and the tech community to collaborate. In a first for UK local authorities, Oxfordshire County Council is using its OSM procurement to demonstrate how to leverage innovation

Liverpool City Region's Mayor, Steve Rotheram, speaking at Smarter Travel LIVE!, last week, referred to the Office of Road and Rail’s report into a summer of rail chaos which found “systematic failures from government, Network Rail and the rail operators” leading to collapsed services and missed chances to avoid disruption. “Can you honestly imagine chaos on that scale being allowed to happen in London and the South East without major government intervention,” he as

The mobility options on offer to meet users’ personal travel needs have significantly diversified over the last few years. While the traditional analogue options of walking, driving or cycling with your own car or bike, or using a timetable and catching a fixed route bus or train still exist, they are now augmented (and in some cases are being replaced) by digital ways to identify, book and use a much wider range of transport modes, including those adopting very different, and much more fl

The Highways Agency has published revised plans for a three-lane dual carriageway linking Essex and Kent, including a 2.4-mile tunnel under the Thames. The 14.5-mile Lower Thames Crossing will connect the M2 near Rochester and the M25 in Essex between Gravesend and Tilbury. According to the Highways Agency, the crossing will have the longest road tunnel in the UK and, at 50ft wide, the third largest bored tunnel in the world. Changes have been made to proposals after a consultation, which rece

The DfT has admitted a letter instructing councils in England to pause work on level surface street designs was targeted at town centres and not residential developments.  The DfT is now working with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) to clarify what it means for residential streets. The Local Transport Note 1/11: Shared Space has been temporarily withdrawn. Most observers believe the government’s request for a pause on new projects was aimed at town c

I’ve done my fair share of travel behaviour change programmes in my time. These programmes often succeed in getting more people cycling, walking and using public transport more often but, when we ask people their primary reason for making a change, the main reason is something to do with personal health and fitness. Similarly, when we come to evaluating programmes, the largest benefits tend to reside in health improvement rather than ‘transport’ benefits. So, I was interested

Corethree bills itself as the “world’s leading mobile ticket provider”. It issued its 50 millionth m-ticket in February this year – sold through apps developed for transport operators large and small across the UK. Corethree’s customers include a wide range of operators and authorities including First Bus, Arriva, Santander Cycles, Translink, Lothian Buses, My Get Me There (Transport for Greater Manchester), McGills Buses and Go Ahead. But, on 3 September, everythi

Reports published by the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) rarely attract significant amounts of media attention but there was an important exception to this on 20 September when no fewer than three national daily papers (The Daily Mail, The Times and The Guardian) featured details of the latest ORR report on their front pages. “Passengers are routinely being failed by a chaotic rail industry, a damning official report concludes today,” The Mail said. “Bosses, ministers and regula

Corethree bills itself as the “world’s leading mobile ticket provider”. It issued its 50 millionth m-ticket in February this year – sold through apps developed for transport operators large and small across the UK. Corethree’s customers include a wide range of operators and authorities including First Bus, Arriva, Santander Cycles, Translink, Lothian Buses, My Get Me There (Transport for Greater Manchester), McGills Buses and Go Ahead. But, on 3 September, everythi

Drivers’ dependency on the car has jumped in the last year, with third (33%) of motorists – the equivalent to 13.2m – saying they are more reliant on their cars now than 12 months earlier, compared to just 27% in 2017, reveals research conducted by the RAC. The motoring association's annual Report on Motoring is based on a representative survey of 1,808 motorists. Data from the study of motoring trends, now in its 30th year, shows car dependency had been dropping steadily sin

Network Rail has agreed terms with Telereal Trillium and Blackstone Property Partners for the sale of its commercial estate portfolio. Proceeds from the £1.46bn transaction will be used to fund the railway upgrade plan. Telereal and Blackstone will hold equal ownership stakes and intend to be long-term owners of the estate. Telereal will oversee the day-to-day property management of the portfolio. Both parties say they will adopt ‘tenants first’ approach, cemented in a tenant

The Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority’s plan for a new rapid transit system funded by land value capture have been called into question in the final report of the Cambridge & Peterborough Independent Economic Review. The review, chaired by the economist Dame Kate Barker, was commissioned by James Palmer, the elected mayor of the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority. Palmer is championing plans for a rapid transit network for the county. Consultant Steer

Opening this month, Edinburgh's Your Bike cycle hire scheme is using innovative 'hybrid lock' technology that supports a network of 'virtual' geo-fenced bike parking stations along with physical stations. It's about bringing a planned and integrated approach with new facilities and solutions for cities so that the private car is no longer first choice, says Matt McNulty, urban mobility director for Serco and Your Bike The Your Bike scheme in Edinburgh, to be known as ‘Just Eat Cycles&rsqu

A scrutiny committee of Leicester City Council has recommended that the council pursue a new partnership with bus operators, rather than franchising. The council’s economic development, transport and tourism scrutiny commission has held an inquiry into the powers of the Bus Services Act 2017.  The commission concludes that, through a “strong formal partnership”, the council can encourage operators to deliver better vehicles, better information, and new ticketing initiati

The government has announced £2m to support the uptake of e-cargo bikes. The funding is designed to help pave the way for electric delivery vehicles to replace older vans, improving both the environment and reduce congestion. The announcement is part of the international Zero Emission Vehicle Summit being held in Birmingham this week. The event brings together policy makers, industry experts and opinion formers from around globe to tackle carbon emissions and to explore ways to impro

Clean air zones and low emission zones, safer lorry schemes, alternative fuels, Brexit... Central and local government is presenting the road freight sector with a plateful of policy challenges, making life busy for industry bodies such as the Freight Transport Association. “The workload is certainly increasing greatly, particularly in the areas of the environment and Brexit,” says Natalie Chapman, the FTA’s head of urban policy and the South of England.  Think about the

Hundreds of new housing developments across the country could be delayed for months because of the DfT’s request that councils “pause” design work on street schemes with level surfaces – i.e. no kerbs.  Transport minister Nusrat Ghani wrote to councils in England at the start of this month “asking” that they “pause the introduction of new shared space schemes that incorporate a level surface, and which are at the design stage”. The Department

The development planning system in England has an in-built bias towards building new housing estates on greenfield sites that are heavily car dependent, a new report concludes.  The Transport for New Homes project was funded by the Foundation for Integrated Transport, an environmental transport grant-making charity set up in 2014, and with help from the RAC Foundation. The project team visited scores of new housing developments in England and three in the Netherlands to assess their locati

With profound apologies to The Temptations, and to those of you who – with every justification – think that I’ve already written too much about this topic in these pages, I’m afraid I’m going to spend a few hundred more words on the subject of so-called ‘Shared Space’ (henceforth ‘SS’).  What precipitated this turn of events is the DfT’s publication, last month, of The Inclusive Transport Strategy. Just three paragraphs of this 76

A shared pedestrian and cycle path linking Bognor Regis to Littlehampton in West Sussex has been officially opened. The 4.5km shared cycle and walking route cost £2m to construct. The new path runs alongside the A259 and was funded by the county council and Coast to Capital Local Enterprise Partnership.  Rupert Chitty, chief executive at Coast to Capital, said: “Improving transport links has been identified as a priority in our newly-published Strategic Economic Plan – Ga

Roads, footpaths, buses, trains and trams are used day in day out by ordinary people from all walks of life, and the way that transport supports – or frustrates – their plans and needs is a fundamental influence on their wellbeing and personal fulfilment. Transport planning is fundamental to our society; well-planned transport supports and enriches people’s lives, and can help people be healthier and happier, and build stronger communities.  It’s only right then tha

New mobility services capture the imagination and have the potential to transform how we travel. An otherwise truly terrible course I was on a few years ago introduced the earworm of “Just because you can doesn’t mean you should; just because it’s new doesn’t mean it’s good.” So how do we identify ‘good’ and when does ‘can’ become ‘should’? There is a healthy coherence emerging around the whole agenda-that-has-no-name &ndash

What does it take to become a cycling champion? That is a question I could ask any of my recent bosses: Andrew Gilligan, Will Norman and Chris Boardman. I have held senior roles under all three, advising on the quality of infrastructure and planning the spending of billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money. I hope they don’t mind this Viewpoint, or that’s my career finished! They are three very different characters, all with their own unique attributes and specialities but there i

Thousands of motorists are still flouting a traffic ban that was introduced three years ago in the London Borough of Waltham Forest as part of the Mini Holland programme. More than 9,000 fines have been issued to motorists contravening the traffic ban on Orford Road in the Walthamstow Village area. The scheme was introduced in 2015 as part of the Mini-Holland programme, with three outer London boroughs – Waltham Forest, Enfield and Kingston upon Thames – receiving around £100m

The revised National Planning Policy Framework has been published, and sets out the government’s planning policies for England and how these are expected to be applied. The revised framework replaces the previous National Planning Policy Framework published in March 2012. Building attractive and better-designed homes in areas where they are needed is at the centre of the new planning rules, says Government, as Secretary of State Rt Hon James Brokenshire reveals the new framework. The consu

Researchers have published a comprehensive report on private- and public-sector big data policies affecting transport in EU countries and abroad. The travel behaviours and transport preferences of city dwellers are changing. Transport researchers and policymakers are therefore faced with numerous challenges as they strive to create efficient, safe and sustainable transportation systems, notes CORDIS, the EU Research and innovation news service. In order to address these issues, the EU

Now in its 3rd year, the Awards will showcase the ways in whiich people's lives are being improved through cost-effective, clean and integrated transport provision across towns and cities. These awards celebrate both the positive impact that smarter travel projects can deliver, and the professionals who lead them. Whoever you are, whatever your project or service, everyone has a chance of winning a Smarter Travel Award. You don’t have to have the biggest budgets, the sexiest product or th

According to recent statistics produced by the Department for Transport, bus service use in England is in decline. Although bus use per person has increased significantly in London over the last 25 years (+52%), it has fallen by 40 per cent in many other English metropolitan areas. Along with London, Liverpool City Region is a proud exception to the rule. As a result of the introduction of a range of customer-focused improvements, including on board Wi-fi and USB charging points, the number of f

ArrivaClick is an on-demand minibus service that takes multiple passengers heading in the same direction and books them on a shared vehicle, with the aim of tackling air quality issues and congestion. Enabling people to move out of private cars with the offer of convenient and comfortable shared journeys is a key driver for the project. ArrivaClick in Liverpool will become operational later in the summer. There are no fixed routes, with journeys determined by where passengers want to go wit

Painting a picture of the changing use of our transport system is not easy. A picture composed only of averages or aggregate change amounts to clumsy brush strokes. The finer detail in the picture comes from the artist’s ability to reflect the diversity of components of change – the distributions from which the averages arise. The Department for Transport's latest statistical release, 'Road Traffic Estimates: Great Britain 2017'  attempts to paint a picture, including fine

The National Infrastructure Commission has called for a shake-up of the local transport funding system in England outside London, and for the DfT to increase urban transport funding.  The NIC’s first National Infrastructure Assessment says local transport authorities should be awarded “stable, devolved infrastructure budgets”, just like Highways England and Network Rail.  “The devolved budget should comprise of five-year settlements, with fixed annual budgets

A model for estimating the effect of transport investment on the wider economy and Treasury tax revenues could help open up a new route to financing transport infrastructure, according to the tool’s promoters.  The Greater London simulator model is intended to provide insights into the long-term social, economic, environmental and fiscal impacts of infrastructure investment. It has been developed by Swiss consultant Greenwood Strategic Advisors working with the Greater London Authori

Local transport authorities in south-west England are being asked to approve plans for two shadow sub-national transport bodies.  The South West Peninsula STB would cover Somerset, Cornwall, Plymouth, Torbay, Devon and Dorset.  The Western Gateway STB would cover Gloucestershire, Bath & North East Somerset, Borough of Poole, Bournemouth, Bristol, North Somerset, South Gloucestershire, Wiltshire, and the West of England Combined Authority.  A report sent by the councils to t

Local authorities can undertake speed limit enforcement and prosecute drivers who break the limit using a little-known piece of legislation, according to campaign group 20’s Plenty for Us.   Although signed-only 20mph limits have been implemented across a huge number of the nation’s residential streets, few limits are enforced, with many police forces not regarding it as a high priority. 20’s Plenty said this week that  existing legislation may provide the scope for

