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:

Is the energy transition moving fast enough to meet climate change targets and limit the damage caused by fossil fuels? Two recent reports from global consultants appear to take rather different views...and, as usual, the devil is in the detail... According to consultant Wood Mackenzie, the energy mix is changing only gradually and the world risks relying on fossil fuels for decades to come. Despite great efforts to reduce costs in renewables, electricity, zero-carbon technologies and advanced

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

Seven years ago, my title for June’s ramblings was ‘Honesty is the best politics’, Stan Laurel’s version of a well-worn proverb. This time, I’ve added a further twist of my own, but with no similar comedic intent. My 2012 article exhorted fellow practitioners to resist the pressures to do or say something they don’t actually believe in. This piece, by contrast, is a reflection on what some politicians are prepared to do and say, seemingly because the only thi

A new degree apprenticeship for transport planners in England will be launched this autumn, having received final approval from the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education. Designed by employers, the ‘Level 6’ transport planner degree apprenticeship opens a new route into the profession and combines academic education with practical experience. People who complete the course will receive a BSc (Hons) in transport planning. Employers are now able to recruit candidates

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

The Government has tabled legislation committing the UK to achieving net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.  The draft Statutory Instrument to amend the Climate Change Act 2008 was laid in Parliament last week. It toughens the Act’s target from an 80 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 against 1990 levels to a 100 per cent reduction. The UK’s share of international aviation and shipping emissions are excluded. Announcing the secondary legislation, outgoi

Sue Percy, the chief executive of the Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation for the last seven years, has been awarded a CBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours for services to transport. Also receiving a CBE were: Simon Blanchflower, chief executive officer of the East West Railway Company and a former Network Rail director; Caroline Low, director of airport expansion and aviation and maritime analysis at the DfT; Ian Findlay, chief officer of Scottish charity Paths for All; Mi

Living Streets started life as the Pedestrians Association, a charity launched in 1929 by the journalist Tom Foley OBE and Nobel Peace Prize winner Viscount Cecil of Chelwood. During the 1930s the charity played an influential role in the introduction of the first Highway Code, the driving test, the 30mph speed limit in built-up areas and zebra crossings. The Pedestrians Association became Living Streets in 2001 and now runs the annual Walk to School Week and campaigns on issues such as the dan

Living Streets, the UK charity for everyday walking, has celebrated its 90th anniversary by paying tribute to the journalist and diplomat who took the first steps towards making roads better and safer spaces for pedestrians. Thomas Foley was a journalist who worked for a number of London newspapers. Foley loved walking and never learned to drive. Throughout his life he campaigned to improve life for pedestrians as became increasingly concerned about he dangers posed by growing numbers of cars,

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

The draft London Plan’s transport infrastructure priorities will prove to be nothing more than a “wishlist” unless a way can be found to fill a £3.1bn a year funding gap, a borough has said. The London Borough of Bexley says there is little likelihood that all the schemes listed in table 10.1 of the draft plan will be delivered during the plan period to 2041. “The draft plan states that ‘most of the schemes in Table 10.1 are currently unfunded’ and tha

The DFT has outlined its research priorities for improving the quality of transport analysis to underpin decision-making.   The work programme includes valuing urban realm and other locational impacts of transport improvements, more coverage of active travel modes, and greater use of distributional analysis in appraisal.  Research is underway to inform revised optimism bias values for project costings.  A prototype ‘uncertainty toolkit’ to help scheme promoters asse

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

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

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

I promise this isn’t a column about Brexit, though I can’t help it if you feel there’s a resonance. It’s about a new philosophy I learned of last month when I joined Twitter (after a nearly unbroken record of turning my back on social media, which I found intrusive and distracting, apart from Second Life, in the early days, which was sweet).  It was a short tweet from a young American academic, with a heavy load of grading, i.e. marking, student scripts. She wrote &

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

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

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

Just about every major change to spatial planning that has occurred in the last 20 years, with the exception of the regional spatial strategies, has made it more difficult for transport planners to be able to deliver cohesive strategies and ones that give due weight to environmental protection.   With the establishment of Regional Assemblies in the late-1990s came regional transport strategies (RTSs) as part of regional spatial strategies (RSSs). This enabled transport planning across loca

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

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

Wales’ Future Generations Commissioner has accused transport consultants of failing to  understand how the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 affects transport scheme development. Too often they jump to the conclusion that road schemes are the solution to transport problems, she says. Sophie Howe said Wales’ transport appraisal guidance, WelTAG, had been revised as a result of her team’s work with the Welsh Government’s transport department. “We

The new draft local transport plan for the West of England area (Bristol and surroundings) features transport investments costing at least five times more than those in the area’s spatial plan, even though the documents cover the same geography and time horizon. A public examination is currently underway into a statutory joint spatial plan covering the four unitary authorities of Bristol, Bath and North East Somerset, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire. Once adopted, the plan will p

Combined authorities with strategic planning powers will be given the power to implement a strategic infrastructure tariff (SIT) to help fund transport and other infrastructure, the Government has announced. A SIT would be similar to the mayoral CIL in London, which has been used to part-fund Crossrail, will be additional to the community infrastructure levies (CIL) that individual councils operate to fund infrastructure.   The SIT idea featured in a consultation held earlier this yea

Leeds City Council is proposing short-term exemptions from its charging Clean Air Zone (CAZ) for some types of vehicle, to soften the blow of the scheme. The council plans to introduce the CAZ on 6 January 2020 but says there is “high potential” for legal challenges from those who think the plan is either too draconian or not strict enough. Both Client Earth and Friends of the Earth want the scheme to cover cars, something the council has refused to countenance.  Leeds will in

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

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

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

Dundee City Council has appointed firms to deliver a range of mobility services in the city, which could provide the foundation for a Mobility as a Service (MaaS) product.  Neil Gellatly, Dundee’s head of roads and transportation, told LTT the initiatives were all part of the city’s Mobility Innovation Living Laboratory (MILL) project, which aims to deliver new services for citizens while enabling mobility firms to develop and test their products in a live setting. The council

A widespread view in Parliament that London has received too much of the Government’s recent transport spend could hamper the battle to secure funds for further major schemes in the capital, Sadiq Khan’s new deputy mayor for transport has warned.   Heidi Alexander, the former Labour MP for Lewisham East, highlighted the problem in her confirmation hearing before the London Assembly’s confirmation hearings committee last month.  “From my time in Parliament, I k

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

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

The Charter for Parks, launched by the National Federation of Parks and Green Spaces, and a coalition of national organisations, has called on on Prime Minister Theresa May and First Ministers Nicola Sturgeon, Carwyn Jones and Arlene Foster, to celebrate these spaces and take action to safeguard them. The Charter calls on the UK’s four political leaders to: Endorse a legal duty for all public greenspace to be managed to a good standard Ensure adequate long-term resources for maintenanc

MPs have voted in favour of building a third runway at Heathrow by 415 votes to 119 – a majority of 296. The Conservative government had instructed its MPs to back the Airports National Policy Strategy (NPS) in the House of Commons vote last night. Labour’s official position was to oppose expansion, but its MPs were given a free vote. The SNP abstained. Construction on a third runway at Heathrow could start within three years. Transport Secretary Chris Grayling has formally designa

A London-wide byelaw to manage dockless bike share schemes is being explored by  London Councils and Transport for London.  The plan was presented to London Councils’ transport and environment committee (TEC) last week. Owain Mortimer, London Council’s principal policy officer, said: “TfL and London Councils are exploring the feasibility of putting formal mechanisms in place for the regulation of dockless bicycle operators, restricting their operation other than by c

“When I hear someone say they have a data platform I reach for my shotgun,” Professor Jonathan Raper declared earlier this year. Raper was in a Q&A session with Graham Hanson, the DfT’s Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) policy lead, at the Catch! showcase event at the Future Cities Catapult in Clerkenwell Green. Raper reflects mounting concern amongst transport data experts that people have a misplaced understanding of what data platforms should provide to qualify as use

“Pity the baffled passenger from Edinburgh, Newcastle or Leeds as the train painters get to work on yet another rebrand on the East Coast main line,” Simon Calder, The Independent’s travel correspondent, began an article entitled “Is rail doomed to fail?” on 16 May. “The average passenger will not care [what colour the trains are], so long as the train is on time, affordable and staffed by the same excellent men and women who are losing count of the number of

The West Midlands Combined Authority has an ambitious agenda to build a healthier, happier, better connected and more prosperous region in the broadest sense of ‘build’ – not just the urban fabric and infrastructure, but also in our industrial capability, community well-being and environmental resources.   When we talk about strategic transport modelling we mean modelling that connects transport forecasting to the higher-level aims outlined by the Mayor: economic pro

Academics in Australia have launched an extraordinary attack on the work of a British-based academic whose research has shaped the UK Government’s approach to costing  transport and other infrastructure projects.  Peter Love and Dominic Ahiaga-Dagbui say Bent Flyvbjerg’s research, which attributes project cost overruns to the  behavioural issues of optimism bias and strategic misrepresentation (lying), is “akin to being fake news”. “No evidence at a

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

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

A new Institute for Government (IfG) report has targeted three key aspects of policy to improve infrastructure decision-making in the UK. Over the past year, the Institute for Government has explored how the UK can improve infrastructure policymaking in areas including transport, energy, flood defences, digital communication, waste and water. Pulling together the findings of our work, this report identifies how competing needs and perspectives can be balanced to improve three vital aspects of

The Welsh Government wants Transport for Wales to become the owner or operator of Wales’ bus and rail networks. At the National Assembly for Wales last week, transport secretary Ken Skates reiterated the Government’s view that Transport for Wales (TfW), wholly owned by the Government, should eventually resemble Transport for London.  “The Government’s economic action plan commits that Transport for Wales will work with the Welsh Government’s new regional team

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. 

