Contact: John Buckett, ext 6599 email: [email protected]

1. Summary

1.1 This report discusses the draft Local Transport Plan (LTP) guidance received from the Department for Transport (DfT), the implications for Hampshire County Council and the recommended response to the draft guidance.

1.2 The draft guidance consultation responses are required by 8 October 2004 and final guidance will then be issued in November. This leaves a very tight timetable for the preparation of the new LTP for submission in July 2005.

1.3 The guidance asks for the LTP to be set within a wider policy context and long term strategy, with four priority areas of tackling congestion, safety, accessibility and air quality.

1.4 Tackling urban congestion is a key priority. Large urban areas (which includes South Hampshire, with Portsmouth and Southampton) will be required to produce strategies to tackle congestion which include investigating the impact of congestion charging. This is optional for the rest of the county.

2. Corporate Strategy

2.1 This report supports all Aims of the Corporate Strategy as the overall objectives for Hampshire's LTP are proposed to be the same as the corporate objectives.

3. Local Transport Plan Guidance

3.1 The County Council's new LTP, covering the period 2006 to 2011, is required to be submitted to the Government by 29 July 2005.

3.2 Draft LTP guidance was received from the Government on 2 August 2004. It contains 70 pages of advice, plus annexes and reference lists. Responses to this consultation are required by 8 October 2004 and final guidance is expected to be issued in November.

3.3 A summary list of the main points of the guidance is included in the attached appendix. While there may well be some changes incorporated in its final version, the timetable is such that it is necessary to begin the production process in earnest now, rather than wait until final guidance is issued.

3.4 The main issues which need to be addressed immediately concern the timetable and the role of this committee, the implications of the emphasis within the guidance on urban congestion and short term assessment and specific requests within the guidance for comments on indicators.

4. Timetable

4.1 The LTP to be published in July is required to include:

(i) an analysis of problems and opportunities;

(ii) a longer term strategy set within a wide policy context;

(iii) county-wide (and other) targets showing what the County Council and its partners intend to achieve in the five year period 2005/06 to 2010/11; and

(iv) proposed programmes of capital investment and other measures.

4.2 The overall objectives for Hampshire's LTP are proposed to be the same as the corporate objectives, seeking to develop the quality of life for everyone by:

(i) maximising life opportunities;

(ii) stewardship of the environment;

(iii) achieving economic prosperity;

(iv) building strong and safe communities;

(v) improving services; and

(vi) developing Councillors and staff.

4.3 These objectives need to be presented in a form required by the DfT, with particular reference to the four shared priorities it has agreed with the Local Government Association:

(i) Tackling Congestion;

(ii) Safety;

(iii) Accessibility; and

(iv) Air Quality.

4.4 While authorities are encouraged to bring out wider policy issues within the LTP, demonstrating how they interact with transport, the guidance requires that they are covered under the four shared priorities rather than being dealt with in separate sections. Rights of way and access to the countryside, personal security and cycling and walking strategies are examples of issues that are to be covered in this way.

4.5 It is proposed that a series of reports will be submitted to the Environment Policy Review Committee (PRC) to consider the county-wide approach and priorities, with Transport Strategy Panels looking at more local matters. It is proposed that the following timetable is adopted for Transport Strategy Panels' formal contribution to the LTP:

October 2004 Environment PRC Agree timetable

and Autumn Panel Meetings Consider key policy issues

Special January 2005 Consider outline LTP

Panel Meetings Report on accessibility planning

Report on environmental assessment

Approve area priorities

March 2005 Panel Meetings Report on consultation

Approve draft area programmes

Consider draft document

4.6 The views of Panels can be incorporated in reports to the Environment PRC and the Executive Member for Environment with reports to the December 2004 and February 2005 cycles. The final text should be approved by full Council as the LTP is a corporate Hampshire County Council document.

4.7 Consultation will take many forms but the main areas will be:

(i) Strategic Environmental Assessment - formal consultation with key environmental and other interested parties required under new legislation at each stage of the preparation process. First (scoping study) consultation in October 2004.

(ii) Consultation with District Councils - initial discussions already held with officers to be followed up with discussions with Councillors between November and January.

(iii) Consultation with Local Strategic Partnerships (LSPs) - special meetings to be sought early in 2005 with all LSPs on the LTPs and in particular their community strategies, and the Accessibility Planning agenda. Each LSP is required to produce a community strategy for its area, which is designed to identify local priorities, and the LTP will be written to address and incorporate these priorities where appropriate. An initial Accessibility Audit exercise is expected to be carried out in December, which will identify problem areas in terms of people's ability to access employment, education, health and shopping facilities. This is subject to the computer software packages being developed and delivered in time by the Government.

(iv) Other stakeholders - there will be consultation with business and other transport interests in various ways, including the Solent Transport partnership in that area, as well as regular liaison with Government and regional agencies and neighbouring authorities.

(v) Joint Working with Portsmouth and Southampton - there is a very strong case for joint working with the two cities on certain aspects of the LTP. The DfT requires congestion-related indicators and targets covering the larger urban areas in the country (including greater Portsmouth and greater Southampton). Officers from the three authorities will produce a report setting out how a joint approach might work, for the January meeting cycle.

4.8 This is a very tight timetable, particularly given the decisions that will be needed to be taken on the new requirements, not least on the approach to congestion which is discussed below.

5. Main Issues with Guidance - Approach to Congestion and Assessment

5.1 All urban areas with populations over 250,000 are required to produce strategies, and targets for tackling congestion in their areas. Although the Solent Area is not specifically identified in the draft guidance, the Government Office for the South East (GOSE) has confirmed that it will be expecting the three Solent transport authorities (Hampshire County Council and Portsmouth and Southampton unitary authorities) to comply with this requirement.