You wait ages for a consultation about bus information and then two come along at once. The DfT has just published proposals that will require operators to broadcast audio-visual information about services to help passengers with visual and/or hearing impairments, and for making data such as fares, routes and timetables ‘open’ so that they can be used in apps and other digital products.   The consultation on audio-visual information applies to the whole of Britain, and sets out

A project designed to reduce the dominance of the car on a shopping street in Newcastle has won support from a retailer who was among its harshest critics. Steve Robson (pictured) and other traders had opposed Newcastle City Council’s plans to remove parking bays on Acorn Road, in the suburb of Jesmond, and feared the changes would drive away customers. Three years ago the council implemented the £350,000 project, funded by the government’s Cycle City Ambition Fund, making th

The government must start to lay the foundations now for the altered streetscape of 2050 when all cars and vans will be electric as well as mostly autonomous, argues the National Infrastructure Commission (NIC) in a new report. The first National Infrastructure Assessment, published this week, sets out a long-term strategy for the UK’s economic infrastructure from 2020 to 2050. Electric vehicles will soon have the same range and be cheaper to buy and maintain than fossil fuel vehicles, t

A once notorious gyratory road system has been transformed into Aldgate Square, one of the largest public spaces in the City of London, featuring safer routes for cyclists and pedestrians. The six-year, £23m project is now complete, with the square being opened by Charles Bowman, the Lord Mayor of the City of London. The square, which is near Aldgate Underground station, has undergone a host of changes. The one-way gyratory system has been replaced with two-way traffic. Also, new cycling

Our little branch line between Oxenholme and Windermere has been in the national news lately as a result of a vintage train being hired to operate on the route whilst franchise operator Northern suspended all of its trains and replaced them with buses. Resulting claims of “showing the Lake District is still open for business” and the area “even resorting to hiring a preserved train to protect this important visitor season” fall considerably wide of the mark. Let’s b

Plans for a cycling and walking network across Greater Manchester, made up of more than 1,000 miles of routes, was unveiled at Cycle City Active City last week. The ‘Beelines’ network will include 75 miles of segregated bike lanes as well as 1,400 safer road crossings on most routes and 25 ‘filtered neighbourhoods’ where priority will be given to people over motorised traffic. Beelines was launched at Cycle City Active City by Chris Boardman, Greater Manchester’s c

Steve Rotheram, Liverpool City Region Metro Mayor, and Nathalie Nicholas, the Combined Authority’s recently-appointed Deputy Portfolio Holder for Transport and Air Quality, represented the city region during June at a National Clean Air Summit convened by Mayor of London Sadiq Khan, UK100 and IPPR. The idea is a simple one, says The Independent: ‘Get people from across the UK in the same room, from a local level all the way up to the corridors of Whitehall, to see what can be do

Worcestershire County Council has revised its proposed parking standards for new housing developments after developers, consultants and even some of the council’s own officers said the original plans would deliver unattractive car-dominated estates.  The council’s draft streetscape design guide recommended a minimum of two spaces per one and two bedroom house; three spaces per three bedroom house; four spaces per four bedroom house; and thereafter an additional 0.5 spaces for e

Brighton's bike share scheme (BTN BikeShare) is to expand with 120 new bikes and nine new hubs, mostly in Hove.  The scheme started last September with 450 bikes at 51 sites and, in the nine months since, has attracted 35,000 subscribers. Back in March, after gaining more than 22,000 users in just six months, the scheme became the biggest in the UK outside of London, and by the end of May there had been 213,000 rentals and more than 400,000 miles cycled, according to the Brighton and Hove N

Readers may wonder where certain core ideas in transport planning have come from – in many cases their roots are in the work of Stephen Plowden, who died last month aged 85. He played a key role in creating the idea that more and bigger infrastructure was not always the answer to meeting people’s travel needs or their aspirations for the places they inhabit. His pioneering work on managing demand and on the pursuit of safe, active and sustainable transport was reflected in a career s

Work is to start next week on building a new transport interchange at Ashton Bus Station in Greater Manchester. The new interchange – to be delivered by Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) and Tameside Council – will feature a covered concourse, with seated waiting areas, as well as electronic information screens. It will have shops, fully accessible toilets, baby-changing provision and enhanced passenger security including CCTV. There will also be improved taxi facilities. Dur

Following the release of the first fleet of proof of concept vehicles in Christchurch in 2017, along with trials across NZ and Australia with other partners and technologies, HMI Technologies (HMI), a New Zealand / Australian-based Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) innovator and a member of ITS UK, has developed a self driving & self-learning AV technology company called Ohmio Automotion. HMI has been a player in the ITS industry for more than 15 years and, based on its experience wor

Anna Delveccio, who started her transport engineering career as a teenager, has received the top honour at the 2018 FTA everywoman in Transport & Logistics Awards.  Launched 11 years ago, the awards programme celebrates women transforming transport and logistics in the UK. The winners included women working for transport organisations including Heathrow Airport, Royal Mail, Merseytravel and Transport for London.  The Woman of the Year Award was presented to Anna Delvecchio, Comme

Stockholm’s congestion charge scheme has proved remarkably effective at suppressing traffic levels and encouraging a shift to other modes of transport in the 20 plus years since its launch. After initially facing widespread public opposition, it now has majority support, even among those who regularly pay the charge. One of the scheme’s architects, Director of the Stockholm City Transport Administration Jonas Eliasson, vividly recalls the uproar around its launch in 2006: “It w

A long-term plan for Britain’s railways, involving expenditure of hundreds of billions of pounds on new lines and upgrades, has been published by Greengauge 21, the think tank-cum-lobby group that helped put high-speed rail, in the form of HS2, on the political map. Timing is important in politics and Greengauge may be rueing its decision to release the report when some operators cannot run today’s timetable. It will be hoping the National Infrastructure Commission, which is currentl

In my early days campaigning for sustainable transport I put a huge effort into submitting evidence to local plans in an effort to get public transport more squarely on the map. Finally I realised that my efforts were largely in vain, because local public transport of the quality that I envisaged was desperately under-funded, and because local plans were more or less dominated by a single theme. This was how to accommodate targets for new homes on ‘strategic’ sites. Transport, it see

A virtual reality tool to promote safer interaction between drivers and cyclists has been launched by Ford Motor Company. The ‘Wheelswap’ tool will help bring about behaviour change, making urban areas safer and helping to reduce pollution and congestion, said Ford. The tool is designed to show motorists and cyclists how inconsiderate driving and riding can be potentially fatal. Initial studies show that after undergoing the experience, nearly all participants said they would chang

Transport for London is pitching to deliver more transport project work on behalf of boroughs, undertaking activities that are currently done by council officers or consultants. It is also advising boroughs against using “costly consultants” to prepare bids for a TfL funding stream. TfL’s offer is set out in a letter sent to boroughs last week by Penny Rees, head of network sponsorship in the surface transport directorate.  “I am pleased to confirm that we have ded

Most of us played with Lego as children, but I was more likely to leave lines of toy cars around the house, which is somewhat ironic given my current line of work. But I still play with Lego today, as I tidy up my children's efforts when they’re not looking. But I think the two are linked in my line of work.  I like to imagine transport models in a similar way: a number of blocks that are interconnected to produce a replica of how people and goods move around our real cities. All the

A trial taxi feeder for bus services has been launched in north Bristol.  Bus operator First West of England has teamed up with Bristol-based technology start-up Esoterix Systems to deliver the taxi service, branded MyFirstMile. CityFox is providing the taxi service under a hackney taxi licence using eight-seater cabs. The trial service, which will run to the end of September, operates from 06:00-10:30 for outbound trips, and 15:00-20:00 for return trips  on weekdays, excluding bank

A bus operator that uses the easyCoach and easyBus brand is suing Shropshire Council in the High Court. The news comes as the company expands its operations with a new route between Shrewsbury and Liverpool John Lennon Airport. Shrewsbury-based TSL Ltd has the rights to use the easyBus and easyCoach brands of Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou’s easyGroup outside London. It operates several commercial and tendered local bus routes, including one under contract to Shropshire Council. Director Andre

The key findings of a European research project into the impact of transport policy on congestion have been published in a new report. The project – called CREATE (Congestion Reduction in Europe: Advancing Transport Efficiency) – examined congestion reduction policies in five western European capitals: Berlin, Copenhagen, London, Paris and Vienna. The report charts how policy priorities in the cities have shifted over the past 50-60 years: from road building, parking, lower density

Walking is a basic human activity but its fundamental character can make it difficult to identify and categorise as a mode of transport and consequently to occupy a prominent position on the policy agenda. In order to find its political identity it must be given a context. For example, this can include walking for a purpose, such as for leisure or as part of a journey to work, or how walking interacts with its environment, including urban and suburban townscapes, and more natural rural landscape

Walking is a basic human activity but its fundamental character can make it difficult to identify and categorise as a mode of transport and consequently to occupy a prominent position on the policy agenda. In order to find its political identity it must be given a context. For example, this can include walking for a purpose, such as for leisure or as part of a journey to work, or how walking interacts with its environment, including urban and suburban townscapes, and more natural rural landscape

“You can never have too much government,” said no-one, ever. Yet Cambridgeshire is groaning under the weight of local government. There’s a county council, a unitary, five districts, and 260 town and parish councils. A local enterprise partnership was formed in 2010; the Greater Cambridge Partnership (GCP) of Cambridge and South Cambridgeshire in 2014; and a mayoral combined authority in 2017. The LEP is being resurrected as a business board within the combined authority after

What twerp used the expression “gondola” in respect of a cable car system in the Lake District (‘Gondola could replace car trips to Lake District attraction’ LTT 11 May)?  Gondola is a term used for the actual cars, the boxes swinging from the cables, but the use of the term to describe the system is wrong and should be avoided as there are other uses of gondola, as with the steamship on Windermere, for example. As for managing car trips into Keswick, the old railw

The government is being urged to ban cars from the immediate vicinity of school gates during drop-off and pick-up times by Living Streets. The walking and sustainable transport charity has produced a report, Swap the school run for a school walk, in which it sets out 21 recommendations designed to enable more children to walk to and from school.  The charity delivered the report to the transport minister Jesse Norman at the start of Walk to School Week. More than 2,000 primary schools in

Transport for London taxi and private hire (TPH) compliance officers have been granted new powers by the Metropolitan Police to carry out road stops without the need for a police presence.  The new powers will enable more enforcement against illegal and non-compliant activity to be carried out, thus improving the safety of taxi and private hire passengers while freeing up police resources. Some 109 TfL’s TPH compliance officers are being trained with powers to stop any TPH vehicle f

Sustainable transport charity Sustrans has been appointed to a panel of urban design experts recommended by the Mayor of London and Transport for London (TfL). The Architecture Design Urbanism Panel 2 (ADUP2) is a pre-approved list of built environment consultants. The Panel’s job is to support the Mayor's regeneration programmes and priorities, as well as other public sector-funded projects in London. The panel is intended to make it quicker and easier for organisations such as local au

Greater Manchester’s bus network could be split into five to ten large franchises, complemented by as many as 25 smaller ones, under proposals being studied by Labour mayor Andy Burnham. Transport for Greater Manchester’s (TfGM) detailed thinking on how a bus franchising system would work is set out in a questionnaire that has just been sent  to 35 local, national and international bus operators. No decision has yet been made to move to a franchising system and talks about an

Consultants have identified 21 possible options for improving transport links between South-East Scotland and the Scottish Borders. They will be explored by Transport Scotland’s second strategic transport projects review (STPR). Transport Scotland commissioned Jacobs to conduct the Borders transport corridors – pre-appraisal study in the context of a vocal lobby for the recently reopened Edinburgh-Tweedbank Borders Railway to be extended south along its original route, potentially a

Police have fined a community transport operator for operating a local authority schools transport contract with a Section 19 permit. The fines have been cited as an example of the “confusion” caused by the DfT’s proposed reforms to community transport regulations. DANSA Integrated Community Transport, based in Neath, South Wales, has been fined £600 after a South Wales Police officer noticed two DANSA vehicles operating under Section 19 permits, while conducting a spot

Electric vehicles, hydrogen vehicles, driverless vehicles, Mobility as a Service, open data, ride-hailing apps, public bike hire schemes... a bewildering array of disruptive transport technologies and mobility products have emerged in recent years. But how should local authorities respond? Help pioneer each one? Embrace just one or two? Or let others take the lead? Hertfordshire County Council’s cabinet member for highways recently summed up the choice in the context of road technology dev