In 1999, after an exhaustive review, SACTRA (the Standing Committee on Trunk Road Assessment) found a “strong theoretical expectation” that transport investment could boost economic growth but that direct evidence was “weak and contested”. By 2013, when George Osborne unveiled a radical change in spending priorities (Investing in Britain’s Future), all doubt had evaporated. Henceforth, roads, rail and airport expansion would help us build our way out of the worst re

The EU’s General Data Protection Regulation could have far-reaching consequences for companies and public authorities of all sizes, from central government all the way down to sole traders. Any entity that collects, holds or uses personal data must comply with stricter governance policies and provide information about data on request. Data breaches will be punishable by substantial fines. For the past two decades, the UK’s main legislation in this area has been the Data Protection A

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

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

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

Enhanced partnerships Enhanced partnerships (EPs) are a new more powerful form of partnership working between councils and bus operators.  Before beginning the process of preparing one, local authorities must hold informal talks about the idea with operators.  An EP is a “negotiation between the authority and operators” in which “neither side has overall control.” Although the authority ‘makes the EP’ they cannot do so without the consent of a def

Local authorities in Cambridgeshire are to consult early next year on bus rapid transit or light rail options for  a radial route into Cambridge from the south-east. The Greater Cambridge Partnership, which comprises the City Deal authorities (Cambridge City Council, South Cambridgeshire District Council and Cambridgeshire County Council), has been exploring bus-based improvements for the A1307 corridor between Cambridge and Haverhill and has narrowed the choice down to three options. 

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

Policies that seek to ban diesel and petrol cars from towns and cities is a knee-jerk reaction that ignores the efforts the automotive sector has made to produce less polluting vehicles, the president of the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) has said. Tony Walker used his speech at the SMMT’s annual dinner to address the issue of air quality. He focussed on the automotive sector’s efforts to invest in new technology and improve air quality in towns and cities.  

Councils should not feel compelled to cancel contracts with community transport organisations (CTOs) as a result of the DfT’s new interpretation of  licensing requirements, the Department has said. The advice note sent to councils this month addresses their  concerns about the implications of the original DfT letter sent at the end of July (LTT04 Aug).   In the July letter, the DfT announced a re-interpretation of EUregulations that will mean CTOs can no longer undertake c

The Association of British Insurers (ABI) has set out criteria for what drivers should expect from vehicles described as ‘automated’ and will task Thatcham Research with assessing any car marketed as ‘automated’ or ‘driverless’ against its 10 new criteria. The ABI’s announcement comes in reaction to the Automated and Electric Vehicle Bill, which is currently being considered by Parliament. Matthew Avery, director of research at Thatcham Research, said:

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

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

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

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

The government has initiated an “urgent review” to consider whether a new offence equivalent to causing death by careless or dangerous driving should be introduced for cyclists. The Department for Transport (DfT) announced the review into cycle safety following a series of high profile incidents involving cyclists. The highest profile involved the death of mother-of-two Kim Briggs after she was struck by cyclist Charlie Alliston, who has received a custodial sentence after bein

The US Department of Transportation (DOT) and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has released new federal guidance for the transition to autonomous vehicles.  Automated Driving Systems (ADS): A Vision for Safety 2.0 is designed to encourage state and local governments to draft laws for autonomous driving and help manufacturers to build self-driving cars that have contingencies for event of system failures. Click here to view

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

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

Bus passenger journeys and revenues in London are running ahead of budget in 2017/18, according to figures released by Transport for London.  Passenger journeys up to 22 July were 711 million, 3.3% above the forecast of 688 million. Fare income was £452m, 2.3% above  the £442m forecast. TfL attributes the better performance to “increased bus speeds and improved bus reliability”. London Underground patronage and revenues are below expectations. Patronage is 42

Up to 90 bus stops in south Birmingham could be closed in a trial designed to speed up bus journeys. Councillors on West Midlands Combined Authority’s transport delivery committee will be asked to approve the six-month trial affecting five bus corridors next week.  A report to the committee by Danny Gouveia, Transport for the West Midlands’ bus scheme development manager, says ad hoc requests from passengers and local councillors, and changing land-uses mean that some parts of

New drug-driving laws are taking a dangerous drivers off UK roads, with conviction rates running at 98%, says the Department for Transport. A new law introduced in 2015 makes it illegal to drive with certain drugs in the body above specified limits. The law covers eight illegal drugs and nine prescription drugs. If caught, drivers can lose their licence for at least a year, be fined up to £5,000 or even end up in prison. In 2015 some 1,442 motorists were convicted for offences inclu

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

Whenever we talk about autonomous vehicles, a little alarm bell goes off in my head. No, not the safety one – I am sure that boffins in white coats with pens in their top pockets will sort out the safety issues. We will probably all be safer with the Terminator driving behind us, rather than with the human idiot who decides that he has an unnatural fondness for my back bumper at 70mph on the M25. The little mental alarm bell is the one that sounds whenever we’re getting too excited

Last week, the press was aflutter with the headline-grabbing announcement of the demise of not just diesel cars, but petrol by 2040 to help tackle the UK’s air quality problems. This might be great for all sorts of reasons – if a little late – but will the lights stay on? And is this the right way of looking at the urgency of today’s urban air quality crisis anyway? Before we get much further, it’s worth being clear about what we mean by these different terms &ndash

Seventeen local authorities in Yorkshire this week called on the Government to grant a devolution deal for the entire region, a move that threatens to undermine Sheffield City Region’s devolution agreement that has still to be sealed two years after being announced. The Yorkshire devolution declaration has been signed by the following councils: Barnsley, Bradford, Calderdale, Craven, Doncaster, East Riding of Yorkshire, Hambleton, Harrogate, Hull, Kirklees, Leeds, North Yorkshire, Richmon

Chris Boardman, Olympic cycling champion, has been appointed as Greater Manchester’s first ever Cycling and Walking Commissioner. Greater Manchester’s Mayor, Andy Burnham, selected Boardman to help boost cycling and walking in Manchester, which was a key pledge in Burnham’s mayoral election manifesto. The announcement comes as the Mayor received and endorsed a four-year plan to get ‘Greater Manchester Moving’. Burnham has committed his leadership to implement the

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

The Department for Transport has revealed the winners of £6.6bn worth of contracts to build the first phase of HS2 between London and Birmingham. Transport secretary Chris Grayling announced the decision to award contracts today, which the DFT said would mean the new high-speed link reaching Birmingham by 2026. Carillion, Costain and Balfour Beatty are among the consortia that will build tunnels, bridges and embankments on the first stretch of the new high-speed rail line.  “

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

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%

The Welsh Government has launched a consultation on proposed changes to the licensing system for taxi and private hire vehicles (PHVs). As LTT reported last month, the Government proposes a single tier regime to deal with taxis and PHVs in the same way. It says the distinction between taxis and PHVs is perhaps more understood in London than elsewhere. The Law Commission’s 2014 report on taxi and PHV licensing in England and Wales considered the case for treating taxis and PHVs under the

Local authorities are challenging the analysis underpinning the Government’s revised draft air quality plan, and questioning whether there is evidence to justify implementing charging Clean Air Zones. The tensions are revealed in responses to the draft plan consultation, which closed last week. A number of councils have raised concerns about the modelling of nitrogen dioxide concentrations undertaken by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).  Councils are po

Cambridgeshire County Council is commissioning a study of bus improvements in a corridor where Cambridgeshire and Peterborough’s new elected mayor wants a light rail line. A comparative study of bus and light rail is also to be commissioned.  Cambridgeshire’s tender notice for the Cambourne to Cambridge better bus journeys market research study says: “We would like to create better bus journeys by improving the existing, or creating new bus infrastructure, and where possi

Transport received far less media coverage than many other issues in the run up to the General Election, with the possible exception of Labour’s proposals to renationalise the railways (see Media Monitor 26 May). An exception to this was a lengthy article in The New Statesman that went through the major transport policies of each of the major parties in some detail. “Education gets around five pages of the Tory manifesto,” NS writer John Elledge noted on 31 May. “The NHS

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

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.&

Welcome… This year's Data and Modelling publication brings together thoughts from three events in the Modelling World series: Modelling Tomorrow's World, run in November 2016 in partnership with the Transport Systems Catapult, Modelling World Middle East 2017, held in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, in February 2017, and themes and ideas to be discussed at this year's Modelling World in London, to be held on June 14 for the 12th successful year.  It is published at a time of unprecede

What the feature in the last issue on heavy goods vehicles shows is that bold freight policies are needed (‘Can’t live with them, can’t live without them: whither the HGV?’ LTT 12 May). We receive many requests for advice from the public on how to ameliorate the adverse impacts of lorries using unsuitable urban and rural roads. In the past, freight, which does not have a vote and was not seen as sexy, was often overlooked by politicians and officials alike. Growing aware

The Conservative manifesto for next month’s General Election makes no mention of Crossrail 2, the plan to link up rail lines in south-west and north-east London, adding to fears that the project could be shelved by a Tory victory.  The party’s manifesto pledges to continue a programme of “strategic national investments, including High Speed 2, Northern Powerhouse Rail and the expansion of Heathrow Airport”. Before the prime minister called the election, Transport f

The promoter of a 60-tonne, 25.25-metre lorry is waiting to hear if the DfT will approve his proposal for on-road trials of 1,000 of the vehicles.  Dick Denby, non-executive chairman of Lincoln-based Denby Transport Ltd, has lobbied successive governments to permit trials of his eight-axle lorry, dubbed the Eco-Link. He says the vehicles would cut fuel consumption, reduce lorry miles –  thereby improving road safety – and reduce costs for shippers.  The UK’s cu

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

Tees Valley Conservative Ben Houchen was a councillor on Stockton on Tees Council. One of his key priorities is to bring Durham Tees Valley Airport back into public ownership, which he says is vital to securing its status as an operational airport.