5.2 There is expected to be an index of key routes in the Solent Area where the performance will be measured using geographical positioning systems (GPS) for morning peak journey speeds. Motorways and trunk roads are not to be included in this index as they are not local authority roads.

5.3 The three authorities are required to set down their strategy for tackling congestion on this network (which must cover all potential approaches including forms of demand management such as congestion charging). A five year target is required, with trajectories so that progress can be measured on an annual basis.

5.4 It is not mandatory for other areas (eg the rest of Hampshire) to have congestion targets. However, the guidance makes clear that authorities declaring that congestion is not a problem cannot expect funding for schemes (including major schemes) where reduced congestion is intended to be the principal benefit.

Comments

5.5 The emphasis on urban congestion and annual assessment of performance is a real concern for this authority. Southern Hampshire is a mixed urban, suburban and rural area where traffic volumes are still rising and where the motorways (M27 and M3) are very heavily used for local journeys. The Solent Area does not fit the DfT model of a typical urban authority where motorways and rail (or ferry) have a much less significant role to play in local transport.

5.6 There is a problem in that short term measures designed to reduce peak car journey times may encourage more people to take car journeys. Similarly, longer term measures designed to encourage buses or new pedestrian crossings could reduce peak hour car speeds, and so could have an adverse effect on the County Council's `performance' which could feed through into its Comprehensive Performance Assessment.

5.7 The County Council must decide whether to declare parts of the county other than the Solent Area as having a congestion problem.

5.8 The Traffic Management Act 2004 places a new duty on transport authorities "...as far as is practicable...securing the expeditious movement of traffic on the authority's road network" and for other road networks, ie the trunk road network.

5.9 It is proposed that a study is carried out examining congestion and transport needs in conjunction with work on development scenarios associated with the South East Plan, and that the outcomes from this will feed into the LTP preparation process. A report will be submitted to this Committee in the January cycle proposing a way forward.

6. Mandatory Targets

6.1 As well as inviting comments on the guidance in general there are specific invitations to comment on the mandatory targets both key (or definite) and others (or possible).

6.2 There are `definite' mandatory targets for areas such as road safety, road maintenance, air quality, public transport patronage, accessibility and congestion (the last for large urban areas).

6.3 The list of `possibles' cover bus satisfaction and performance, modal split (for work, schools and central areas), travel plans, cycling, parking and traffic flows. It should be noted that control over a number of the above does not rest with the County Council, eg parking. There is also a question of at which level these targets are applied (County, Solent-wide, Transport Strategy Area or local area).

7. Proposed Response to the LTP Draft Guidance

7.1 It is proposed that the DfT be thanked for the opportunity to comment on the draft guidance with the following comments:

(i) that the County Council is concerned that the timetable is very tight for producing a quality LTP by July 2005;

(ii) there is a potential conflict between longer term and wider policy objectives (eg reduction of pedestrian severance and promotion of sustainable transport) and short term assessment regimes (eg peak hour traffic speeds);

(iii) the link to Rights of Way Improvement Plans is included within the guidance; however the County Council, in welcoming this new duty to produce a Rights of Way Improvement Plan, has taken a much broader approach to reviewing and developing the whole access network for walkers, riders and cyclists. This approach to Rights of Way Improvement Plans, which the County Council has called Countryside Access Plans, has clear links and benefits to all the main priorities of the LTP set out by the DfT and therefore these links and benefits will be identified throughout Hampshire's LTP rather than in a stand-alone section. The concentration on the four shared priorities, however, rather undermines the authority's ability to properly coordinate its own priorities within the document;

(iv) the County Council will work with its neighbours and other partners in developing an approach to congestion and transport needs across the county;

(v) the guidance and assessment appear to be based on urban situations and unitary authorities and some indicators eg parking controls would be difficult in a two tier situation or where there are combined targets required (with Portsmouth and Southampton);

(vi) the County Council would favour a smaller number of mandatory indicators, specifically those on the `key list' plus school travel mode; and

(vii) the County Council will seek advice from the DfT and GOSE on the best way of dealing with authority-wide and local targets, given the specific requirements for the Solent Area.

Recommendations

1. That the Committee considers the report and proposed response to the draft guidance in section 7.

2. That a report be prepared for the January meeting on details of a proposed approach to the Local Transport Plan after consultations with Transport Strategy Panels, the Department for Transport and Government Office for the South East.

8982/JWB

APPENDIX

LTP Draft Guidance Main Points

The guidance identifies four new principles for LTPs in that they should:

· set transport in a wider context (and for LTP objectives in the longer term through transport strategies)

· set locally relevant targets for outcome indicators

· identify the best value-for-money solutions to deliver those targets

· set trajectories for key targets (to aid assessment).

Other changes from the current LTP are:

· The `shared priorities' for local transport which are tackling congestion, accessibility, road safety and air quality are to become the focus for targets.

· There will be new formula-derived spending guidelines indicating approximate funding levels available which the authority should use as a basis for its investment programme.

· There are new requirements for consistency with Regional Strategies and guidance on cross-boundary working.

· New requirements to produce Accessibility Strategies.

· Incorporation of Air Quality Action Plans and Rights of Way Improvement Plans.

· Reference to the Transport Asset Management Plan Report.

· The requirement to carry out a Strategic Environmental Assessment exercise throughout the plan preparation period.

· While not discussed in detail in the draft guidance, the final guidance is expected to contain more references to the Traffic Management Act 2004 which establishes new obligations on transport authorities, including the need to appoint `Traffic Managers'.