The disappearance of “Garden City principles” from the new draft National Policy Planning Framework does at least seem to have succeeded in provoking more people into wondering whether the currently-intended mass of huge developments in the countryside, hitherto masquerading as something unchallengeably beautiful, will really be such a wonderful thing.  Even regular countryside defenders seem so far to have been bewitched into silence by the mere mouthing of the ‘garden&r

As a major supermarket joins the trend for using electric cargo bikes for its delivery services, changes in general travel trends need much more careful scrutiny, say researchers. Increases in levels of home deliveries, and the rapid growth in light van traffic, for example, are poorly understood. In April this year, Sainsbury’s began its innovative new trial of grocery delivery services by electric cargo bike. A fleet of five zero emission bikes is making deliveries across South London,

Changes in how we plan our transport networks for the future are urgently needed, says the first report from the Commission on Travel Demand We need to start planning now for how we travel around England in the coming decades, according to a major new report. It explains how, as a population, we travel substantially less today than we did one or two decades ago. Overall, we make fewer trips, spend less time travelling, and travel fewer miles.  But there are noticeable differences in our t

National Express’s dominance of the West Midlands conurbation’s bus market may be at risk as Transport for the West Midlands begins a global search for an operator(s) of the proposed Sprint bus rapid transit (BRT) network.  TfWM has launched a market sounding exercise for Sprint, saying it wants “to engage with operators who can offer or partner with BRT experience, and help the West Midlands realise the vision of Sprint as part of an integrated transport system”.&n

Councillors in Middlesbrough are calling on the Tees Valley Combined Authority to introduce bus franchising.  The recommendation features in a report of Middlesbrough’s economic development and scrutiny panel, chaired by Labour member Matthew Storey, and presented to the council’s executive last week.  Middlesbrough is run by Labour elected mayor Dave Budd and the town’s MP is Andy McDonald, the shadow transport secretary, who is a champion of franchising. Labour th

After the Labour Party had launched a policy providing free bus travel for people under 25 in areas that adopt bus franchising or municipal bus operations (LTT 13 Apr), Guardian columnist Polly Toynbee observed on 12 April that: “It’s a good idea, but still a lot less generous than many older people’s free travel passes. Outside London over-65s get bus concessions; in London the over-60s get not just free buses but free tubes as well, even for high earners still in work. &ldqu

Over two-fifths of children are worried about air pollution near their school, a new UK-wide survey reveals. Some 43% of children living in urban areas are concerned about the levels of air pollution near their school. The YouGov poll, carried out for walking and cycling charity Sustrans, surveyed over 1,000 children aged six to 15 years old last month about their attitudes towards air pollution and the actions they think should be taken to help clean up the air.  More than one in three (

Councils in the North East of Scotland are proposing to quash developer interest in building new retail and commercial developments beside junctions on the new Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route (AWPR). Construction of the 29-mile dual carriageway AWPR is nearing completion, with opening scheduled for the autumn. The Aberdeen City and Shire Strategic Development Planning Authority (SDPA) says the new road is already attracting interest from developers.  “Recent planning applications

Transport for the North should change the way it presents the Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR) project so it is not perceived as a solution searching for a problem, Lancashire County Council has said.  The NPR concept envisages the creation of fast intercity connections between the north’s major cities. The project was originally championed by the then chancellor George Osborne and is now being led by Transport for the North, which became England’s first statutory sub-national tr

Government company Transport for Wales will operate Cardiff’s new bus station in another sign of the organisation’s growing ambitions.  The convoluted saga of the bus station’s delivery may now be drawing to a close, with the Welsh Government deciding to take the leasehold on the site.  The previous bus station, immediately north of Cardiff Central railway station, was closed in summer 2015 because the BBC wanted the site for its new Welsh headquarters. Cardiff Coun

FirstGroup is to sub-contract the operation of one of the three new Metrobus routes in the Bristol area to a community transport operator. Bristol Community Transport (BCT) was this week named as the operator of the M1 Metrobus route, connecting Cribbs Causeway to Hengrove Park via the University of the West of England and Bristol city centre. BCT will operate the route under contract to First West of England, which will operate the other two Metrobus routes directly: the M2 (Long Ashton park-

Extra police patrols and increased CCTV is being deployed in Greater Manchester in response to a spate of crimes on the Rochdale via Oldham Metrolink line. Mayor for Policing and Crime Bev Hughes, said: “The Greater Manchester Travelsafe Partnership (TSP) is bolstering its team including police community support officers (PCSOs), TravelSafe officers, inspectors and sergeants.

Uber has launched a free to access web-based database of road journey time data for London based on aggregated Uber journeys. Uber Movement for London does not provide information about Ubers’ movements around London. Rather it is a database of aggregate journey time data, which does not reveal how many trips have been aggregated in order to answer your query. That aside, the tool gives access to travel times between areas for selected dates (since 2016) and the ability to compare those

Grants totalling £48m for ultra-low emission buses are being offered to councils and bus operators to help them roll out new, cleaner fleets.  The fund, which covers the next three years, will pay for “hundreds” of new ultra-low emission buses and the infrastructure to support them, says the DfT. This follows a previous scheme, where 13 organisations received more than £30m, enabling them to put more than 300 low-emission buses on the road by 2019.  Any bus w

Jon Orcutt, director of communications and advocacy at Transit Center, NYC, talks to Transport Xtra about the need for NYC's proposed congestion charging policy and why Uber and Lyft are currently a menace to the city. Jon talked with Andy Salkeld, Leicester City Council Transit Center is a national Foundation dedicated to improving public transit. We are based in New York City, specifically in Lower Manhattan, and were closely involved with the major positive changes that took place under th

Proposals for a 5km cycleway have been announced by Manchester City Council. The mostly segregated route would link the city centre with Chorlton Park to the south. The Department for Transport has awarded £3.9m for the project while Manchester City Council, Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) and the Cycling and Walking Commissioner for Greater Manchester, Chris Boardman, are seeking to raise a further £5m. A Manchester City Council spokesman said: “This would pay for the

Transport for West Midlands (TfWM) has appointed nextbike to run the largest docked bike-share scheme in the UK outside London. More than 2,000 bikes will be available for hire in Birmingham, Coventry and Wolverhampton from September. A further 3,000 bikes will be rolled out in phases in Walsall, Sandwell, Dudley and Solihull in 2019.  Docking stations will be installed at key sites, with bikes available 24 hours a day, and annual membership will cost £30. A discount rate will be of

The Government’s plan to designate a Major Road Network of the most important local authority roads in England should be accompanied by a performance specification and funding for the network’s maintenance, councils and road interests have told the DfT.  The comments come in response to the DfT’s consultation on the MRN, which ends on 19 March (LTT05 Jan). The DfT has proposed an MRN of about 5,000 miles. Councils will be able to bid to the new National Roads Fund, being

The first generation of station travel plans (STPs) were implemented in a bid to better manage, and proactively influence, the modes of travel people use to get to and from UK rail stations. They generally sought to actively promote sustainable travel options; reduce single occupant car trips; and tackle imbalances between parking demand, the quality of facilities for different station users, and differential impacts on neighbouring land uses.  Following an initial wave of pilots, the UK b

What’s going on at Ebbsfleet in Kent? Not a great deal, it seems. A decade ago LTT was given a tour of the Fastrack bus system in the area, and shown the big chalk quarries that would one day be home to thousands of new homes. Nowadays the Government talks of building an Ebbsfleet Garden City. Yet, in practice, few homes have been delivered and Ebbsfleet International station – which is supposed to lie at the heart of the city – remains surrounded by a sea of car parking (5,000

A growing number of workers in the UK would rather be based in lively urban centres than business parks on the outskirts even when there is ample parking, according to a new report from the Urban Transport Group. “More people in more key sectors of the economy do not wish to be ‘buried alive’ in a business park on the outskirts (however good the car parking) and their skills are in sufficient demand that they can choose the employers that provide them with a more interesting a

The Campaign for Better Transport has announced it is looking to appoint a new chief executive office to replace Stephen Joseph, who will be stepping down at the end of Autumn. Joseph was appointed executive director of Transport 2000 in 1988, the same year Michael Palin was appointed President, and received an OBE in 1996 for services to transport and the environment. Transport 2000 changed its name to Campaign for Better Transport in 2007. During his 30-year tenure with the charity, Joseph

All over the world, we are observing the trend towards pedestrianising whole districts rather than individual streets. Zaha Hadid Architects has proposed ‘Walkable London’, a full-scale network of pedestrian routes which will create corridors of activation across the capital.  Walkable London aims at re-introducing walking as an integral part of the city’s transport network. The firm's research highlights, available as a research booklet, state several key statistics driv

Following its trial of bus services in London last year, travel app Citymapper has finally launched what it terms ‘The Responsive Network: a  solution for dynamic shared transportation in cities’. The service is live in London, and is know as ‘Smart Ride’, and is already available via the apps. Writing in a post on medium, Citymapper declares that they ‘design a network, not a route’. ‘Unlike traditional buses that are tied to a route, our veh

Following entrance to multiple markets in the United States, Chariot  is launching its daily commuter shuttle service in London, to 'make getting around the city easier'. Chariot London is the latest of Ford’s European initiatives, accelerating the development of its smart mobility technologies. Throughout 2018, Ford will be trialling a 20-strong fleet of plug-in hybrid Transit Custom vans in the UK capital as part of the “Cleaner Air for London" initiative supported by Tra

The City of York Council is to  toughen up restrictions on vehicles in the city centre and near the racecourse in response to heightened national concerns about vehicle-borne terror attacks.  York city centre has a number of pedestrian streets (‘footstreets’) created using Traffic Regulation Orders. The restrictions operate between 10.30 and 17.00 seven days a week, with restrictions mainly enforced using bollards. Some footstreets, however,  permit disabled vehicle a

Islington Council has invited public comment on the redesign of the Old Street roundabout as part of the £1m competition to transform the gateway to London’s ‘tech city’. Thirty-nine proposals have been selected for discussion from the 120 submitted. One proposal, called Silicon Hill, from architects Cove Burgess and Eco Cycle storage envisages three cylindrical glass towers with safe storage for more than 600 bicycles, which would surround a 'pocket park' and café

The pace of technology-driven innovation from the private sector in shared transportation services, vehicles, and networks is rapid, accelerating, and filled with opportunity. At the same time, city streets are a finite and scarce resource. These principles, produced by a working group of international NGOs led by Robin Chase, and including c40, ICLEI and World Resources Institute, are designed to guide urban decision-makers and stakeholders toward the best outcomes for all. Ride-sharing start

The premier annual forum for senior professionals across the rail and property sectors is being held 15 Hatfields in London on 21 February.  This year’s Rail Stations and Property Summit organised by Landor LINKS and sponsored by law firm Burges Salmon, will discuss how railway property can be unlocked for residential development as well as new funding mechanisms and models of collaborative delivery.  The leading players in the sectors will be in attendance including

A software package that forecasts the effects of infrastructure investment, development proposals and regulatory change has been developed by Prospective, a company founded by researchers from UCL, Cambridge and the Alan Turing Institute. The software outputs a wide range of forecast impact indicators, from land and property values to social and physical utilities demands and multimodal travel behaviour. The most dramatic aspect of the software, however, is that proposals can be designed and te

Plans are being drawn up for five new stations across England and Wales, which will receive a total of £16m funding from the Department for Transport towards the projects. All the stations – in County Durham, Warrington, Reading, Ceredigion and Bristol - are due to be completed by March 2020:  Horden Peterlee in County Durham will receive £4.4m of DfT funding towards a scheme worth £10.55m. The area has low levels of car ownership, and it is hoped the station will

Regeneration projects at and around rail stations can be hindered by investors’ concerns over their viability as well as lack of local support. But taking a creative, practical and flexible approach can increase the chances of success, believes Philip Beer, a partner at law firm Burges Salmon who specialises in advising both public and private sector clients on major regeneration and redevelopment projects. “It’s a question of working up a strong business plan that is realis

A team of leading architects, designers and engineers have been selected by HS2 Ltd to modernise Euston station and develop plans for new stations in Birmingham, Solihull and Old Oak Common, north-west London. The firms will be contracted to create detailed designs for the four stations, due to open in 2026: The contracts are as follows: Birmingham Curzon Street – WSP UK Limited (working with Grimshaw Architects LLP) Birmingham Interchange – Ove Arup & Partners International