West of England Conservative Tim Bowles was a councillor on South Gloucestershire Council and a big part of his campaign message was to defend the interests of Bath and North East Somerset, and South Gloucestershire, from domination by Bristol. “Only by voting Conservative can you ensure there is no return to a Bristol dominated Avon,” – a reference to Avon County Council, which was abolished in the 1990s in favour of unitary councils. On transport, he has said: &ldqu

Liverpool City Region Labour’s Steve Rotheram has promised to “re-regulate the buses” and says the area will “only buy clean  buses from 2020”. A campaign to promote walking and cycling will be run with health leaders. Rotheram, the former MP for Liverpool Walton, wants to explore improving the existing freight-only rail link to the Port of Liverpool through north Liverpool, including the possibility of passenger services to communities in Fairfield,

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

The Government is being urged to draft legislation to accelerate the delivery of road improvements to serve the Channel Ports in Kent. Charlie Elphicke, the MP for Dover and Deal, wants the planning processes temporarily  suspended to ensure the quick delivery of the Lower Thames Crossing (LTT 14 Apr); an upgrade to the A2/M2; and a new lorry park beside the M20 in Kent (LTT 14 Apr). All are taking too long to deliver, he says, claiming that the  need for them is urgent because the t

US engineering giant CH2M announced at the end of March that it was withdrawing from the running for the  £170m contract to serve as the Government’s development partner for HS2 phase 2B (Crewe to Manchester, and West Midlands to Yorkshire) (LTT 31 Mar).  CH2M had already performed the role for phase one of HS2 (London to the West Midlands), and in February it was named preferred bidder by HS2 Ltd for the 2B contract. That prompted Mace, one of the other shortlisted bidder

Bernadette Kelly has been appointed as the new permanent secretary at the Department for Transport. This follows Philip Rutnam’s move to the Home Office, which was announced in February.  The appointment has been made by the Cabinet Secretary with the approval of the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Transport. The Cabinet Secretary, Sir Jeremy Heywood, said: “Bernadette has an excellent track record, having worked in a number of departments across government inclu

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

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. &

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

The South East Scotland transport partnership (SEStran) has paused proposals to acquire more powers and responsibilities after some constituent councils questioned the plans, and others failed to respond by the consultation deadline. SEStran had asked all eight member authorities to respond by 2 March to a consultation on moving from being a model one to a model three regional transport partnership (RTP). Model one partnerships are chiefly responsible for preparing a regional transport strateg

Of course we all appreciate that local authorities are struggling with revenue resources due to austerity. I should know, having previously led a public sector organisation whose budget was cut by 35% and staff reduced by over 50%. This means that fewer people have to work smarter and harder, but great care needs to be taken to ensure that the efficiency drive does not have perverse or unintended local consequences. Take procurement as an example. An obvious way of reducing procurement costs is

Transport & Health Summit 2017 takes place in Bristol on the 23 and 24 Febrary. The key focus group/workshop session on Transport & Environmental Health will take place on February 24 at 12.00 during this event. More information online The workshop will explore issues relating to improving air quality, lowering emissions and congestion reduction for smarter fleet operations. Participants will include Public Health Wales, Scania UK, Bristol City Council, LoCITY, WHO Europe

The pitfall of focusing solely on efficacy or cost is that it’s often to the detriment of human experience; both psychological and physiological. However, over recent years, we’ve seen a positive change towards attitudes to health and wellbeing of people and communities.  Originally developed for use in the built environment, WellBriefingTM enables the most influential factors on health and wellbeing to be prioritised. Some of these, including noise, movement and air quality, a

Local authorities are discussing the idea of an elected mayor of Yorkshire, which could deliver additional funding for transport infrastructure and see a shake-up to existing transport governance arrangements. The idea of a mayor representing the five million people of Yorkshire has its political backers, including the leader of North Yorkshire County Council (LTT 25 Nov 16). West Yorkshire Combined Authority chair Peter Box this week told communities and local government secretary Sajid Javid

Not so long ago, the Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) was being championed as the way to increase developer contributions to transport and other infrastructure. Introduced in England via the 2008 Planning Act, the levy was designed to collect contributions towards the cumulative impacts of development across an area. In places where CIL was adopted, the previous, often cumbersome, practice of councils negotiating Section 106 developer contributions would be restricted to site-specific issues

The welsh Government this week called for Welsh transport planning to be regionally based and aligned geographically with economic development initiatives. It has also invited views on whether English-style combined authorities should be formed in Wales. Introducing the Reforming Local Government: Resilient and Renewed White Paper, Mark Drakeford, cabinet secretary for finance and local government, told the Senedd: “It confirms the intention to mandate regional working for strategic trans

The National Infrastructure Commission (NIC) is consulting on the population scenarios it plans to use for the National Infrastructure Assessment of the UK’s transport and other infrastructure needs.  The Commission plans to use four scenarios in developing its  National Infrastructure Assessment (NIA). Three are:  the Office for National Statistics (ONS) central population projection, which sees population rise by 12.9 million (20%) from an estimated 64.6 million in 2

A House of Lords amendment to the Bus Services Bill giving all local transport authorities in England the power to introduce bus franchising looks set to be overturned by the Government. The original Bill proposed that franchise powers would only be available to mayoral combined authorities. For other areas a two-stage procedure would apply. In stage one the Government would make regulations allowing a particular category of authority to implement franchising – for instance a combined aut

Nine public transport operators serving 25 European cities have now published a strategy for electric buses for 2020 and have plans to deploy 2,500 of the buses by that date. Europe, while behind the mass-deployment of electric buses in China, now has 1,300 electric buses on order, with the U.K leading the way in terms of take-up so far, followed by the Netherlands, Switzerland, Poland and Germany, according to the report, published as part of the Zero Emission Urban Bus System p

Car-makers and smartphone manufacturers will meet transport ministers to discuss technological solutions that could reduce the problem of people being distrated by handheld devices while driving. It is anticipated that the meeting, which is due to take place in Whitehall, will see Department for Transport ministers and officials tell the mobile phone companies that “drive safe” modes, similar to the now common airline mode, must be included in basic phone software. Drive safe w

Ministers are drawing up a longer list of cities that will have to implement charging clean air zones (CAZs) to cut vehicle emissions following the High Court’s quashing of the Government’s air quality plan. Only five cities were required to introduce charging CAZs under the air quality plan published in 2015 – Birmingham, Nottingham, Derby, Southampton and Leeds. The plan was quashed after the High Court ruled that it failed to bring down nitrogen dioxide emissions to within

Peter Jones has been awarded an OBE for services to national transport policy in the New Year Honours. Jones is professor of transport and sustainable development at University College London’s Transport Institute and was a founding member of the Independent Transport Commission (ITC).  Said the ITC: “Peter’s inspiring leadership of our ‘Road and rail travel trends’ research has been ground-breaking in helping UK policy-makers understand the dramatically chang

Oxfordshire is going places. This month’s completion of a new rail link between London Marylebone and Oxford city centre is just one part of a much bigger plan to improve the county’s transport networks. On roads, the Government is preparing a major project to improve the county’s north-south trunk road, the A34, and build an Expressway from Oxford to Milton Keynes and Cambridge in the east. On rail, ministers this month signalled their commitment to the East West Rail project,

A commercial Mobility as a Service (MaaS) pilot scheme is to be launched in the West Midlands conurbation, enabling users to choose from a wide range of travel options via a smartphone app.  The proposed pilot will be delivered over an 18-month period for up to 500 customers based in the West Midlands providing them access, through their smartphone, to bus, metro and rail travel, car hire and car journeys, officers told this month’s West Midlands Combined Authority meeting. “If

Welsh infrastructure secretary Ken Skates has insisted that devolution of the complete Wales and Borders franchise is still on track, after Plaid Cymru seized on comments by UK transport secretary Chris Grayling. Plaid Cymru AM Dai Lloyd claimed that Grayling had said: “We are not devolving responsibility for the whole Welsh franchise … We are doing so in part … We cannot have a situation where we, the Government in Westminster, give up control over services in England to th

The transport secretary Chris Grayling today took to the airwaves to deride a claim from the London Mayor that under Transport for London's control capacity would be increased on commuter routes in South East England. The Mayor Sadiq Khan used social media to encourage commuters affected by on-going strike action on Southern Rail services to urge them to back his campaign to take control of Southern, Southeastern and South West train lines. "You'd get a more frequent, reliable service with fewe

London mayor Sadiq Khan has ordered Transport for London to help the four local councils and Greenpeace who are bringing a legal challenge against the Government’s decision to support construction of a third runway at Heathrow.  Khan has directed TfL to provide assistance to the London boroughs of Hillingdon, Richmond, Wandsworth, the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead, and Greenpeace who are seeking a judicial review of last month’s decision (LTT 28 Oct). The mayor&rsquo

Planning transport for pupils with special educational needs (SEN) can be a time consuming activity for local authorities. But help could be at hand from a new cloud-based system – Q Routes. Geoff Dudley explores the technology and asks if it could have wider applications in planning transport networks In times of intense austerity for local authorities the cost of school transport can be a necessary but highly expensive item. Within this type of expenditure, the specific and detailed req

Combined authorities need to invest in transport to boost their peripheries, whilst the Government must also spread investment more evenly, given the declining performance of most English towns, especially in the North, a think-tank claims. A growing gap in socio-economic performance between urban centres and three out of five English towns requires plans that "set out a clear vision for the economic future of all parts and economic sectors of a region," Demos said. "If the eventual fate of the

The transport secretary Chris Grayling has told an audience of county council officers that "pragmatism" sums up his approach to devolution, which he sees as potentially necessary "if journeys are beset by congestion, delay, crowding, needless cost or preventable pollution". He told the County Councils Network meeting: "I want structures of power, accountability and responsibility that work. I don't mean structures that work for the DfT, for Parliament, for transport operato

Local authoities in the Solent area have tried to allay bus operator fears that the proposed mayoral combined authority will impose bus franchising.  First Bus and Stagecoach wrote to the Portsmouth, Southampton and Isle of Wight councils this summer to outline their concerns.  A spokesman for the Solent deal authorities told LTT this week: “Partners working on the Solent Combined Authority proposals have had ongoing discussions with bus operators. There were strong concerns ex

Plans to make electric vehicle chargepoints more widely available and convenient for motorists have been unveiled by the government. The Department for Transport is consulting on a series of measures that it says will make chargepoints more accessible, making it easier for drivers to recharge as demand for low emission vehicles increases. The measures, which are due to be included in the Modern Transport Bill, would also give government powers to support the roll-out of hydrogen refuelling

The government has given its support for a third runway at Heathrow, the first full-length runway to be built in the south-east since the Second World War. The scheme will be taken forward in the form of a draft National Policy Statement (NPS) for consultation. The government believes that a new runway at Heathrow can be delivered within the UK’s carbon obligations and that concerns over air quality can be addressed. The decision has been welcomed by a wide range of business groups, but

Road safety charities, medical bodies, police forces and motoring bodies are calling for MPs to reduce the UK’s high drink driving limit. Organisations as the Insitute of Alcohol Studies, Brake, Pacts, the AA and British Medical Journal point out that there has been no reduction in the number of drink driving deaths since 2010. Every year drink driving causes 240 deaths and more than 8,000 casualties in the UK. This costs an estimated £800m a year. Some 60% of those who are killed

Labour is set to seek to trump the Conservatives' drive for devolution to deliver infrastructure improvements as the new shadow minister for local government demands full fiscal devolution in England as well as Scotland, it has been reported. Gareth Thomas will say that Brexit means that Scottish devolution needs to be reproduced in England's regions, including income tax-raising powers, The Guardian reported. He is expected to say that "when England voted to take back control, it wasn't voting

The models we use today, says Neffendorf, in conversation with Modelling World programme director Juliana O'Rourke, tend to be based on how people behave today, or are projections from trends, or from cross-sectional analysis of people's current behaviour. But the disruptions that the transport sector is facing, and the dramatic changes in society, technology and information, mean that these no longer hold true. 'We must think about what is changing, and how we get to where we need to be. Devel

Government announcements in the past two weeks of significant proposed changes to transport appraisal to capture wider economic development goals have provided further evidence of a major shift in the transport decision-making landscape. The forthcoming publication of a major white paper prioritising housing delivery points to dominant influences from beyond traditional policy inputs. The moves underline how the traditional methodologies and priorities of transport planning and resource allocat

Replacement funding schemes for deprived areas of the UK after withdrawal from the European Union should not replicate the priorities or outcomes of current EU funding, insist transport campaigners. Billions of pounds in EU grants have been directed towards poor and rural areas of Britain over recent decades. Many road improvements and other transport projects have benefited. For example, dualling the A465 from Brynmawr to Tredegar received £82m from the European Regional Development Fund

Theresa May's Government must make good its pledge to make a nation that "works for everyone" by overhauling the appraisal of projects so that their impact on which people benefit, not purely the total amount of growth. A commission on 'inclusive growth' set up by the RSA (Royal Society of Arts) to influence the Autumn Statement says the vote to leave the European Union highlighted the problem, noted by May, that too many people are not benefiting from growth, with fast-growing sectors locating

Councils in the north of Scotland are preparing to establish a joint committee to oversee road collaboration activities.  The Northern Roads Collaboration Joint Committee will comprise eight councils: Aberdeenshire, Aberdeen, Angus, Argyll & Bute, Highland, Moray, Orkney Islands, and the Western Isles.  Four initial areas of collaborative working have been identified: • Workforce: sharing the workforce where one roads authority has the capacity or skills shortfall that can

Bus services on new bus rapid transit (BRT) routes in the Bristol area may have to be subsidised because of operators’ reluctance to register commercial services.  The West of England Partnership is delivering three BRTroutes with a combined cost of £205m: Ashton Vale to Temple Meads (£55.3m); South Bristol Link (£47.2m); and North Fringe to Hengrove (£102m). The DfT has provided £112m of the funds. The schemes cover three council areas: Bristol, South G

Transport planning needs to be much more open about the huge uncertainties about the future transport system, according to a report published by the Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation. The report from the CIHT FUTURES project draws upon discussions held in 11 regional workshops involving just over 200 CIHT members.  It highlights widespread disquiet about current appraisal procedures but also reports that professionals feel they have no choice but to use them. “Th

Richard Allsop says that society accepts deaths and injuries on UK roads as the trade-off for the benefits of road transport (LTT 19 Aug). Unfortunately this is a very harsh reality. Drivers of road vehicles are a quirky bunch to say the least, and a very biased bunch too, something that is irresponsibly fed by headline-seeking journalism, and deliberately avoided by politicians. If there is an air crash, it will be headline news for several days, and reporters like nothing more than to dig out

The new rules for evaluating travel time savings for people travelling on employers’ business are based on the idea that the values measure “the change in total welfare as a result of quicker business journeys” (‘DfT confirms new travel time values for project appraisal’ LTT 19 Aug). This is the fallacy criticised in my letter you published in the same issue (‘GDP appraisals are sending transport down the wrong road’). Everybody, from the Prime Minister

The DfT’s appraisal methods were criticised this week by transport planners and environmental campaigners for becoming too skewed towards major inter-urban transport projects. The criticisms feature in letters received by LTT in response to last month’s interim reports on the Oxford to Cambridge Expressway and Trans-Pennine Tunnel studies, and the DfT’s decision to reform the treatment of travel time savings in appraisal (LTT 19 Aug).  Transport academic Peter Headicar t

I’d like to share my journey into the world of local transport and, like Ellis Dodwell in LTT703, it’s not entirely conventional. Not only did I never plan on being in this industry, I specifically spent most of my life avoiding it! I was born the same year as the company I now help to run, which my parents both founded and worked for. Even in my teenage years I was engulfed in ‘transport stuff’ that they engaged in and I wanted nothing to do with.  When my friends

The Chancellor announced yesterday that all projects reliant on EU funding signed off by the forthcoming autumn statement are guaranteed promised funds even if they continue after we leave the union. But the Local Government Association said that while welcome, the statement did not guarantee all £5.3bn in regeneration funding promised by councils by 2020. Philip Hammond said that all structural and investment funding under the European Regional Development Fund that is signed off by the

The DfT is commissioning research into how to reconcile the results of transport scheme appraisals focusing on GDP/GVA with traditional welfare cost-benefit analysis. “There is considerable divergence in the way in which major capital investments are appraised across different organisations,” says the DfT. “Many organisations appraise potential transport investments using GDP/GVA and employment impacts rather than welfare impacts [e.g. cost-benefit analysis].”  The

The Government has promised “no impossible hurdles” to local authorities wanting to introduce bus franchising, as the DfT prepares its response to the Competition and Market Authority’s concerns about the Bus Services Bill.  The CMA wrote to transport minister Andrew Jones earlier this summer, recommending that local authorities be required to demonstrate that franchising is justified before implementing a scheme (LTT 08 Jul).  Transport minister Lord Ahmad told pee

Your comment article says that the sub-national transport bodies will be operating in “new territory, beneath national government but above the city-regions and the rest of local government” (‘The middle ground’ LTT 22 Jul).  Well, up to a point. But is this really “new” territory? Highways England and Network Rail already occupy it for strategic roads and rail, both bodies planning their networks in response to national, regional and local interests. If

Local leaders and not Whitehall must decide how connectivity is improved a think-tank has urged as local authorities consider the next steps for the 'Northern Powerhouse'. ResPublica says that with Whitehall "paralysed" over how to leave the European Union, this is an opportunity for local areas to "no longer have to justify their priorities to Whitehall" and "instead get on with making the investments they judge to be most needed". The intervention was made as North of England authorities cons

DERBYSHIRE AND Nottinghamshire county councils are urging the Government to block plans for district councils in their areas to join the Sheffield City Region Combined Authority. The counties say allowing the districts to join the CA will create confusion over how transport and other matters are governed. The Sheffield City Region CA is consulting on plans to move to an elected mayor governance model from next May and for Chesterfield Borough Council in Derbyshire, and Bassetlaw District Counci

THE REFERENDUM result to leave the EU, the National Audit Office’s report on HS2 cost over-runs and timetable slippage (‘HS2 faces costs & delivery pressures – NAO’ LTT 08 July), and the realisation that EU funding for transport projects might not be as secure as originally thought (‘Major transport schemes at risk following UK’s Brexit vote’ ibid), all throws into question exactly what level of transport investments might go ahead in the immediate f

LOCAL AUTHORITIES in South East England are exploring the merits of establishing a statutory sub-national transport body (STB).  Discussions are at an early stage and the geography has yet to be finalised. The initial thinking is that the body could stretch from Kent in the east to Hampshire in the west.  Becky Shaw, chief executive of East Sussex County Council, told councillors this week that talks with the DfT had established that the Department was “committed to the creatio

CHRIS GRAYLING has succeeded Patrick McLoughlin as transport secretary in new Prime Minister Theresa May’s cabinet.  London-born Grayling served as shadow transport secretary from December 2005 to June 2007. The MP for Epsom and Ewell was justice secretary from 2012 to 2015 before becoming leader of the House of Commons.  Grayling’s responsibilities are: transport strategy, including economic growth and climate change; spending review; transport security; and high-speed r

Calls for a referendum threaten plans for a combined authority and devolution deal covering transport for the Solent authorities in Hampshire. The Solent councils claimed in the spring to have struck a deal with Government for an elected mayor-led combined authority covering Portsmouth, Southampton, the Isle of Wight and districts in south Hampshire. The leader of Portsmouth, Councillor Donna Jones, said the authority has "reached the conclusion of negotiations". Southampton's Labour

PLANS TO build a high-speed rail station at Meadowhall on the outskirts of Sheffield were abandoned this week, as HS2 Ltd chairman David Higgins announced new proposals to serve Sheffield city centre instead. A spur will be built off the high-speed line south of Chesterfield, linking to the existing rail network, allowing HS2 trains to travel directly into Sheffield Midland station, potentially calling at the existing  Chesterfield station on the way.  HS2 Ltd says the new arrangemen

The Bus Services Bill could herald a new era for people being able to use public transport in England, enabling the bus to make its true contribution to our economy, our communities and our environment. As the Bill stands, it probably won’t. It doesn’t go far enough to ensure change and there are serious risks that it could cement in place the failings of the current system.  We believe that by putting passengers and communities at the heart of the Bill and addressing three cri

ELECTRIFICATION OF the Valley Lines in South Wales could be among transport schemes denied EU funding in the wake of the UK’s Brexit referendum result. Projects in places such as Northern Ireland and Cornwall could also be hit. The EU had earmarked €10.8bn in 2014-20 for the UK from the European Regional Development Fund and the European Social Fund. Allocations  were €6.9bn for England, €2.4bn for Wales, €895m for Scotland, €513m for Northern Ireland and &eu

THE BREXIT vote in the referendum on 23 June, in terms of its transport-related media coverage, appears to have been almost all about the expansion (or otherwise) of Heathrow Airport. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) issued a statement within hours of the referendum result being known, which stated that: “Preliminary estimates suggest that the number of UK air passengers could be 3-5% lower by 2020, driven by the expected downturn in economic activity and the fall in the