Following her recent appointment as a junior transport minister, Conservative MP Nusrat Ghani used a column in The Times to introduce herself. After announcing, with understandable pride, that she was the first female Muslim MP to be made a government minister, Ghani then extolled the virtues of the HS2 high-speed rail network, the supervision of which is part of her ministerial brief. “Growing up in Birmingham, London seemed out of reach, as did Leeds and Manchester,” she began. &ld

Respondents to the Welsh Government’s consultation on  the future of the concessionary travel scheme for older people and the disabled have given contrasting views about what, if anything, should change.  There were so many conflicting views in local government that the Association of Transport Coordinating Officers Cymru decided not to provide a response. The Welsh Local Government Association’s (WLGA) views are contradicted on several points by at least one local authori

Guidance on how to make new developments bus-friendly has been published by the Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation (CIHT).  Buses in urban developments includes advice on matters such as street design, bus priority, traffic calming, and the location of bus stops. Its principal author is independent transport and planning consultant Tim Pharoah.  Streets used by buses “should be direct and without severe curves or frequent turns to minimise operating distances

Plans for a bus-based, and ultimately autonomous, rapid transit system serving Cambridge and its surroundings are to be developed by the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority.  The CA board, chaired by elected mayor James Palmer, this week approved a new £600,000 study into a system dubbed Cambridge Autonomous Metro (CAM). The decision follows a review of three different mass transit technologies by consultant Steer Davies Gleave.  SDG examined: • light rail

Pembrokeshire County Council in south-west Wales has started to operate two more local bus routes into Pembroke Dock from the surrounding countryside, after commercial bus operators showed no interest in the work.  Services 360 and 361 were operated by Silcox Coaches for many years before the company closed in 2016. They were then taken up by a coach company based near Pontypridd, approximately 80 miles to the east, but this operator recently said it required considerably higher subsidy to

A major probe into the changing travel behaviours of young people has been published by the DfT. The DfT commissioned the report from  researchers at the Centre for Transport & Society at the University of West of England, and the University of Oxford. The research team was led by UWE’s Kiron Chatterjee. The team’s focus was the 17-29 age group but the researchers also explored how travel patterns in this age cohort change as they grow older.   The trend for young ad

London Mayor Sadiq Khan has given the green light for six new cycle routes across the capital, with a mix of main roads and Quietways through Ilford, Barking, Tottenham, Wembley, Willesden, Peckham and Rotherithe.  About 75% of the routes, spanning nine boroughs, will run on main roads. “We have already expressed a strong preference for most of the routes on main roads to be segregated,” said a Mayor of London spokesman. These projects have been chosen from a list of 25 routes

Plans for a new ‘Station Quarter’ around Runcorn rail station forms the centrepeice of a major regeneration of the Cheshire town. Halton Borough Council is working with a consortium, including architects We Made That and consultants Regeneris and Steer Davies Gleave, to develop a masterplan featuring housing, retail, commercial and leisure units in Runcorn. Runcorn station is on the Liverpool branch of the West Coast Mainline and is also a commuter station into Liverpool Lime Street

A £150m scheme to build a new rail station at Guildford and to turn the adjacent surface car park into a ‘Station Quarter’, with homes and shops, has been approved by the Planning Inspectorate. The appeal decision overturns Guildford Borough Council’s refusal to give the scheme planning permission. The development will feature a new public square, reconfigured access for vehicles with a new taxi drop-off area, a nine deck multi-storey car park and secure cycle parking.

The Cooperative Automotive Research Network (CARNET)* has implemented a cutting-edge simulation environment for the Barcelona Metropolitan Area in the form of The Virtual Mobility Lab. The aim of the lab is to show how it can analyse and assess the impact of smart mobility projects in Barcelona, and how the results can be extrapolated before the implementation of a pilot test. The new model will support those who make decisions on mobility policies, transport operators and new companies that are

It was almost a year ago that I stood on the podium at Rail Stations and Property Summit describing the concept of ‘Station Place’, which we had developed for the Rail Delivery Group to demonstrate how their Nine Principles of Future Station Design might look.  After my talk, I was introduced to Jonathan Martin, the director of investment and delivery at the London Borough of Waltham Forest. Jonathan had spoken at the Summit on his vision for developing some key areas of under-

The new Maghull North station rail station is set to open in May as part of a £340m package of rail improvements across the Liverpool city area over the next three years.  Work on the £13m scheme, which is being delivered by Network Rail on behalf of Merseytravel, started in September 2017. Funding came from the government’s Local Growth Fund (LGF), Merseytravel and the Homes and Communities Agency, which previously owned the land on which the station will be built. 

The achievements of women working in the transport and logistics centre will be recognised by the FTA everywoman in Transport & Logistics Awards. Currently in its eleventh year, the awards are designed to showcase the role women play in the future of transport and logistics. Maxine Benson

The Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority is to delegate some of its transport functions to Cambridgeshire County Council and Peterborough City Council. The change comes as the combined authority (CA) admits that the current administrative landscape for transport is confusing. In a report to the combined authority board, officers said there was currently a “complex environment with a variety of bodies with different powers and responsibilities promoting, developing and delive

The planned East Midlands Hub station should open well in advance of the arrival of HS2 in 2033 to help stimulate the local economy. This is among a list of priorities agreed last week by the DfT and Midlands Connect and East Midlands Councils. They have stated a commitment to open the station at Toton in the 2020s, at least for Network Rail services, to support the planned Innovation Campus nearby, which has the potential to create 10,000 new jobs. In a meeting between transport secretary Chr

The economic benefits of modernising Preston railway station are to be explored in a study commissioned by Lancashire Enterprise Partnerships (LEP). Last week the LEP approved proposals by its Transport for Lancashire committee to assess the case for transforming the station. “Specialist consultants will need to be engaged to undertake this work, which will also need to include forecasts of future passenger demand, particularly for when HS2 services begin operating in 2026.” 

A new report from the MaasLab at UCL, commissioned by TfL, provides insights about Londoners’ attitudes towards car-ownership, shared mobility services and Mobility as a Service (MaaS) as well as an impact assessment about a potential introduction of MaaS in the city. Londoners’ attitudes towards car-ownership and Mobility-as-a-Service: Impact assessment and opportunities that lie ahead is available online.  According to the report, at least 35% of regular car users stated that

The related problems of air pollution and congestion impact negatively on key risks to the public's health: namely cardiovascular disease, lung cancer and respiratory diseases, along with rising obesity levels brought about by the lack of physical activity due to car-dominated lifestyles and road safety fears. Many transport academics and practitioners are asking if some form of road pricing is essential inn order to reduce traffic volumes and so help to fix these challenges?  The recent U

CIHT has finally launched its review of the issue of shared space and how it is being designed, implemented and installed across England. ‘Creating better streets: Inclusive and accessible places’ provides a series of recommendations to Government and industry on how this complex issue can be further improved and developed. The review’s recommendations are aimed at Government, local authorities and those professionals who are working to make our highways inclusive, safer and a

Responsibility and regulation is becoming an increasingly hot topic for bike share, with questions being asked in the UK Parliament and the Lords about what powers local authorities in England have to regulate schemes within their boundaries. These issues will be a major focus of the DfT-supported Bike Share Masterclass in Leicester on 30 January, as Minister Jesse Norman contemplates the need for a possible ‘national standard’  Bike share goes from strength to strength acros

Wandsworth Council has approved the design for the new London Underground station at Battersea Power Station, which is due to open in 2020. This new tube link, which is being funded entirely by the area’s private sector developers, will serve existing local communities as well as those working and living at new developments in Nine Elms.   The council said that about 25,000 new jobs are being created at Nine Elms plus thousands of new homes including around 2,400 new affordable home

Proposals to improve the transport interchange in Bradford city centre have been approved by the West Yorkshire Combined Authority Investment Committee.  Phase 1 of the project – to carry out short to medium terms works – would include a new pedestrianised station frontage, improved station concourses, better inter-modal links and re-location of taxi and drop-off facilities.  The £5.65m scheme would be funded by the West Yorkshire plus Transport Fund, although the a

Highways England has published a set of design principles, which, it says, will encourage the building of roads that are environmentally sustainable, “nurture wellbeing” and allow “dignified and equal use by all”.  The document – The Road to Good Design – sets out 10 principles that act as “prompts” rather than instructions on how to create “better, more beautiful roads”. The principles, published today, state that good de

A new safer route for walkers, cyclists and horse riders, connecting the villages of Okeford Fitzpaine and Shillingstone in north Dorset, has officially opened to the public. The route, known as the Little Lane Trailway, had been largely impassable for the last 30 years. The project was wholly funded by the EU’s LEADER Rural Development Programme through the Northern Dorset Local Action Group (LAG). The Little Lane Link Project secured an award of £44,200, due to

Planning ahead to take advantage of future opportunities is vital – but so, too, is confronting the here and now. The difference is striking in terms of our road infrastructure, so vital for the efficient, safe mobility on which our economy depends. Autonomous vehicles and disruptive technologies dominate public debate and government research. We had more of the same on a recent front page of The Times, previewing the latest Highways England progress report with a piece about fibre optic

Since our industry came out of the recession proper in 2013, we have seen a great demand for transport modelling across the UK. In my role as a specialist search consultant within transport modelling this has created both fantastic opportunity, but also great challenges. It’s a thought that would be echoed by all of the clients we work with. My position puts me in a unique position to see how the demand is affecting the industry across all companies and locations; to see the effect it is h

Network Rail’s new method for allocating fixed costs between train operators could prompt a renewed debate about the future of secondary routes and branch lines, the Urban Transport Group has warned. The method, developed by Brockley Consulting (LTT10 Nov 17), loads more of the industry’s fixed costs onto regional operators and freight, with a reduction in costs borne by intercity operators (see table). Network Rail has been consulting on whether to use the method to allocate fixed

Scotland’s transport minister Humza Yousaf has refused to guarantee the future of the country’s seven regional transport partnerships as a review of transport governance progresses.   Yousaf’s thinking on the RTPs  is revealed in a letter that he sent to Gordon Edgar, the chair of the South East Scotland partnership (SEStran), last October and which was released last month.  “I am clear that the functions performed by RTPs will continue but that the exact

Highways England (HE) wants to study the case for new and improved orbital routes around some of England’s major urban areas. The idea features in HE’s initial report on the strategic road network, which will inform the next road investment period (RP2: 2020/21-2024/25). The DfT has just launched a consultation (running to 7 February) on the HE’s report. The proposed orbital study would “investigate the strategic case for the development of strategic orbital routes to p

The developer behind plans for residential tower blocks and an expanded shopping centre in Walthamstow, north-east London, said it will pay £1.5m towards the extension of the Tube station.  Last week Waltham Forest’s planning committee approved Capital & Regional’s application for the shopping centre, which would extend onto a third of the existing town square. Outline permission was granted for up to 502 homes in four tower blocks of between 12 and 29 storeys. Capit

Transport for London (TfL) has announced that Gareth Powell, director of public transport and strategy, will be its new managing director, surface transport. He takes over from Leon Daniels with immediate effect. Powell joined TfL from consultant Atkins in 2003 in a business improvement and performance role. Since then he has held a number of roles in group business planning and performance before taking a lead role in the re-organisation of TfL. He went on to join London Underground as direct

Poor air quality and physical inactivity are the public health issues of our time. In political circles, we hear plenty of strategic posturing: the new £220m Clean Air Fund has been announced, although details are not yet forthcoming. Integrated transport and spatial planning is back on the agenda, this time to improve health, rather then economic, outcomes. In reality, a combination of appropriate measures is needed to get more people moving, and to do so in clearer air. Plans for air qu

The new East West Railway Company, which will operate a direct rail link between the university cities of Oxford and Cambridge, was launched by transport secretary Chris Grayling at Bletchley. The new company will oversee the restoration of the link between the Oxford and Cambridge nearly 50 years to the day since the closure of the old Varsity Line at the historic Second World War code-breaking site of Bletchley Park, Buckinghamshire. The transport secretary also visited nearby Bletchley Stat

A new report has argued that the government should create a new commission to involve the public in major infrastructure projects. The absence of a national strategy for infrastructure has serious implications, says the independent Institute for Government (IfG) in its report How to Design an Infrastructure Strategy for the UK, the fourth in a series of reports on improving infrastructure decision making in the UK. New projects are ‘dreamt up, reframed, scrapped and reinvented, seemingly w

A fleet of 500 all-electric Renault ZOEs will be arriving in Madrid this month to join new car-sharing scheme ZITY, the result of a cooperation between Renault and urban services operator Ferrovial. Madrid has the highest rate of daily car-sharing in Europe due to the city’s size, population, traffic problems and air pollution issues. This new car-sharing scheme covers a wide area of the Spanish capital, with vehicles provided to customers in the right place at the right time via a smartp

A tightening of parking standards for new developments  features in London mayor Sadiq Khan’s draft London Plan.  Housing developments in the parts of London that are best connected by public transport will be expected to be car-free, with no parking provided, other than for disabled people. The areas are: the central activities zone; inner London opportunity areas; metropolitan and major town centres; all areas with Public Transport Accessibility Level (PTAL) scores of 5 or 6;

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has launched a public consultation on the next phase of his plans to tackle London’s poor air quality by expanding the Ultra-Low Emission Zone (ULEZ). The ULEZ standards would be applied London-wide for buses, coaches and lorries from 26 October 2020 and for cars, vans and motorbikes, with limited exemptions, up to the North and South circular roads from 25 October 2021.