Transport secretary Patrick McLoughlin insisted that long-term infrastructure investment will continue despite the response of the markets to Brexit, it was reported. "It is more important, not less important than ever before," he was reported as saying at the National Infrastructure Forum event. "It is vital that the UK is seen to be open for business. Our infrastructure is fit for the future, the economy is strong and Government and business will pull together for the common good as they alwa

PLANS FOR an elected mayor-led combined authority covering Bristol and the surrounding area could still go ahead despite Conservative-controlled North Somerset Council’s rejection of  the idea. The Chancellor George Osborne announced a devolution agreement with the leaders of the four unitary authorities – Bristol, North Somerset, Bath and North East Somerset, and South Gloucestershire – in his Budget in March.  The agreement envisaged a mayor-led combined authority

HEALTH IMPACT assessments should become mandatory for local plans and transport projects, according to the Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation (CIHT).  The recommendation comes in a new report prepared for the CIHT by consultant Peter Brett Associates. A transport journey to a healthier lifestyle says the links between transport, health and wellbeing are “hampered by a lack of strategic integration nationally and joint working locally”. The local planning syst

ENGLAND'S PROPOSED statutory sub-national transport bodies (STBs) should oversee a newly-designated Major Road Network (MRN) of Highways England roads and the most important local authority roads, says the team working on the MRNplan. The concept of an MRN is being developed in the two-year ‘Major roads for the future’ project, funded by the Rees Jeffreys Road Fund and due to report in October. Former RACFoundation chairman David Quarmby and former MRN civil servant Phil C

Labour has urged voters in northern England to vote to remain in the European Union to unlock over £8bn of new investment for infrastructure. Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell made the claim as he urged the Government to ensure that the U.K receives the funding. Britain currently receives less than the per capita EU average in funding from the European Investment Bank due to Tory cuts and regional governance, he said. It came shortly before the European Commission announced a tranche

HAMPSHIRE COUNTY Council is hoping that a public consultation on local government reform options will thwart plans to create two combined authorities that would split the county and its transport functions in two.  Hampshire’s cabinet this week approved plans to consult the public on options for local government reform. Options will include a unitary Hampshire and the plan for a combined authority (CA) covering Hampshire and the unitaries of Portsmouth, Southampton and Isle of Wight

THE WELSH Government has insisted that Wales can build both the South East Wales Metro and the M4 Relief Road round Newport, after a Labour Assembly Member claimed there is insufficient funding for both. Jenny Rathbone, AM for Cardiff Central and a critic of the M4 scheme, told the BBC that the Metro – a proposed programme of improvements to public transport – would address congestion on the existing M4 and was eligible for some EU funding.  The M4 Relief Road is outside the d

PART OF the M8 on the west side of Glasgow city centre could be covered over by a garden as part of plans to reduce the severance effect of the road. The proposal is contained in a regeneration framework for the Sauchiehall and Garnethill district of central Glasgow prepared by the city council and consultants Gehl Architects, CLES (the Centre for Local Economic Strategies), Urban Movement, and Nick Wright Planning.  Consultation on the framework took place over the winter. The framework

The outcome of the UK’s referendum on European Union membership on 23 June could have big implications for a wide range of transport policies and operations, even though transport has received little coverage in the debate that has dominated the media for weeks.   Andrew Petry, a partner in law firm Simmons-Simmons, who is an expert on EU infrastructure and its procurement, summarises how the referendum debate has tended to generate more heat than light. “Nobody has the answers

Passenger numbers on the Borders Railway are running 22% ahead of forecast but with much bigger differences at many stations, according to data released by Transport Scotland. The total number of single trips on the line linking Edinburgh and Galashiels/Tweedbank in the first six months (6 September last year to 6 March) was 694,373, compared with a forecast of 568,023. As the table shows, the number of trips made from the two most southerly stations – Tweedbank and Galashiels – ar

URBAN TRANSPORT policy needs to return to the road traffic  demand management agenda of the late 1990s if bus services are to flourish, according to a former Government transport adviser. The message comes in a new report from bus lobby group Greener Journeys, written by transport economist David Begg. Begg was a member of the advisory panel that helped produce John Prescott’s 1998 Transport White Paper, Transport: the new deal, which represented the high water mark of demand managem

There is much interest in the possibilities for autonomous vehicles, in particular driverless cars. The focus is mainly on matters such as technological feasibility, the role of the driver, risks and insurance. What has not yet been sufficiently considered is the implications for traffic. How much difference would autonomous vehicles make?  There are two broad routes to driverless cars. Mainstream auto manufacturers are equipping vehicles with devices that assist the driver. Adaptive cruis

Local enterprise Partnerships and local authorities across England have submitted their first bids to the DfT’s new £475m Large Local Majors Fund. The DfT has announced two rounds of funding bids, both with tight deadlines given that the  guidance has only been released in recent weeks.  The first round of bidding is for the £10m available in 2016/17, to cover costs of preparing scheme outline business cases. The deadline is 31 May and successful schemes will be ann

The new Welsh Government is going back to the drawing board on plans to reduce the number of local authorities in Wales. The previous Labour administration proposed replacing the 22 unitary authorities introduced in 1996 with eight or nine authorities, depending on whether two or three would cover North Wales. Only Powys, the large rural county in Mid Wales, would have retained its present shape.   The proposals had been championed by Leighton Andrews, the public services minister, w

London mayor Sadiq Khan has proposed tougher measures to improve the capital’s air quality, including expanding and earlier implementation of the Ultra Low Emission Zone, and tougher  London-wide emission standards for lorries and other heavy vehicles. In his first major announcement since being appointed mayor this month, Khan said a consultation on measures would start imminently, including:  • extending the proposed ultra-low emission zone (ULEZ) beyond the existing cen

Strathclyde Partnership for Transport is developing proposals for a bus alliance with operators to try and reverse a steep decline in patronage. Bruce Kiloh, SPT’s head of transport planning, explained  the proposals at last week’s STAR (Scottish Transport Applications and Research) conference in Glasgow.  Passenger numbers in the south-west of Scotland and Strathclyde (12 local authority areas) fell by 49 million (22%) between 2004/05 and 2014/15. The network has shrunk,

Earlier this week roads minister Andrew Jones gave us a peek at what the Modern Transport Bill, announced in the Queen’s Speech, will have to say about motor insurance, promising consultation over the summer. This seems to represent the driverless car taking one more step away from the realms of science fiction, one more step towards our everyday travel reality. It’s easy to see why the Government is so keen to put the UK at the forefront of developing autonomous technology –

It’s been a long-time coming but the Bus Services Bill was finally published last week. The need for the draft legislation arose after the Chancellor included pledges of bus franchising in the first devolution deals struck with Greater Manchester in 2014 and Cornwall last summer. Franchising has since been included in the devolution agreements struck for other parts of England. As discussions of new legislation progressed, further powers have been added, resulting in the Bill running to &n

The Government should assess whether devolution of transport and other powers to nations and regions of the U.K will lead to better policy outcomes and "at what level of government the powers in question should be exercised and why". The Peers note calls for guidance on what policy areas might be included in devolution deals, after the first eight deals mostly included a devolved consolidated transport budget and bus franchising, but do not urge greater standardisation or even a list of powers

As elected mayor, Sir Peter Soulsby was able to fulfill his long-held ambition to turn the Nicholas Place car park into a public space. “As council leader I could never have made the major improvements to the space that is now Jubilee Square,” he says. Before becoming mayor it had proved “impossible” to change the site due to “a combination of contentious issues” such as removing the car park, moving bus stops and cutting down a tree.  The council estima

The discovery of a slain king under a car park and the emergence of a football team that has defied the odds have both played a key role in raising the profile of Leicester. The East Midlands city attracted global media coverage in 2012 when the skeleton of King Richard III was discovered under a council car park. After DNA testing confirmed that the remains belonged to the last Plantagenet ruler, reinterment took place at Leicester Cathedral last year. This has prompted the arrival in Leiceste

For his inaugural lecture in November 2014, Bjorn Birgisson, pro vice-chancellor and executive dean for the school of engineering and applied sciences at Aston University, chose the curious title: ‘Roads, Love Them or Hate Them’? A friend suggested I go along, for some liveblogging experience. I was open-minded, but with a niggling assumption that this might be an attempt to bring academic activities together in a futuristic, utopian way with no real understanding of the day-to-day

The election of a new mayor for London was not the only mayoral contest held on May 5, of course, and one other contest in particular, the battle to win control of Bristol, received a significant amount of media coverage after Labour candidate Marvin Rees won comfortably. “Where was the election won and lost?” The Bristol Post asked rhetorically on 7 May. “The answer to this question cannot be dismissed by simply saying there was a citywide dislike for George Ferguson [the incu

The Government’s proposal for an elected mayor-led combined authority (CA) for Bristol and the surrounding area may unravel because of local opposition. An elected mayor-led CA was part of the West of England devolution agreement announced by the Chancellor in his March Budget. The West of England geography is the four unitary authorities in the former Avon County Council area: Bristol, South Gloucestershire, Bath and North East Somerset, and North Somerset.  The agreement also prom

A bus operator has produced a guide to encourage councils to pursue bus franchising.  Most UK bus operators oppose the Government’s plan to include bus franchising powers in the forthcoming Buses Bill. But HCTGroup, the UK’s biggest social enterprise operator, sees franchising as an opportunity to grow its market share and says franchising is better for passengers, local authorities and operators than the deregulated system that exists across the UK outside London.  HCT o

The UK is out of shape. According to a recent study by the University of Washington, almost two-thirds of English adults are either obese or overweight. In western Europe, only Malta and Iceland beat us when it comes to obesity. This trend is forcing the Government to pay attention, not least because of the gigantic costs it inflicts on the NHS. It seems that every other week brings a new scare story about diet and nutrition with sugar the latest villain and a soft-drink sugar tax duly announced

The road sign that signifies children crossing has been given a makeover by its designer, Margaret Calvert, over 50 years. The release of the remastered sign marks the finalisation of major overhaul of the UK’s traffic signage regulations. The UK’s current system of traffic signs came into effect on 1 January 1965, following the Anderson Report and the Worboys Report of 1961-63. The graphic designers employed for both were Margaret Calvert and the late Jock Kinneir. The system produ

The opportunity to end decades of political dithering on airport expansion has been “squandered”, says the House of Commons’ Transport Committee in its report on airport expansion in the South East of England. The MPs urge transport secretary Patrick McLoughlin to set out a clear timetable for expansion, making clear the measures that have been accepted or rejected as well as the work that needs to be completed.

The City of Cardiff Council is preparing to procure a public bicycle hire scheme, five years after the previous one ended suddenly. The council pledged this month to “deliver an externally funded on-street cycle hire scheme for the city”. It began to put out feelers in December 2014, publishing a Prior Information Notice that envisaged circa 20 docking hubs and circa 250 bikes in the initial phase, increasing to 350 to 500 bikes later. A scheme was supposed to be operating by this m

Designating A Key Route Network (KRN) of roads in the Liverpool City Region will have far-reaching consequences for road maintenance funding and delivery, say the councils. A KRN was included in the devolution agreement for the Liverpool city region struck between ministers and the councils last year. The KRN will be managed by the combined authority (CA) on behalf of the city region mayor, who will be elected next May.  The KRN will include: all roads that form part of the primary r

Conwy County Borough Council has set itself on a collision course with Network Rail by resolving that a foot crossing that closed five years ago should be reopened. Network Rail has formally objected to the Definitive Map Modification Order that Conwy made last month in response to an application from the local MP.  The council intends to confirm the right of way Order following a period in which the public could comment, which ended on 21 April. If the Order is confirmed, Network Rail wi

To be a successful transport planning freelancer requires a wide and distinctive range of skills, including a high degree of flexibility, impartiality, diplomacy, self-confidence, and good communication abilities.  Every freelancer has a unique story to tell, but it is not a form of employment that will suit everyone. Peter Mattinson, a director of recruitment consultants the Mattinson Partnership, has wide experience in placing freelance transport contractors, and emphasises that some peo

There are many new sensors that can be used to collect travel data or produce digital traces that in turn can be processed to deliver this type of information. CCTV, smart cards, bank cards, Global Positioning Systems (GPS), mobile phones, Bluetooth devices and WiFi all leave digital footprints that offer the opportunity of collecting travel data at low cost. Conventional methods such as Household Travel (HTS) and Intercept Surveys are not error-free, and the observations are often disappointed

What are the current challenges with respect to sustainable cities and transport planning in Middle East context?  Nadeem Shakir: Car culture is dominant across the Middle East, with as many as 700 cars per 1,000 population, one of the highest rates in the world, and growing at 6.5 per cent per annum in the GCC region. With summer tempertures of +50 degrees celsius, it's no surprise that encouraging moves to public transport is a real challenge. The maximum walkable distance used in the pl

Local Enterprise Partnerships are important players in England’s local transport scene but a new National Audit Office report says they are uncertain about their role in the new world of combined authorities and elected mayors. Andrew Forster reports England’s 39 Local Enterprise Partnerships are preparing bids to the third round of the Government’s Local Growth Fund, with £1.8bn up for grabs. As in the first two rounds, which were worth a combined £7.3bn, transpor

A recent @Transportxtra Tweet asked: “Is this what a place needs to be like for #smartertravel?” The tweet referred to a map of a small area of Hackney that benefits from a series of road closures which, along with parking controls and self-enforcing 20mph zones, means through traffic is excluded, making it a great place to cycle, walk and play. To quote Meg Hillier MP Hackney South and Shoreditch, in the Parliamentary cycling debate of 16 October 2014: “...it is possible to c

Capacity on the north-west quadrant of the M60 Manchester orbital motorway must be increased to cope with burgeoning demand, according to a preliminary study of the corridor for the DfT and Transport for the North.    The Manchester North West Quadrant study is examining the capacity on the M60 between junctions 8 and 18, plus the M62 on either side (junctions 9 to 12, and 18 to 20). The road forms part of the M62 Trans-Pennine corridor from Liverpool to Hull.  “If the eco

READING BOROUGH Council has turned down an application on behalf of the Uber taxi/minicab firm to obtain a licence to enable its drivers to operate in the town.  Rejecting the application, the council’s licensing applications sub-committee heard: “Officers are concerned that, due to the way Uber works by listing the closest driver/vehicle to the customer, any vehicle from any borough within close proximity would be able to access the job and complete the booking.” This w

A utopian vision for the future of private transport in the UK reached an audience of many millions when a BBC correspondent gave the idea significant nationwide coverage.  “There are currently 31 million cars in Britain, but are we close to ‘peak car’?” The BBC’s home affairs editor, Mark Easton, asked on 9 March. “Could technology – including driverless electric vehicles and uber-style apps – mean that, rather than owning a car, we will soo

Transport secretary Patrick McLoughlin has written to Boris Johnson setting out the detail of Transport for London’s funding settlement for the next five years. The letter comes as TfL this week published a new business plan, outlining how it plans to cope with the spending settlement, which will see its resource grant from Government slashed from £447m in 2016/17 to zero in 2018/19.   London transport commissioner Mike Brown told the TfL board this week that the abolition of

The transport decision-making landscape in England was re-shaped this week by the Budget and related announcements on the future of Network Rail and the role of the National Infrastructure Commission. Chancellor George Osborne announced three new elected mayor combined authorities with transport powers, covering  East Anglia, Greater Lincolnshire, and the West of England  (see below).  He also confirmed that the Midlands Connect transport alliance of local authorities, local ent

Plans for a combined authority with an elected mayor  overseeing transport across Derby, Derbyshire, Nottingham, and Nottinghamshire seem to be falling apart, as a number of Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire districts refuse to participate.  The North Midlands Combined Authority deal would have covered 19 authorities – the unitaries of Nottingham and Derby, the county councils of Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire, and their  15 constituent district councils.  Earlier this m

Transport minister Andrew Jones gave the keynote speech this week at Landor LINKS’ Smarter Travel Live event in Milton Keynes. The two-day event was being attended by 700 delegates. Discussions included the Government’s latest Budget decisions, and the framework between Government, local authorities and the private sector for delivering transport innovations and decision-making. When challenged about the Government’s use of instruments to change travel behaviour the minister

The Chancellor this week announced £135m for the North of England to take forward development work on road and rail improvements.  The Government will award £75m for the development of road improvement plans – a TransPennine road tunnel under the Peak District linking Greater Manchester and South Yorkshire;  the A66, A69 TransPennine routes; and the north-west quadrant of the M60 in Greater Manchester. A further £60m will fund plans to improve rail between the

Network Rail has commissioned designers to come up with a less intrusive form of overhead electrification equipment following complaints that gantries on the Great Western Main Line have disfigured Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB).  Balfour Beatty has been appointed to conduct feasibility work on designs, with 2B Landscape Consultancy Ltd, run by Bill Blackledge, sub-contracted to undertake the landscape and visual impact assessment work.  About 11 of the 17 miles of line b

The falling number of recorded crimes on the UK’s roads does not represent a reduction in offences being committed. In Road Traffic Law Enforcement, the MPs link the fall in the number of traffic offences being detected to a decline in the number of road traffic officers. The committee also flags up an increase in the number of people being seriously injured and expresses particular concern over the safety of cyclists and motorcyclists.

Maas is an exciting development in the transport sector, offering a new way of thinking in terms of how the delivery and consumption of transport is managed.  It is an efficient, personalised transport service, integrating a range of modes and presenting the consumer with the best options for getting from A to B through the use of an app. Flexible ticketing and payment options allow consumers to pay for access to a range of mobility options, rather than a specific mode.  Over the yea

Following the announcement that the Crossrail train line is to be named the Elizabeth Line, in honour of the Queen, various media commentators chose to use the news to discuss the importance, or otherwise, of London’s new rail system. “There will be no Elizabeth tube line from Salford to Rochdale, from Bolton to Wigan,” columnist Simon Jenkins said in The Guardian on 25 February. “There may be a train or two, but not a royal highway blessed by the monarch… The capi

The current debate over bus provision focuses on two main models – deregulated partnerships and London-style franchising. Proponents of deregulated partnerships stress the benefits of commercial innovation and flexibility, with the profit motive giving greater focus to cost, quality control and increased turnover.  The local authority’s partnership role usually focuses on the operational cost savings it can bring such as bus priority, parking controls and traffic management, bu

The London Borough of Newham is preparing a £100m ten-year programme to improve roads, footways, and streetlighting.  “We believe this is the largest local road and lighting improvement programme ever undertaken in London,” Gary Alderson, Newham’s director of commissioning (community and environment), told the cabinet. Newham is run by a Labour elected mayor, Sir Robin Wales. Newham currently has a £20m five-year programme, which still have two years left to

An unprecedented transfer of transport powers from a county to a neighbouring combined authority was expected to be approved by councillors as LTT closed for press this week.   Councillors on Chesterfield Borough Council, which lies within Derbyshire County Council’s area, were expected to approve plans to become a full member of the Sheffield City Region Combined Authority. The decision, which will have to be endorsed by the Secretary of State for communities and local government, w

Minor injury collisions have fallen at fixed speed camera sites in Wales, according to a new statistical analysis that also finds no evidence of casualty benefits from mobile camera enforcement.  Last year GoSafe, the Welsh safety camera partnership, commissioned the Local Government Data Unit Wales (LGDU) to determine if there had been a change in collisions in the vicinity of speed cameras. The data unit applied the method deployed  by Professor Richard Allsop for an RAC Foundation

Enhanced partnerships, bus franchising, and a requirement on operators to publish data on fares, routes and timetables, will be the three components of the forthcoming Buses Bill for England, the DfT has revealed.      Buses minister Andrew Jones told a conference last week that the current mechanisms for securing improved services – voluntary partnerships, statutory partnerships, and Quality Contracts – all had drawbacks.  “Voluntary arrangements are only

Give me a snapshot of your Smarter Travel career to date? Rachel Evans: I’ve been at Atkins for three years and have been involved with a wide range of travel behavioural change projects. My experiences include leading multi-business travel forums at business parks to managing community Personalised Travel Planning (PTP) and the implementation of Travel Demand Management for Gloucester’s host City role in the 2015 Rugby World Cup.  Sarah Fisher: My decade at Atkins has  b

The European Commission has declared that connected cars should be on the road by 2019 as industry representatives and public authorities agreed a shared vision for deploying co-operative intelligent transport systems. Vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure communications have a "strong potential to improve road safety and road transport efficiency," the report states, but says without common action, deciding where to start investing, and how to make systems inter-operable, would be p

Councillors in Edinburgh have over-ruled objections to proposed signed-only 20mph limits on residential streets and shopping areas across the city.  The city-wide 20mph limits will be implemented in six phases beginning with the city centre and rural west Edinburgh in July and ending with the southern fringe of the council area in February 2018.  A network of 30mph and 40mph roads is being retained but the 20mph limit will apply to many important roads, including Queen Street in the

Vehicular traffic may be banned from streets outside more schools in East Lothian at the start and end of the school day, under council proposals.  In 2014 the council introduced experimental Traffic Regulation Orders (TROs) to ban moving traffic on two roads outside schools in Haddington between 08.30 and 09.30 and 15.00 and 16.00. The aim of the ‘school streets’ is to improve road safety and encourage children to walk/cycle to school. Last summer councillors agreed to make t

Network Rail has warned that it will vigorously oppose the designation of active travel routes in Wales that make use of level crossings because of safety concerns. The Active Travel (Wales) Act obliges all 22 unitary authorities to map their existing active travel routes, after which they will prepare maps of future networks and prioritise routes for implementation. This week is the deadline for all authorities to submit their maps of existing provision to the Welsh Government for appraisal.