The government hopes that its Industrial Strategy will place the UK at the forefront of development of autonomous vehicles (AVs), artificial intelligence (AI) and innovative approaches to shared mobility services. The draft Industrial Strategy, titled “Building a Britain Fit for the Future”, outlines how the government intends to boost businesses and worker productivity through investment in the skills, industries and infrastructure of the future. The White Paper confirms governmen

Housing developments will be car-free except for disabled people in parts of the capital with the best public transport connections, under new measures announced by London Mayor Sadiq Khan. This is among the proposals to reduce parking capacity in the mayor’s draft London Plan, published this week. The draft states that residential car parking would not be linked to unit size, so that parking spaces would no longer go up as unit sizes increase. Meanwhile, office developments in central a

A £13.4m initiative to create a driverless transport testing area based in Greenwich, south-east London, is due to be up and running by spring 2019. Loughborough University (LU), the lead academic partner, has been awarded £500,000 as part of the project to develop a research programme enabling a real-world working testbed for connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs). The Smart Mobility Living Lab: London will enable companies to trial their ideas, technology and services within co

For five weekends in the run-up to Christmas Brighton & Hove Buses is offering free bus journeys to up to three children under the age of 16 or Bus ID holders who are accompanied by an adult The bus company hopes the offer will help reduce congestion caused by cars at such a busy time of year for shopping. Brighton & Hove Buses managing director Martin Harris said: “We want to help people to leave their cars at home and opt for public transport in order to reduce congestion on o

A £1.7bn Transforming Cities Fund to improve transport links and promote local growth within city regions was announced today by the government. This will include a £250m project to extend the Metro service in the West Midlands.  The government also unveiled plans today for more public and private research & development investment, which will projects to develop ‘big data’, artificial intelligence and self-driving cars. A Department for Business Energy and Indus

Idealised visions of ‘The City of the Future’ are often presented as a symbol of progress. Whilst specific visions differ, the common element is the notion that in the future, the world’s most concentrated populations will occupy city environments where a digital blanket of sensors, devices and cloud-connected data are brought together to enhance the living experience for all. Smart concepts encompass key elements of what enable effective city ecosystems – from traffic c

Older cars in urban areas not to blame for harmful emissions, claims the RAC Foundation. The motoring research body says that a study it commissioned shows that scrapping the oldest cars owned by people living in towns and cities would only have a negligible effect on air quality. An analysis of MOT information for 22 million individual cars has enabled a team of academics, led by Professor Jillian Anable of the University of Leeds, to use mileage, emissions and registered keeper data to map ex

Improving local transport connections between Oxford and Cambridge could lead to the creation of both new jobs and housing, says Lord Adonis. The chair of the National Infrastructure Commission (NIC) is urging ministers, and council leaders across the arc covering Oxford, Milton Keynes, Bedford, Northampton and Cambridge, to “seize the opportunity” and harness the area’s economic potential. Lord Adonis has launched Partnering for prosperity: a new deal for the Cambridge-Milton

Legislation that will make Transport for the North (TfN) the first statutory sub-national transport body with its own legal powers and duties were laid in Parliament. The move to put TfN on a statutory footing means that its recommendations must be formally considered by the government. The Department for Transport (DfT) also confirmed the award of £18.5m from a £150m government fund for TfN’s smart ticketing programme. TfN will use this to introduce paper

A scheme that enables local communities to adopt under-used stations and rail lines is set to receive a multi-million pound boost from the Department for Transport. Around 60 Community Rail Partnerships (CRPs) have been set up around the country since 1993. They have helped to revive and reshape more than 80 routes and stations, thanks to the efforts of volunteers and community engagement. The most successful projects have seen passenger numbers boosted, while others have recreated railway sta

Shadow sub-national transport body Transport for the South East has revealed more details of its work programme and administration.  TfSE covers an area with a population of 7.5 million people  and 16 local transport authorities: Kent, Medway, East Sussex, Brighton, West Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire, Portsmouth, Southampton, Isle of Wight, Reading, Bracknell Forest, Slough, Windsor and Maidenhead, West Berkshire, and Wokingham.  Itis currently identifying a major road network for t

When it comes to mobility, innovation tends to focus on new technical leaps forward – innovation represents a world where driverless cars and smart infrastructure tell us where to go and then take us there, as if human choice were an afterthought or a non-consequential part of these new intelligently mobile systems. The intelligent mobility practice at Atkins is, however, all about exploring new ways of finding smart solutions to complex problems. One exciting new approach is to employ cyb

The regulatory environment for road transport needs to be overhauled to make it fit for emerging forms of mobility products and services, Michael Hurwitz, Transport for London’s director of transport innovation, has told the London Assembly’s transport committee inquiry into future transport.    Said Hurwitz: “The regulations were set in the 1970s and the 1990s, and the world of transport in those days was crudely speaking as follows: you had a car or you took a priv

How can we separate the way we live our lives, the way we think, the way we move, and what we demand from our cities? All of these are intrinsically linked so it’s almost impossible to see which one is the driver of change. We are clearly in the midst of a seismic shift in respect of our demands for mobility and how we express them. This begs several questions: Is user demand driving change? Or technology? Or are we part of a master plan that seeks to define the way we use transport and ou

Sustainable transport charity Sustrans has developed a tool with environmental consultancy Eunomia that has been designed to help make the case for walking and cycling measures in terms of air quality. The air quality tool shows how to get the best value in terms of air quality from supporting walking and cycling, and sets a framework for how to build plans for walking and cycling into plans to improve air quality. Dr Andy Cope, director of insight at Sustrans says

While the push to deliver new homes and retrofit existing communities is high on the political agenda, if not actually happening in practice, we need a conversation about the kind of places that we build. Research carried out by Local Government Information Unit (LGiU) and the Ramblers found that local authorities want to build places that encourage walking and active travel. Developers do not always share these priorities, however, and many councils feel the mismatch is a challenge in achieving

Local transport has long held an important place on the political agenda, though it moves up and down the rankings as other challenges and issues assert their own significance. Global level matters like Brexit, terrorism and international conflicts apart, there are things with a degree of equivalence in the political landscape – the NHS, education, policing and social welfare, for example – jockeying for position with congestion, the state of the roads (or railways), cycling, parking

The UK has much to learn from other countries when it comes to maximising the economic, social and environmental benefits of railway stations, according to a report published by the Campaign for Better Transport. Development around stations: Exploring international experience and lessons for the UK examines the international experience of creating development hubs around railway stations and the benefits that they can bring. The report has been published by the campaign’s Tracks think-ta

Replacing private car traffic with shared mobility services in urban areas can dramatically cut the number of cars needed, reduce CO2 emissions and free public land for uses other than parking. This was the key finding of a report from the International Transport Forum at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).  The report, which was presented at Smarter Travel LIVE! last week, examines how on-demand shared transport modes could change the face of mobility in He

Automated pods are being tested between Cambridge Station and Trumpington park & ride to look at the feasibility of launching a driverless bus system.  The £250,000 project, funded by Innovate UK, is being delivered in partnership with Connecting Cambridgeshire and the Smart Cambridge Programme. The automonous PodZero vehicle has been developed by Coventry-based RDM Group. The trial aims to pave the way for 10-seater driverless buses on a guided busway after 8pm, filling the cur

Local authorities will face longer-term repercussions if they award bus contracts solely on price, one of Britain’s traffic commissioners has warned.  Nick Jones was appointed traffic commissioner for Wales a year ago, after the UK and Welsh governments agreed terms for a full-time commissioner. Previously Wales was an adjunct of the West Midlands traffic area, where Jones was commissioner. In his first annual report to the Welsh Government, he reveals that he asked all 22 Welsh unit

Network Rail has surprised Oxford City Council by objecting to development plans for the city’s railway station. It has expressed concerns over several aspects, including financial viability and flexibility for future track alterations to meet passenger growth. The council recently consulted on its Oxford Station Supplementary Planning Document (SPD), which brings together proposals for comprehensive redevelopment of the station area to create an integrated transport hub and to counterbal

Active travel will enable cities to spend less on building, maintaining, and upgrading their infrastructure by replacing congested urban road networks and car parking infrastructure, according to a new report by technology company City Science. Helping incorporate higher levels of physical activity into the daily life of the city, walking and cycling can reduce regional healthcare costs, says the report. Some of these benefits might be readily captured by conventional transport planning impact

Replacing private car traffic with new shared mobility services in urban areas can dramatically reduce the number of cars needed, significantly cut CO2 emissions and free public land for uses other than parking – without making it more difficult for users to get from door to door. This latest report from the International Transport Forum at the OECD, presented at Smarter Travel LIVE!, examines how the optimised use of new on-demand shared transport modes could change the future of mobilit

The UK has much to learn from other countries when it comes to maximising the economic, social and environmental benefits of railway stations, according to a report published by the Campaign for Better Transport. Development around stations: Exploring international experience and lessons for the UK examines the international experience of creating development hubs around railway stations and the benefits that they can bring. The report has been published by the campaign's

A new set of road use rules devised specifically for London is among the ideas proposed by an independent commission studying ways of making the capital’s highways work more efficiently. A ‘Movement Code’ is one of a series of policies proposed by the Commission on the Future of London’s Roads and Streets, convened by the Centre for London think-tank with the aim of developing new thinking on what can be done to manage the conflicting pressures on the capital's surface t

More than £400m extra each year could be spent by councils on improving local roads if government funding mirrored rising income in fuel and motoring taxes, claims the Local Government Association (LGA). The LGA's call comes ahead of the Autumn Budget statement, which takes place on 22 November. The LGA statement picks up themes from its recent report, A country in a jam: tackling congestion in our towns and cities. Council leaders are calling for the government to implement a full

The MOVE_UK consortium has completed the first phase in its three-year fully autonomous vehicles research programme, which is intended accelerate the development of automated driving systems and make them intelligent and safe enough for the UK’s roads. Taking place in the Royal Borough of Greenwich, south-east London, the project has enabled the MOVE_UK consortium to develop a new validation method. It is anticipated that the validation method will reduce introduction time of highly autom

Smarter Travel LIVE! 2017 offers an expertly-crafted overview of need-to know people, initiatives, products and services – all in one place Resources are squeezed, time is precious and expectations upon local authorities and transport professionals increase.  The travelling public assumes that everything about their travel experience can, and should be, improved through the smart (and positive) implementation of technological innovation.  But is it really that easy? The t

Dockless bike sharing start-up oBike has launched in Oxford, providing cyclists and cyclists-to-be with a cost effective, convenient and sustainable way of travelling around the city.   Following substantial liaison with the local authorities, oBike will roll out its dockless bike sharing scheme across the city on an indefinite trial basis. Haroon Khan, Business Development Lead for oBike Uk, said: 'We are extremely excited to launch oBike in Oxford. Building on from our successes in

Investigating a diverse mix of regional rail services would not only represent high value for money but would also act as an “effective conduit” for regeneration, economic growth and improving the envirorment, says a new study from the Urban Transport Group. The group builds on its previous research to highlight the benefits on investing in four different types of regional rail services. “Obviously, there isn’t a ‘one size fits all’ formula so we have develop

Glasgow City Council has sparked anger among bus operators by deciding to focus its Low Emission Zone (LEZ) exclusively on buses initially. One operator is talking to lawyers about a possible legal challenge, while another wants to see the data on which the decision was based. At the end of last month, the council approved in principle a blueprint for establishing Scotland’s first LEZ in the city by the end of 2018. It believes that bus-only measures can be introduced quicker than restric

The Department for Transport has this week published its Summary Report on the Impacts of the Local Sustainable Transport Fund (LSTF), which indicates that the Fund successfully supported projects that reduced car use, increased walking and cycling levels, boosted bus patronage, supported local economies and cut carbon emissions. Published figures suggest that LSTF investments 'achieved high value for money', says the report. In 2011, the Department launched the £540 million LSTF to i

Propelmee, an autonomous mobility software provider with specialist expertise in perception, will unveil its last mile delivery pod ‘Go4’ at the Smarter Travel show in Milton Keynes on 19 & 20 October. ‘Go4’ will appear on the ‘Street of the Future’ showcasing the first demonstration platform of Propelmee’s unique and highly robust autonomous mobility capabilities. ‘Go4’ will go live in a public demo in Cambridge later this year as a foot

More than 300 delegates attended Healthy Streets at Walthamstow Assembly Hall last week to explore the connections between public health and transport strategies. The event, organised by Landor LINKS and hosted by Waltham Forest Council, brought together council officers, urban designers, public health specialists, transport planners, consultants, academics, equipment developers, innovators and campaigners. The programme encompassed health-led street design, re-allocation of road space, behavio

The winners of the inaugural Healthy Streets Awards were announced at Walthamstow Assembly Hall last night, with a host of inspiring entries gaining recognition. The trophies were presented following the Healthy Streets conference and exhibition, hosted by the London Borough of Waltham Forest and organised by Landor LINKS. Among those receiving trophies was Caroline Russell, London Assembly member and Green Party councillor at the London Borough of Islington, who was named Healthy Streets Champ

Media pundits were fairly evenly split on Transport for London’s decision to suspend ‘ride-hailing’ smartphone app platform Uber’s London operations once its current private hire licence expires on 30 September. Among those to support the ban was Toby Moses, an assistant opinion editor at The Guardian. “Uber is cheap, convenient and by and large safe,” he began. “But it has serious flaws too. No company deserves a free pass just because it’s popul

A consultation has been launched for a new segregated cycle superhighway that will bring safer cycling to west London. Cycle Superhighway 9 (CS9) will add nearly 6km of new segregated track to the capital’s roads linking Kensington Olympia to Brentford. CS9 will also feature five new traffic light crossings and improvements to 20 pedestrian crossings. The superhighway is part of the Mayor of London’s work to encourage more Londoners to walk and cycle as he makes the capital’s

Uber London has lost its licence to provide minicab services after Transport for London (TfL) decided the ride-hailing app operator is not "fit and proper" to hold a private hire operator licence. This morning TfL announced that Uber would not be issued with a private hire operator licence after expiry of its current licence on 30 September.  Uber has signalled its intention to appeal the decision. In a statement, Uber said: "Transport for London and the mayor have caved in to a small

Meerkats can now be seen travelling around the streets of Crawley, on the side of a bus. The bus was redesigned by Metrobus to celebrate of Tilgate Nature Centre’s conservation work with endangered species. The West Sussex nature centre is home to more than 500 animals. The marketing team at Metrobus worked with Tilgate Nature Centre manager Simon Woodward to come up with the design and provide animal facts in the interior coving panels.   Nick Hill, Metrobus head of commercial, Nic

Transport for the West Midlands (TfWM) has abandoned plans to introduce extra-long buses on its proposed Sprintbus rapid transit routes.   TfWM had been seeking special derogation from the DfT to use 24-metre articulated vehicles on the first Sprint route along the A456 Hagley Road between Birmingham city centre and Quinton, to the west of the city (LTT27 Nov 15).  Buses in the UK are typically no more than 12 metres long, though articulated buses are 18 metres. The European General

Hertfordshire County Council has written to transport authorities surrounding London to gauge their interest in a capital-region transport body. The idea of a new transport body covering Greater London and its surroundings was floated last autumn by Hertfordshire’s executive member for environment, planning and transport, Derrick Ashley (LTT28 Oct 16).  In a letter to LTT this week, he expands on the case for reforming governance. “The time has come to re-think how public tran

England’s Economic Heartland (EEH) is pressing the  DfT to treat England’s most important local authority roads and the Highways England’s strategic road network as a single major road network instead of treating them separately. The EEH says that what “might initially appear a question of semantics, it is in fact potentially a significant issue”, with implications for how the new National Roads Fund is allocated. The concept of a major road network (MRN) was

Councils have expressed doubts about the Government’s proposed Oxford to Cambridge Expressway road, questioning the plan to upgrade only one route between Oxford and Milton Keynes and suggesting the improvement between Milton Keynes and Cambridge may not be enough.  The Oxford to Cambridge Expressway study aims to identify a route for a continuous dual carriageway between the cities for delivery in the second Road Investment Strategy (RIS) period (2020/21 to 2024/25).    T

Harry Blundred, one of the pioneering figures of bus deregulation in the 1980s and 1990s, has died at the age of 75.  In 1986 Blundred led a management buy-out of Devon General – the first part of the National Bus Company to be privatised. Deregulation followed later that year and Blundred pioneered high frequency minibus services in and around Exeter and Torbay. He went on to form Thames Transit in Oxford and in 1994 was awarded an OBE for services to the bus industry. Noel Newson,

Brighton & Hove Buses has teamed up with a local art gallery to take air quality data and transforms it into a visual spectacle that enables people to see the state of the air they breathe. Mephitic Air will run at the ONCA Gallery from 16 September to 1 October as 

Air quality in the Spanish city of Barcelona deteriorates by as much as 48% during public transport strikes, researchers have found. The study found that alterations in public transport could trigger a rise in the number of private vehicle trips, which in turn increases air pollution levels.

A planned road tunnel running past Stonehenge will be moved to protect views of the historic stone circle, the government has announced. Previously it was planned the upgraded A303 would go south of the stones, but there were concerns this would affect the view of the setting sun during the winter solstice. The 1.8-mile tunnel will closely follow the existing A303 route, but will be 50 metres further away from the monument than previously planned. The government said this means th

With less than six weeks to go before Smarter Travel LIVE! on 19 and 20 October, this year’s Smarter Travel LIVE! event is bringing together the widest ever range of key players to spark dialogue and debate. The convergence of digital technology with the travel and transport sector is catalysing the most radical and sophisticated possibilities in decades, and Smarter Travel LIVE! is the place to be for those who need to be engaged in what is happening across the UK and beyond. Such rapid

Traveller information must get much more reliable and available before Mobility as a Service (MaaS) can become a reality, a group of transport experts has warned. The ITS (UK) Public Transport Interest Group in London says out that only a quarter of bus companies have their timetable organised electronically, rather than on paper, making dynamic travel solutions almost impossible. The group said that more complete real-time information is required from local authorities and t

Transport experts are to join leaders from the further and higher education fields in new advisory group, the Department for Transport (DfT) has announced. The Education Advisory Group will discuss best practice in promoting transport through education. Skills minister John Hayes, who is leading the government’s work to develop infrastructure skills, said he believes that more needs to be done to work effectively with the higher and further education sectors. “I have been a ch

The Department for Transport and Landor LINKS announce new Cycling & Walking Innovations event on 21 November in London.   This new event will focus on how cycling and walking is supporting the Government's Industrial Strategy by keeping active modes at the heart of intelligent mobility. Sessions will include best practice examples of using innovation and technology to boost levels of cycling and walking. The event will showcase smart ways for local authorities to work with investors

The Healthy Streets conference, exhibition and awards will take place on Thursday 28 September at The Assembly Hall in Walthamstow, London. Anyone involved in the planning and provision of Healthy Streets should not miss out on this major industry event where the leading influencers, policy-makers and budget holders will meet, network and discuss the implications of the Mayor's draft Transport Strategy (MTS).   Healthy Streets is at the top of the policy agenda and will have implications

A modified version of Uber's internal demand and usage data has been made available after getting feedback from city transport authorities that "access to our aggregated data will inform decisions to adapt infrastructure to make our cities more efficient". Uber emphasised that "Uber Movement" preserved the privacy of riders and drivers by anonymising the data, with full details outlined in a methodology white paper and said that data on origins and destinations was available under a Creati

A tram route extension linking Birmingham city centre with Edgbaston and the city’s growing Westside area given go-ahead, by the Department for Transport (DfT). Five new stops will be served by up to 10 trams an hour at peak when the 2km extension of the Midland Metro, from Grand Central, outside Birmingham New Street station, to Edgbaston opens in March 2021. The £59.8m pledge from the DfT completes the total £149m funding for the project, with £84m having already been

A three-mile extension of Edinburgh’s tram line into the north of the city could cost £165m and double the system’s patronage, the city council said this week.  The plan would see the  airport to city centre line extended beyond its York Place terminus to Newhaven, via Leith Walk and the Ocean Terminal shopping centre. Edinburgh’s transport and environment committee will be asked next week to authorise the procurement of a contractor for the project. However,

The outline business case for extending the Edinburgh tram system has been published by City of Edinburgh Council. If approved, Leith and Newhaven and Newhaven will be added to the network. The capital cost of the project is estimated to be £165.2m, including risk and inflation through to project completion. The overall construction programme is estimated to be approximately three years plus four months for testing and commissioning. The line is projected to be open to passengers in the

The government is to invest £11m in green bus technology across England and Wales. Local authorities and bus companies in Bristol, York, Brighton, Surrey, Denbighshire and Wiltshire have been awarded the funding under the government’s Low Emission Bus Scheme. The funding will enable them to buy 153 new electric and gas buses, and to also install stations to fuel or charge them. Transport minister Paul Maynard said: “Low emission buses are an important part of our plans t

Airbus is starting a new innovation centre in China for its new 'urban air mobility' concept, a pilotless, Uber-like service for air travel and 'last-mile' drone delivery that aims to challenge the automotive sector, it has been reported. Headed by Luo Gang, who established Uber China, as its CEO, Airbus China, and will set his sights on providing an alternative to both road freight and road travel in congested cities, noting the Voom on-demand helicopter service that has already been tested in

A body representing political, business and other leaders should be set up to speak with one voice for the North, a transport summit held in Leeds has agreed. The Northern Transport Summit of business and political leaders was called after transport secretary Chris Grayling cast doubt over long promised improvements to Northern railways. The case for a new representative forum was included in a statement signed by: Judith Blake, leader of Leeds City Council; Andy Burnham, Mayor of Greater Man

A stretch of disused railway between Scarborough and Whitby which could be given a new lease of life as cycling and walking route. Sustainable transport charity Sustrans has used a grant from the Coastal Revival Fund to develop a plan for a restoration of the old Yorkshire railway line, which is now referred to as The Cinder Track. The

The future of the North of England’s transport networks lies in the hands of its local authority leaders and not Whitehall departments, Chris Grayling has said on the eve of a summit on the need for better transport connections across the region. Writing in The Yorkshire Post, the transport secretary stated: “The success of northern transport depends on the North itself – on Transport for the North (TfN), businesses, mayors and devolved authorities, and on local communities. T

Former Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne has called on the government to build a high-speed rail line across the Pennines between Liverpool and Hull. He swapped being an MP for being editor of London’s Evening Standard, but he made his plea in an opinion piece published in the Financial Times. The trans-Pennine route would be an extension of the HS2 scheme, a new high-speed line that is intended to link London and Birmingham and which will have branches to Manchest

The 2017 National Cycle-Rail awards is now open to nominations. The event, hosted by the Rail Delivery Group (RDG) and sponsored by Cyclepods, recognise progress made by the rail industry and associated organisations towards encouraging the integrated use of bikes and train travel. The categories are: Station of the year Operator of the year Best Customer Service Cycling Champion Cycle Security Innovation Door-to-Door Journey, inclu

Cambridgeshire County Council is preparing legal action against its guided busway contractor for repairs that are likely to cost more than £35m. The Cambridgeshire guided busway between St Ives  and Cambridge was built by BAM Nuttall and opened in 2011. Busway services have proved popular with passengers but the concrete track has been blighted with problems. A report to councillors last November identified three key defects:   • Vertical and horizontal steps have dev

The cost of building the Bristol MetroBus rapid transit system (RTS) has risen to around £230m, Bristol City Council has revealed. The scheme was initially budgeted to cost £190m in 2015, but costs have risen in the interim. Most recently they have increased by £10m from the £220m estimate put on the project in November 2016, a report to the council’s cabinet reveals. The report cites contractor cost overruns, design changes and problems of contaminated land dispo