Elected mayors should set up data teams to collect, collate and put to use public and private data to make cycling safer and improve public transport, a new report argues. The think-tank Policy Exchange says most U.K cities have "failed to put in place even the most basic mechanisms to join-up, analyse and act upon the vast quantity of data they already have". Cities agreeing to elected mayors need a Mayor's Office of Data Analytics, like in New York, to combine and analyse data from different

Consultation is underway on Welsh Government plans to cut the number of councils from 22 to just eight or nine.  The eight-authority model would be achieved by merging: Isle of Anglesey, Gwynedd and Conwy Denbighshire, Flintshire and Wrexham Ceredigion, Pembrokeshire and Carmarthenshire Swansea and Neath Port Talbot Bridgend, Rhondda Cynon Taf, and Merthyr Tydfil Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan Blaenau Gwent, Caerphilly, Torfaen, Monmouthshire, and Newp

Council leaders in the West Midlands conurbation have approved a new transport plan.  Movement for Growth is touted as a 20-year plan covering the seven metropolitan district councils, who will soon establish a combined authority overseeing transport. The plan will complement the Midlands Connect transport strategy covering a larger area and focusing on national/regional transport connections. The conurbation plan approved by West Midlands Integrated Transport Authority includes a proposa

A high-speed rail line between the West Midlands and Crewe will be built and opened by 2027, just one year after the opening of the London-West Midlands line, under revised plans for the HS2 project just announced by the Government. Ministers have also signalled their intention to change the plans for the HS2 station in Leeds city centre, with the new proposals integrating the station with the city’s existing station.   The line to Crewe had previously been planned for delivery as pa

City Car Club has retained its car club in Glasgow despite losing the Glasgow City Council contract to a rival.  Community interest company Co-Wheels won the council’s contract earlier this year, giving it access to the dedicated on-street car club parking bays (LTT 12 Jun).  Instead of leaving the city,  however, City Car Club has moved its vehicles to non- council land such as private car parks. “We’re not in the business of abandoning our members,” a s

I agree with many of Yaron Hollander’s observations.  As someone who reviews demand modelling and forecasting reports from around the world on a monthly basis I think we’ve become lost in mathematical nonsense (I nearly wrote “mathematical sophistication”, but commonly it is simply nonsense).   At one end of the scale I come across regression equations ‘estimated’ from the flimsiest of data where fundamental model assumptions are violated, invalidat

I think there are two distinct threads to Yaron’s comments, which it is easy to confuse but which should be considered separately; the first that models are imperfect and second that models can be misused. Even a perfect model could be egregiously misused, as a result of incompetence or malice or both, so the distinction is rather important. On the first point, we must recognise that models will always be imperfect and while we should of course try to improve them we should be humble and

After ten years in development, construction has finally started on the West of England’s MetroBus network. MetroBus is a £200m bus rapid transit scheme jointly promoted by three West of England councils – Bristol City Council, North Somerset Council and South Gloucestershire Council. MetroBus will provide passengers with rapid and reliable journeys to key destinations across the sub-region. The 50km network builds on recent improvements to major bus corridors made by the Gre

Lambeth council has reversed an Experimental Traffic Management Order closing roads at Loughborough Junction after sustained opposition from local residents, businesses and the emergency services. Six roads were closed in the six-month trial at the end of August, with a review planned after three months. However, the London borough responded to concerns, by bringing forward the review to just eight weeks into the trial. As a result of the review, four of the roads - Loughborough Road, Barrington

The monetised value of journey time savings typically forms the largest economic benefit in appraisals of new transport infrastructure. Even savings of just a few minutes to individual travellers can soon add up if millions of travellers use the infrastructure each year.   The current recommended values of time in the DfT’s WebTAG appraisal guidance are based on 2003 research by the Institute for Transport Studies at the University of Leeds (ITS Leeds) and independent consultant John

Northamptonshire County Council may create  a company to deliver specialist transport services on behalf of a range of organisations in the area.  The idea is being explored through the county’s Total Transport project, one of a number of projects around the country being funded from the Government’s £4m Total Transport fund. The projects are looking at ways to secure efficiencies in the delivery of specialist transport in sectors such as education, social and health

Politicians, planners and the public all place far too much confidence in the capabilities of transport modelling to provide reliable forecasts of the future, according to a new report. Yaron Hollander, the report’s author, should know what he’s talking about. He was Transport for London’s policy appraisal & sub-regional modelling manager from 2012 until October this year when he left to set up CT Think!, a consultancy specialising in “infrastructure appraisal, transp

Bus operators lack friends in the political class right now, with the Conservatives and Labour both championing the idea of franchising. Yet, when the chips are down, the operators still have considerable powers of persuasion in legal and quasi-legal circles, as demonstrated in last week’s conclusions of the Quality Contract Scheme board, set up to assess plans for a bus Quality Contract Scheme in Tyne and Wear. The board, chaired by North East traffic commissioner Kevin Rooney, has deliv

Transport models are being widely misused in policy-making, with decision-makers placing far too much confidence in model forecasts, according to a new report.  “The demand for transport modelling in the UK is high [and] when there is so much modelling work to do, there is a risk of doing it in an irresponsible way,” writes Yaron Hollander, a former modelling manager at Transport for London, in his report, Who will save us from the misuse of models? Hollander lists ten types o

The DFT and local authorities were this week digesting the conclusions of Tyne and Wear’s Quality Contract Scheme board, which has all but killed-off Nexus’s hopes of introducing the UK’s first Quality Contract for buses in 2017.  In an uncompromising report, the board, chaired by North East traffic commissioner Kevin Rooney, concludes that the PTE’s proposals would have an adverse impact on the area’s major bus operators that was out of all proportion to the

The full or partial privatisation of Network Rail are among options being examined in the review of the organisation being undertaken for ministers by Nicola Shaw, the chief executive officer of High Speed 1.  Shaw has been asked to develop recommendations for the longer-term future shape and financing of Network Rail. The longer term is defined as 2019-2029 (2019 being the first year of Network Rail’s next five-year control period).  Her remit covers: the scope of activities t

The DfT has appointed a panel of academics to advise on transport modelling, appraisal and evaluation methods.  The ‘joint analysis development panel’ is co-chaired by Amanda Rowlatt, the DfT’s chief analyst, and Peter Jones, professor of transport and sustainable development at University College London.  The other academic members of the panel are:  • Richard Batley, professor of transport demand and evaluation at the Institute for Transport Studies, Un

Consultation closes next week on the Government’s new plan to improve UK air quality and accelerate compliance with the European Air Quality Directive limit values for nitrogen dioxide (LTT 18 Sep). In April, the UK Supreme Court ordered the Government to submit revised plans to the European Commission by the end of December explaining how the period of exceedance of the Directive’s limit values for NO2 would be kept “as short as possible” (LTT 01 May). The new plan says

The Chancellor's announcement today of devolution deals for the North East of England and Tees Valley city regions will enable local leaders to undertake ambitious major transport schemes, according to a think-tank. The agreement will see the creation of investment funds targeted at economic development, including £1.5bn for the North East city region, along with devolved responsibility for the region's transport budget and for delivery. Lord Porter, chairman of the Local Government Asso

The DfT has just completed a series of workshops around England to discuss the content of the promised Buses Bill. The Bill became a necessity after Chancellor George Osborne agreed to support legislation for a franchised bus model in Greater Manchester in return for the area agreeing to have an elected mayor (LTT 14 Nov 14). The Queen’s Speech said the Bill would “provide the option for combined authority areas with directly-elected mayors to be responsible for the running of their

CARDIFF CITY Council has revealed an increase in car usage versus other modes, as new concerns surface about the Welsh Government’s ‘Metro’ plan for public transport in the city region. The Local Development Plan commits Cardiff to a 50:50 modal split by 2026 between car and “sustainable modes” for journeys to work, to accommodate “future city development”. In 2013-14, 44% of commuting trips were by sustainable modes. However, the proportion fell to 43%

CAR CLUB umbrella organisation Carplus has announced a total of £139,000 of government funding to launch five new car clubs, in Poole, Dorset, and across four locations in Cornwall, and to extend the Norfolk car club further. Co-Cars Cornwall, which is being established in association with First Great Western, will create four new car clubs with cars at rail stations in Newton Abbot, Plymouth, Truro and Falmouth. The Poole project, meanwhile, will launch a new car club running four electr

The House of Commons Transport Committee is conducting an inquiry into road traffic law enforcement. The committee will scrutinise how effectively the government's policies to improve road safety by tackling dangerous or careless driving are being enforced. The committee says it is particularly interested in receiving evidence on: The government's priorities and leadership role in im

The House of Commons Transport Select Committee has launched an inquiry into surface transport at airports. The inquiry will examine whether strategic connections to airports fulfil current and future requirements in terms of range and capacity. The committee says it is interested to assess the effectiveness of the government's approach to planning surface access to airports, as well as understanding whether the governme

The City of Cardiff Council is drawing up a full business case for delivering its infrastructure services by a wholly-owned company, known as a Teckal. The company’s activities would encompass highway operations; highway asset management; transport scheme infrastructure design and construction management; waste collection; street cleansing; parks management; and economic development projects, design and development.  Gross and net expenditure on these activities in 2015/16 were &pou