The world's largest bike share operator has signed up as Official Bike Hire Sponsor at this year's Smarter Travel LIVE! taking place on 19-20th October at ArenaMk in Milton Keynes. Delegates will benefit from free bike hire throughout the event and can sign up for this service by contacting Billie Svark.  The nextbike Milton Keynes bike shire scheme was first launched on 17th June 2016 with 300 bicycles at 42 docking stations across the Borough of Milton Keynes.  The scheme utilises

Work has begun on the redevelopment of Wigan Bus Station, which is being delivered by Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM). The first stage of the £15.7m project includes the demolition of the old bus station on Hallgate, which will pave the way for main contractor

With roads close to saturation point and trains becoming overcrowded, transport providers and innovators must work together to develop new solutions, believes Stephen Hart at Innovate UK. “Congestion is getting worse, with growing frustration leading to more road rage,” he says. “There’s no longer a rush hour, there’s a rush five hours.” Current systems used to manage roads and rail services need to be better integrated to be effective, says Hart, head of co

Nottingham City Council is to lead a study of public transport and road improvements to improve access to the proposed HS2 station at Toton, between Derby and Nottingham.  Nottingham says the HS2 Growth Strategy for Toton, currently under preparation, will recommend “mass transit options” for connecting  the existing NET (Nottingham Express Transit) light rail line at Toton Lane to the HS2 station and to a park-and-ride site at junction 25 of the M1; Long Eaton; Derby; and

So, seven years after its predecessor was launched, the draft of the new Mayor’s Transport Strategy (MTS) for London has been published; and anyone who cares to has got until the 2 October to let the mayor, Sadiq Khan, his deputy mayor for transport, Val Shawcross, and their walking and cycling commissioner, Will Norman, know what you think of their and their colleagues’ efforts. The full document is 300 pages long, and so I’ve no intention of providing anything approaching a

In 2009 a paper in the journal Research in Transportation Economics highlighted changing attitudes towards demand responsive transport (DRT), predicting many new opportunities for DRT but cautioning that processes for joint working between agencies needed improvement. Move forward to 2015 and it appeared that DRT in the UK had not progressed at the pace anticipated. Indeed, large-scale DRT networks serving special needs customers in the West Midlands, London and Manchester had significantly cont

Stagecoach has published guidance for local authorities and  developers on how to make new housing developments bus-friendly.   The guidance, written by Nick Small, Stagecoach’s head of strategic development and the built environment (south), comes amid continuing concern that new housing developments are being designed and built with buses as an afterthought. Problems include spine roads that are too narrow, particularly if cars are allowed to park on-street.  Stagecoach

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has placed the Healthy Streets Approach at the heart of his 25-year Transport Strategy. This will require all transport decisions and investments to benefit health by improving the 10 Healthy Street Indicators (shown right). Making public health the driving force behind a transport strategy may seem a bold a step for a city to take, but a brief look at the circumstances in London show that this people-centred approach to transport planning is long overdue.  The l

Transport strategies that turn vehicle-dominated streets into ‘people places’ will do much to tackle the health and social challenges that we face, believes Lucy Saunders Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has placed the Healthy Streets Approach at the heart of his 25-year Transport Strategy. This will require all transport decisions and investments to benefit health by improving the 10 Healthy Street Indicators (right). Making public health the driving force behind a transport strategy may

Transport secretary Chris Grayling confirmed Britain’s high-speed rail lines to the North West, East Midlands and Yorkshire. The decision will see new connections created between Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Sheffield and the East Midlands, with all of them being linked to London by the line. The transport secretary announced the companies who would receive £6.6bn worth of contracts relating to the first phase of HS2 earlier today. An upcoming bill for the section from

A company building a new train line linking Orlando to Miami in Florida is to also develop rental apartments convenient for a station on the new 'Brightline,' it has been reported. Flordia East Coast Industries, building a $3bn, 235-mile express train system, is launching a development company, Park-Line, according to The Miami Herald, including "three towers of rental apartments...at Brightline's West Palm Beach station" and two further towers "at Miami Central station". Daniel Quintana, vice-

Plans have been published to reconfigure the busy Fiveways junction in Croydon, south London, with the aim of making it safer for all road users.  Transport for London (TfL) and Croydon Council say the proposed improvements would help to reduce delays and congestion. They point out that the Fiveways area is often busy, with motorists and bus users experiencing congestion at peak times, especially on weekends when large numbers of visitors go to and from the retail parks along Purley Way.

Cambridge could become a centre for driverless public transport systems according to two reports released this week, which have the backing of local authorities and the city’s research community. One report discusses the Affordable Very Rapid Transit (AVRT) concept developed by Professor John Miles of the University of Cambridge’s department of civil engineering.  The other looks at the potential for autonomous vehicles to operate on the Cambridgeshire busway. The reports were

The first occupiers of thousands of future new homes in Cardiff will be offered a year’s free bus travel. Concerns have previously been expressed about the road network’s capacity to accommodate additional car journeys arising from the city’s expansion. The City of Cardiff Council’s local development plan (LDP) aims to reduce the proportion of journeys made by car so that there is a 50:50 split between car and ‘sustainable’ modes by 2026. Section 106 plannin

Actions to cut vehicular traffic must feature prominently in the next local implementation plans (LIPs) prepared by London boroughs, says draft guidance just issued by Transport for London. The LIPs must support London mayor Sadiq Khan’s draft transport strategy, the central objective of which is to reduce the share of passenger trips by car/taxi/private hire vehicle in the capital from 36% today to just 20% in 2041, with the share by foot, cycle and public transport rising from 64 to 80%

Transport for London should take over the management of two rail services that are currently part of the Thameslink, Southern & Great Northern franchise, Chris Gibb has told ministers.    Gibb says the TfL should be given control of some Great Northern local services and the East Croydon-Milton Keynes service. But he rules out TfL taking control of Southern’s South London ‘metro’ services in the short-term. “I believe there is an option to transfer the Gre

The world's largest autonomous, electric personal/group rapid transit system is to be built under a $1.6bn project in the United Arab Emirates under a contract awarded to the Fairwood Group's 'UltraFairwood' scheme, it has been reported. Under a contract awarded, the PRT system for Ajman City in the UAE will provide six-seater, battery-powered driverless vehicles running on elevated guideways that will transport users anywhere within the network without stops, and connected to the GRT system of

Camden Town Underground station is set to treble in size to reduce current crowding. The upsizing of the station features three new escalators and greater space for customers using the four Northern line platforms. Proposals include providing step-free access and the construction of a new entrance to the station. The development would include homes, commercial spaces for small businesses and retail.  Over 30m customers using the station, built in 1907, making it one the busiest interchang

The UK’s first Mobility as a Service (MaaS) pilot scheme is due to start in the West Midlands this autumn. A test group of 500 people will arrange their multi-modal journeys using a smartphone app. The project will be overseen by Transport for West Midlands (TfWM), an executive body of the West Midlands Combined Authority. “We are planning to recruit a control group alongside the initial 500 to test how MaaS works with other types of customer,” said TfWM’s managing direc

Planning guidance has been published for the redevelopment of Oxford’s railway station, a project that will provide more capacity for trains and remodelled interchange facilities.  Oxford station is already a bottleneck with only two through platforms to serve the Great Western services to/from London Paddington and the Cross Country services between the North/Midlands and Reading/South Coast. Since December, Chiltern services from London Marylebone have  operated into the north

A major road network (MRN) of the most economically important roads in the north of England has been identified by Transport for the North. The network of local authority roads and Highways England roads is described as “the road network that is most economically important to securing the North’s productivity and growth; both now, and in the future.”  The network is outlined in the Initial Major Roads Report prepared for TfN by consultant Jacobs. Says the consultant: &ld

The Liverpool City Region Combined Authority is exploring designating its Key Route Network (KRN) of roads as red routes, on which no stopping is permitted, except in designated bays.  The Liverpool City Region devolution agreement of November 2015 included a statement that a KRN of local roads would be managed by the combined authority on behalf of the Liverpool City Region mayor, with a single asset management plan.   The agreed network covers about 560km (10%) of the Liverpool Cit

A dockless public bike hire system is to be piloted in Manchester. Chinese firm Mobike will provide 1,000 bikes in the six-month pilot scheme covers central Manchester and Salford. It is due to launch at the end of this month.  Mobike’s first scheme was launched in Shanghai last April and the company now operates in 100 cities across Singapore and China. The Manchester/ Salford trial is its first operation outside Asia.  An app enables users to locate a bike using inbuilt GPS

Sixteen London bus routes carried more than ten million passengers a year in 2015/16, according to figures released by Transport for London. The busiest route was the 25  connecting Oxford Circus with Hainault in east London. It carried almost 20 million passengers a year (see table).   TfL has supplied the London Assembly’s transport committee with patronage figures for every route in the capital. Bus patronage in the capital has fallen since 2015/16.

The challenge that disruptive technologies such as autonomous vehicles and Mobility as a Service (MaaS) pose for transport modelling loomed large at this year’s Modelling World event.  Delivering the opening paper, Luis Willumsen, director of Willumsen Advisory Services and Kineo Mobility Analytics, said modellers were faced with huge new uncertainties, making the job of forecasting ever more difficult.  Factors included: political instability; behaviour change; autonomous vehi

Milton Keynes central will be the testing ground for a new mobility solution when the roll-out of a fleet of 40 driverless pods begins early next year.  The foundations for the UK Autodrive project were laid in October 2016 with on-street trials of three LUTZ Pathfinder pods in Milton Keynes by Transport Systems Catapult (TSC). The two-seater pods were developed by Oxford University spin-out company Oxbotica and manufactured by Coventry automotive innovation firm RDM. The next generation o

The need to create healthy streets is at the heart of London Mayor Sadiq Khan’s first transport strategy, which sets out proposals to reshape transport in the capital over the next 25 years. The Draft Transport Strategy includes proposals for ‘Liveable Neighbourhoods’ that encourage walking, cycling and the use of public transport and to increase opportunities to use streets as public spaces and for play. The mayor wants to create ‘Healthy Routes’ - attra

This year's Modelling World, held last week in London – the largest gathering of transport modellers to have taken place in the UK, with a record attendance of 261 – was topped off with the presentation of the first Masters of Modelling Awards during the very well-attended networking session that closed the one-day event. Modeller Luis Willumsen (Director, Willumsen Advisory Services & Kineo Mobility Analytics) was presented with the Lifetime Achievement Award, kindly sponsored b

The road safety benefits of the 20mph speed limit in Edinburgh and Belfast are to be assessed by a three-year study. The study is to be conducted by the University of Edinburgh and the Scottish Collaboration for Public Health Research and Policy. The research will study casualties and traffic accident rates and will also assess rates of cycling and walking and its impact on transport use. The project – the largest of its type in the UK – will also look at wider effects on residents

The Transport Systems Catapult (TSC) has announced that Paul Campion has been appointed as chief executive officer.  Campion joins the TSC from his position leading IBM’s Global Financing in the UK and Ireland. IBM Global Financing is an IT financing house that helps IBM’s clients and partners optimise the financial cases for their IT transformations. He has previously worked in a variety of technical, marketing and sales operational leadership roles for IBM, both in the UK an

Urban and rural rail services are more costly to provide than previously thought, and the taxpayer pays almost £200m a year to keep the rail network capable of carrying freight, according to a new method for allocating rail industry fixed costs commissioned by Network Rail.   Brockley Consulting, a specialist in regulatory and competition matters, has developed a method for allocating fixed costs of the rail network between operators. Says Brockley: “There does not [currently]

Brighton & Hove Buses and the Pride LGBT festival have worked together to launch the Diversity Bus, which is the latest incarnation of the Pride Festival Bus. The bus carries the message #moreincommon, which was set up in the aftermath of MP Jo Cox’s murder a year ago. It aims to demonstrate how much more people have in common than that which divides them. The Diversity Bus will be available for partners in the city for community events where the messages on the bus can be of some val

It’s easy to stereotype different generations; changing values and different levels of comfort with technology often create the sense that there is a growing gulf between old and young. Much has been made of the age-related factors in the Brexit vote, for example. But is your generation really that different from that of your parents (other than in spending an inordinate amount of time on social media)? Is there value in understanding generational factors? And what applications might this

Since Kazakhstan shrugged off the Soviets in 1991 and declared its independence, Almaty, the country’s largest city, has gone through an unprecedented period of growth. That growth was powered by the entrepreneurial energy unleashed through liberation which swept through much of the nation’s economic and social life, not least when it came to public transport. The trouble is that the buccaneering spirit is not necessarily as liberating for local commuters as it can be for the bus op

In December 2015, the 196 countries attending the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Paris came to an historic agreement that could have the most profound repercussions for the future.  The Paris agreement aims to reduce worldwide emissions of greenhouse gases down to zero by the second half of this century, limiting the global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees. It is a boldly ambitious proposal, but some of the tools that could make that ambition a reality, in

We can’t predict future demand, but the transport solutions we help shape will influence that demand. The longer the horizon, the less we know.  Yet our infrastructure can have a lifespan of 30-plus years. Where will we want to go to in 2040,  and when?  What will be the impact of disruptive new technologys such that the connected autonomous car (CAV)? How will socio-economic changes change travel patterns?  To what extent will we work more from home?  What will ha

The scale of change means that conventional elasticity-based approaches need to be adjusted (the ‘arc elasticity’ problem) but, even then, it is difficult to understand all the possible longer-term consequences for example, of relocating homes and jobs Hyperloop is one technology that offers brave new possibilities for rapid travel. It offers extremely fast land-based transportation, at speeds of up to 700mph, on a maglev-type system in an evacuated tunnel.  A test track has b

The Secretary of State for communities and local government may have to rule on competing plans for thousands of new homes in Oxfordshire that would have hugely different impacts on the county’s transport system. Promoters of strategic sites for new housing in South Oxfordshire are understood to be preparing to submit planning applications for their developments before South Oxfordshire District Council’s Local Plan examination next spring, in an attempt to gain competitive advantag

Some of those attending this year’s Cycle City Active City arrived in style, riding into Bradford on the Cycle Superhighway from Leeds. Not surprisingly, several local delegates referred to the route with pride during the two-day event.  The fully segregrated 23km cycleway, completed last year, forms the centerpiece of a range of infrastructure projects being implemented in West Yorkshire. Phase 2 of the CityConnect project is now focusing on improving cycling infrastructure in Hudde

A Green Transport Act would be one of five environmental Acts tabled by the Liberal Democrats if they win power. The party says the acts are needed “to incorporate existing EU environmental protections, maintain product standards such as for energy efficiency, and establish a framework for continual improvement”.  There would also be a Zero-Carbon Britain Act, which would set new legally binding targets to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by 2040 and to zero by 2050.&

Cheshire West and Chester Council is to open negotiations with Ringway to extend a highways contract after councillors heard that retendering now would lead to a significant increase in contract costs.  The council’s contract with Ringway Infrastructure Services Ltd is due to expire on 5 October but can be extended for four more years. Councillors have approved plans to negotiate a two-year extension to 2020, with the possibility of two further one-year extensions.  Robert Broo

Inaccurate travel demand forecasts for urban areas are highlighted in submissions to the Commission made by big city authorities. Bristol City Council says that,  whereas road traffic volumes on the city’s motorways rose 15% between 2000 and 2014, traffic on A roads dropped 6% and AM peak traffic entering the city centre fell 11%.  “This reflects national trends over the same time period, which have seen traffic on motorways substantially increase, with small decreases on

The future of Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT) looks uncertain following the local elections that have seen the SNP become the largest party on Glasgow City Council. The Nationalist’s manifesto for the local election pledged to create a new body, Transport for Glasgow, that would “implement a new integrated transport strategy for the city”.  The party has also pledged to end SPT’s role of operating the Glasgow Subway, the underground railway that lies en

West Midlands Conservative Andy Street, the former managing director of retailer John Lewis, has made a huge number of transport pledges. He wants to improve a ‘hit list’ of major traffic blackspots in the conurbation; has ruled out a universal congestion charge; and promises to explore a lane rental scheme to cut road works disruption. He’ll also ask local authorities to review the timing of traffic signals. A review of bus lanes on major routes is proposed “to

Greater Manchester Labour’s Andy Burnham has pledged new powers over bus fares, routes, frequencies and ticketing. His manifesto does not, however, specifically mention bus franchising. On active travel, the former MP for Leigh promises a “new network” of dedicated cycleways, an “iconic” bike hire scheme, and the appointment of an active travel commissioner. 

Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Conservative mayor James Palmer has promised to investigate an underground metro system for Cambridge; a light rail link between Cambourne and Cambridge; and an upgrade to the A10, which connects Cambridge, Ely and King[s Lynn. Palmer was previously leader of East Cambridgeshire District Council.

Labour is promising to build Crossrail 2 in London and a ‘Crossrail of the North’ connecting the north of England’s big cities if it wins the General Election on 8 June. The party also proposes to give legal protection to bus routes of “critical community value”.  The proposals are contained in a draft version of the party’s election manifesto that was leaked this week.  Labour says it would capitalise on low interest rates to invest over £2

Journey planner app Citymapper says it is launching its own bus service in London to help it develop demand-responsive bus services. Citymapper said its app has allowed it to "learn a lot about how people are moving around," and claimed it is able to see that "existing public transit routes don't always serve people best, nor evolve quickly enough to accommodate changes in the city". It declared as it launched the bus in central London near its offices yesterday that in the era of smartphones "

An ability to interact with customers through apps is going to have a huge impact on our industry, and will change the way that local transport is provided over the next decade,” says Peter Bell, technology and innovation director for transport software provider Trapeze. “It’s a fairly obvious point, but nevertheless crucial, that traditional operators underestimate the speed at which things will flip. The generation of those who can’t or won’t use a smartphone is r

The Leeds to Bradford Cycle Superhighway is changing driver behaviour for the better and opening up cycling to “ordinary people”, believes Pete Zanzottera, a member of the CityConnect advisory group that helped shape the 23km route. The CityConnect project is funded by the Department for Transport’s Cycle City Ambition Grant, which awarded £60m to the West Yorkshire Combined Authority and local authority partners for two phases of improvements, which are due to be comple

Recently there has been a paradigm shift in approaches to active travel within the transport and urban planning industry. Just five years ago, cycling was still seen as a niche pursuit, often accommodated by paint on tarmac and the liberal sprinkling of ‘Cyclists Dismount’ signs across the nation, while walking was considered something one did from the door to the car.  With growing awareness of active travel’s myriad benefits for air quality, public health, reducing cong

Councils in Oxfordshire seem set to prepare a joint spatial plan, which should strengthen the links between the transport and land-use planning.  Transport is a county council responsibility but Oxfordshire’s five district councils are responsible for spatial planning, each preparing a local plan informed by an Oxfordshire Strategic Housing Market Assessment that  identifies overall housing need.  The Oxfordshire growth board, a joint committee of the county council and th

A huge investment in the UK’s road network and higher road maintenance standards may be necessary to make the most of connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs), according to a new report by the RAC Foundation. There is huge uncertainty about how the CAV market will develop, and over what timescales, says report author Charles Johnson, group technical director of consultant CAS (Competence Assurance Solutions Ltd),   He uses the Society of Automotive Engineers’ definition of the

The Welsh Government says its plan to take control of the Valley Lines above Cardiff reflects a lack of confidence in Network Rail’s ability to upgrade the infrastructure within the fixed budget available. Infrastructure secretary Ken Skates told an Assembly inquiry into the next Wales and Borders franchise that Network Rail’s delivery record had been problematic. “If we look at some past experience, for example electrification of the Great Western line, there is sufficient co

There has been plenty of debate across West Yorkshire and beyond about the Leeds to Bradford Cycle Superhighway, which was completed last summer. The 23km route – the flagship of the CityConnect project – is the largest scheme of its kind outside of London. Questions have been raised about the route’s impact on traffic levels, the safety of bus stop bypasses for passengers and whether it will encourage people who have never cycled before to get in the saddle for everyday journ

Candidates to become the elected mayors leading six combined authorities (CAs) in England have set out their plans to improve local transport networks. Inaugural mayoral elections are taking place on 4 May for CAs covering the West Midlands; Greater Manchester; Liverpool City Region; Tees Valley; Cambridgeshire and Peterborough; and the West of England (Bristol, South Gloucestershire and Bath & North East Somerset).  Local elections are also being held in: 35 English councils (27 coun

‘Transport for New Homes’ is a project that hopes to narrow the very large gap between planning public transport, walking and cycling and planning new homes. Sponsored by the Foundation for Integrated Transport, a charitable foundation promoting sustainable transport, the project involves field trips to large-scale housing developments to see what we are actually building from the perspective of sustainable transport. We hope to then make recommendations about how and where we decide

Everyone involved in road planning and appraisal should read, digest and reflect on the research report published by the Campaign to Protect Rural England (LTT 31 Mar). Here are our reflections. Lynn Sloman and colleagues show for over 80 schemes that traffic across a screenline drawn widely around the scheme tends to grow more rapidly than background growth in the region. There are various points of contention, for example whether regional background growth should include or exclude urban traff

Journey times over parts of recently widened sections of the M25 are now longer than before the capacity improvements were made, an evaluation for Highways England has found.  The extra capacity has attracted  thousands more vehicle trips onto the road, resulting in longer journey times for travellers, according to the report by consultant Atkins.  The UK’s first smart motorway all-lane running (ALR) schemes were introduced in 2014 on London’s orbital motorway betwee

Derby City Council has joined Nottingham City Council in prohibiting free concessionary travel on a bus route between the two cities. The councils say the limited stop nature of the service and higher fare charged for adult passengers indicate that there is an “amenity element” to the fare, meaning it can be exempted from the statutory concessionary scheme. Trentbarton’s Red Arrow service runs between Derby and Nottingham with just one intermediate stop, at the Queen’s M

Major legislative reforms to bus service delivery in England outside London will be passed into law within the coming days when the Bus Services Act receives Royal Assent.  The Bus Services Bill received its third reading in the House of Commons last week, the final stage in its Parliamentary process before becoming an Act.  The Bill introduces a range of new powers, including allowing mayoral combined authorities to introduce bus franchising. Other types of authority will have to ap

Bristol City Council has explained where transport functions will be held when the new mayoral West of England Combined Authority (WECA) is formed after the election in May. The combined authority will cover the three unitary authorities of Bristol, South Gloucestershire, and Bath & North East Somerset.  The councils will retain their highway and traffic authority functions. The powers assigned to WECA are Parts 4 and 5 of the Transport Act 1985 and Part 2 of the Transport Act 2000. &

Elevated cycleways and automated underground bike storage feature in concept designs proposed for Waterloo in London and Manchester’s Piccadilly Gardens. The designs have been created by cycle manufacturer Ribble Cycles and a panel of transport planning consultants, university lecturers and regional directors. Based on existing examples from around the world, these future urban landscapes are designed to stimulate the debate surrounding urban cycling and inner city planning. Ribble Cycle

Transport for London is to procure a new fleet of Docklands Light Railway (DLR) trains to replace much of the existing fleet and increase network capacity. The DLR currently operates 149 light rail vehicles (LRVs), supplied by Bombardier. These operate in two or three-car formations. Two-thirds of the fleet was delivered between 1990 and 1992 and TfL says the vehicles have reached the end of their design life, and suffer from deteriorating reliability.  The network carries 115 million pas

A recent holiday in Dubai provided a fascinating opportunity for observations about their transport, which may interest some readers. The city is a concrete jungle with the highest number of skyscrapers in the world, and building work still in progress on more of them. It is a city of excess: for example, if you stood the Eiffel Tower on top of the Empire State building, Dubai’s iconic and stunning Burj Khalifa would still be taller by a good couple of hundred feet. Yet there is somethin

The proposal for an Advanced Very Rapid Transit system in Cambridge sounds revolutionary but only when we saw a picture of the vehicle’s interior did we realise just how revolutionary it is. The information display on the seat backs reveals that the rubber-tyred vehicle is travelling at 740mph – faster than a jumbo jet. “We’re removed that, it was issued in error,” explains a spokeswoman, adding that the top speed is still a handsome 120mph.  One thing tha

Since the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union in the referendum last June, the impact and implications of Brexit have dominated political and public debate. Transport is an area that is particularly affected by EU directives and regulations, through matters such as infrastructure funding and procurement, vehicle standards, driver regulations, safety issues, passenger rights, environmental standards, impact assessments, air quality, vehicle emissions, and noise levels.  The pro