I wonder if you’re familiar with Rule 170 of the Highway Code. You certainly should be if you hold a driving licence, and exercise the privilege it grants you. Rule 170 tells drivers to “take extra care at junctions”, going on to say they “should watch out for pedestrians crossing a road into which you are turning. If they have started to cross they have priority, so give way.” Rule 8 clarifies these relative priorities from the pedestrian’s perspective: &ldqu

Twelve months ago the DfT ended its foray into journey planning websites by announcing the immediate closure of Transport Direct. Launched in 2004 and hailed as the world’s first nationwide multi-modal journey planner, Transport Direct served more than 160 million information requests over its ten-year life, though public awareness of the site was suppressed by a mystifying lack of marketing. When closure came, the Government said, in effect, that other travel information systems, capitali

You are fully justified in saying that “the chief advocates of ultra-light rail, many of whom are now getting on in years, have little to show for all their enthusiastic effort” (‘Any takers for ultra-light rail?’ LTT 10 Jul). However, as one of those advocates, may I implore your readers not to take this as indicating the lack of a market for Ultra Light Rail (ULR)?  In my view, ULR would be flourishing all over the world by now if we had succeeded in getting even

Developer contributions are an established way of funding transport infrastructure. In England and Wales, councils can apply a standard charge, the Community Infrastructure Levy, to development across an area to raise funds for infrastructure to support that development. Scotland doesn’t operate CIL and contributions here are typically sourced through Section 75 planning obligations. These must satisfy a number of tests set out in a Scottish Government Circular (3/2012), including that the

Politicians on the Isle of Wight are seeking assurances from the DfT about the future of the island’s railway. The Island Line links Ryde Pier Head on the north of the island with Shanklin to the south, and is part of the South West Trains franchise currently held by Stagecoach. The line uses former London Underground trains built from 1938 onwards and converted for use on the island in 1989-90.  Local MP Andrew Turner says the line needs £40m spent on it over the next four ye

Business leaders in Yorkshire are calling on the Government to accommodate high-speed rail within the existing Leeds station rather than in a new dedicated station to the south.  The plans may require a huge remodelling of the city’s rail network, including a new rail line to bring some local services into the city’s station from the east, rather than from the west as at present.  The Government is currently reviewing with Network Rail and local stakeholders how HS2 shoul

The introduction of bus franchising to Greater Manchester is still at least three years away, according to one of the conurbation’s district councils. In the devolution deal struck with the conurbation authorities last autumn, the Government said it “stands ready to support legislation if Greater Manchester conclude, following consultation they will take forward, that they wish to move to a franchised model of bus service delivery” (LTT14 Nov 14). The Government’s suppor

Councillors in Edinburgh have approved new street design guidance that gives more emphasis to pedestrians and cycling over motor vehicles. John Bury, Edinburgh’s acting director of services for communities, said key differences with the council’s existing guidance included: • more pedestrian-friendly junctions by providing sharper corner radii to slow down turning vehicles • widening the use of raised road junctions • introducing ‘continuous pavement’ a

A proliferation of tactile paving could be implemented on streets if councils strictly adhere to new draft guidance from the DfT, a street designer warned this week.  The DfT’s consultation document says tactile paving should be used to demarcate the boundary of carriageway and footway wherever there is no level change between carriageway and footway, or a level change of less than 60mm. In these circumstances, the Department says the boundary between footway and carriageway should

A shake-up to bus services in Sheffield this autumn is likely to be keenly studied by transport authorities and bus operators across the country as the debate about bus Quality Contracts and franchising continues to rage. The changes feature a revised network using fewer buses, co-ordinated timetables on some routes, and lower multi-operator fares.  “These proposals are at the leading edge of what can be delivered using partnerships,” Chris Roberts, South Yorkshire PTE’s

Danny Kennedy (pictured), has resigned from his post as Northern Ireland’s regional development minister, which covers transport, following the decision of his party, the Ulster Unionist Party, to withdraw from the Government because of a dispute with Sinn Fein

The DfT has set up a taskforce to look into ways to reduce sign clutter on Britain’s roads.  The taskforce will be led by Sir Alan Duncan MP, who has campaigned on the issue for 20 years. Said Duncan: “The UK has erected thousands of road signs that are completely unnecessary, such as traffic light warning signs when you can see the lights themselves. We are going to look at how we might get rid of whole categories of unnecessary signs.” The taskforce will consider what

The Office for Rail and Road (ORR) is commissioning consultants to advise on how it should benchmark the performance of Highways England.  The Infrastructure Act 2015 gives the ORR responsibility to monitor HE. A memorandum of understanding between the DfT and ORR says the ORR should benchmark HE’s performance and efficiency against “comparable organisations in other countries and other sectors”. Benchmarking will be used to: inform the setting of the next Road Investmen

Scottish councils should be given the power to introduce a standard charge to help fund transport and other infrastructure associated with development, according to a new report for the Scottish Government. The recommendation features in a review of infrastructure planning commissioned by a cross-Government team – including Transport Scotland – from consultants Ryden, WSP, and Brodies LLP.  Responding to the report, Alex Neil, Scotland’s social justice secretary, said: &

Manston Airport in Kent is to be used as a temporary lorry park to complement Operation Stack as the migrant chaos in France continues to affect cross-Channel transport. Manston will provide additional storage capacity for lorries bound for the continent, when the police instigate Operation Stack, turning the coastbound carriageway of he M20 through Kent into a lorry park.  In an attempt to reduce the economic impact of the problems, the Government has also announced a filter system for l

The public spat between Pteg and public transport consultancy the TAS Partnership over bus franchising continued this week, with the two sides accusing each other of failing to look at the evidence objectively, and Pteg revealing the TAS report that sparked the controversy had been commissioned by Stagecoach, a vehement critic of franchising.    The dispute comes amid heightened political interest in franchising outside London, with the Government promising a Buses Bill that will give

Highways and transport staff in Greater Manchester district councils are to be consulted on plans to move to a shared services model for a range of activities including highways design, transport strategy and traffic management.  The ten Greater Manchester districts already collaborate on activities such as urban traffic control, highways forecasting and analysis, and road safety, and have been working with Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) to review further shared service opportunit

‘Capital rich, revenue poor’  is an increasingly apt description of the transport funding situation councils in England find themselves in as ministers pursue a strategy of increasing capital funding in the belief this is good for economic growth, and cutting revenue (or resource) grant as part of the austerity drive. These diverging trends, and their implications, are explored in a new report by Pedro Abrantes and Tom Ellerton of the Pteg support unit (Pteg being the organisat

The Government is committed to delivering the full Y network of HS2, transport secretary Patrick McLoughlin has said. “HS2 is now a manifesto commitment of a government with a Commons majority,” he told an audience in Leeds.  In an apparent reference to pre-election comments made by Ed Balls, the former shadow chancellor, about whether building HS2 was a good idea, McLoughlin said: “Thankfully the northern electorate didn’t listen to those who tried to play politic

It is "not clear" that directly-elected mayors for combined authorities proposed for conurbations will "be the strong leader its proponents desire and its detractors fear," according to the House of Commons library. In an analysis of the Cities and Local Government Devolution Bill, the Commons library notes that individual orders for each combined authority will specify powers to be held by the mayors, and powers held by the combined authority. "Many decisions will have to be taken by majority

The inquiry team investigating the ill-fated Edinburgh Tram project has invited public submissions on the key issues under consideration. The city’s first tram line between the city centre and the airport opened last May. The Scottish Government has set up an inquiry, led by Lord Hardie, to understand why the project was delivered three years late and suffered a massive cost overrun, forcing the route to be truncated.  The inquiry team is sifting through around five million document

Oxfordshire County Council has told housing developers to accommodate cyclists on-street on the main streets in a major new housing development, rather than building parallel shared use cycle/pedestrian paths. Commenting on the outline planning application for the 4,550-dwelling Valley Park development near Didcot, Oxfordshire says: “The main streets should have space for cycling on the carriageway. Shared-use paths running alongside main/spine roads should not be provided.” 

Scotland’s transport minister Derek Mackay ruled out changing the default speed limit on restricted roads from 30 to 20mph during a presentation of the Scottish Government’s transport policies in Glasgow last week.  Campaign group 20’s Plenty for Us recently called on the DfT and devolved administrations to make 20mph the default speed for restricted roads – streetlit roads on which the default limit is currently 30mph – by 2020. Campaign director Rod King tol

Wales was this week promised increased devolved powers over transport, including over bus service registrations and the setting of speed limits. The powers will be contained in the Wales Bill announced in the Queen’s Speech.The Government said the Bill would give the National Assembly for Wales powers over “ports, taxi regulation, the registration of bus services and speed limits”. Bus service registrations in Wales are currently managed by the Traffic Commissioner. The chan

One of the central offers from public health professionals as they re-joined local government in April 2013 was our proficiency in evidence-based practice and policy and the opportunity to apply this lens to various aspects of local government activity. Two years into a new relationship with local government colleagues, many public health teams will have been assessing how ‘evidence’ as public health practitioners understand this word, can be used to guide activities determined by ot

THE GOVERNMENT this week pledged to press ahead with its high-speed rail plans, as a sceptic of HS2 joined the Treasury and reports emerged that the idea of building a line  to Scotland has been dropped. “My Government will continue to legislate for high-speed rail links between the different parts of the country,” said the Queen at the state opening of Parliament. The Government’s legislative programme includes the continuation of the High-Speed Rail (London-West Midland

The Midlands Highway Alliance has awarded AECOM and its supply partner Waterman a new contract to deliver multi-disciplinary design services.  The MHA is led by Leicestershire County Council and has 21 members – 20 local authorities and Highways England. The professional services partnership (PSP) contract covers areas such as major highways improvements, maintenance, road safety projects, town centre regeneration schemes and transport studies. The new contract – known as PSP2

The Local Government Association is calling on the Government to not stop at devolution for cities but to offer all areas greater powers over buses and roads. The LGA, speaking ahead of the Queen's Speech which is expected to include a Cities Devolution Bill to give greater transport and other powers to metropolitan areas, said that areas outside non-metropolitan England are responsible for 56% of national output and have potential to deliver greater growth. In a 'white paper'&n