Archived decisions

Contact: Jon Foley, ext 7559 email: [email protected]

1. Summary

1.1 This report provides a progress update on the workplace and school travel planning programmes in the East Hampshire area, together with information on a recently completed county-wide personalised travel planning project. It also includes an update on the Safer Routes to School programme for schemes within the East Hampshire area.

2. Workplace Travel Plan Programme

2.1 There are currently nine organisations in the East Hampshire district developing a travel plan, compared to seven reported to the last meeting in March 2005.

2.2 The current status of travel plans in the East Hampshire District is shown in the table below. An indication of the number of employees covered by the plans has also been given. Individual organisations are not identified for reasons of confidentiality - for example some travel plans are related to planning applications or a change in location that is not yet public knowledge.

Travel Plan Level	Number of businesses	Number of employees*
0 - Has an interest in travel and transport issues but no plan being produced	2	135
1 - Framework travel plan produced (often planning related), inception meeting held or some measures have been implemented	5	1060
2 - Draft travel plan produced and approved by HCC	1	300
3 - Full travel plan produced and approved by HCC. Measures being implemented and reviewed.	1	170

* this is an approximation. Not all employee data is yet complete

2.3 The Travel Plan Adviser is currently working to update records by liaising closely with District Council officers to provide a more complete picture of travel plan activity.

Travel Plan Partnership Fund 2004/05

2.4 In June 2004 the former Executive Member for Environment approved a £50,000 county-wide allocation from the transport capital programme to the Travel Plan Partnership Fund. Businesses with travel plans were invited to submit bids for matched funding for the provision of 'on-site' facilities to encourage use of a range of modes for journeys to work at their establishments.

2.5 In respect of the East Hampshire District area, no organisations were awarded Partnership funding.

Travel Plan Partnership Fund 2005/06

2.6 In June 2005 the Executive Member for Environment: South Hampshire and Resource Management approved a £36,900 capital and £9,280 revenue county-wide allocation to allow the fund to be run again for a second year. One scheme in the East Hampshire District area was allocated funding.

2.7 Forest Lodge Garden Centre and Birdworld submitted a bid for £4,875 for pool bicycles, cycle storage, display boards, maps and leaflets. An award was made of £3,875 capital and £1,000 revenue partnership funding. The County Council has just been advised that, as the company is preparing for a public inquiry, it will not have time to undertake the project but would like to reapply next year.

3. School Travel Plan Programme

3.1 The School Travel Planning Team continues to work with schools to develop School Travel Plans. To date over 405 schools throughout Hampshire have developed or are in the process of developing plans compared with just over 330 as at March 2005.

3.2 The School Travel Planning Team has been funded since April 2004 through a Central Government grant (£165,000 per annum). Originally this funding was due to come to an end in March 2006, however the County Council is pleased to report that the funding has now been extended to March 2008.

3.3 Schools with travel plans approved by the School Travel Planning Team are eligible for funding through the Safer Routes to School programme, as well as a one-off capital grant from the Department for Education and Skills (DfES). The latter is only available to state schools. In 2004 83 schools received a total of £532,309 from the DfES; in 2005 71 schools were put forward and received grants totalling £402,597 from the DfES.

3.4 The team works closely with District Council officers and is now engaged with 42 of the 59 schools in the East Hampshire area (52 maintained, one non-maintained special and six independent), compared with 40 schools as at March 2005. A summary of the current status of all School Travel Plans in the East Hampshire area is shown as a table below. More detail is shown in the appendix.

Travel Plan Level	Number of schools
Level 0 - Interest shown	8
Level 1 - Initial work on travel plan started	4
Level 2 - Draft travel plan completed	0
Level 3 - Final travel plan submitted and approved	30
C- Contacted, awaiting response	17

4. Safer Routes to School Programme

4.1 The Safer Routes to School programme links very closely with the development of the School Travel Plan programme. One of the objectives of a School Travel Plan is to encourage as many children as possible to be active and independent by walking, cycling or using public transport to get to and from school on a regular basis. This could be through a combination of physical and other measures. If physical works are identified within the approved School Travel Plan then the school can bid for funding from the Safer Routes to School programme.

4.2 On 21 January 2005 the former Executive Member for Environment agreed an indicative allocation of £1.5 million for a county-wide programme of Safer Routes to School schemes from the 2005/06 Capital Programme.

4.3 When a proposal for highway improvements is received from a school with a completed School Travel Plan the feasibility is assessed to determine the scale, implications, costs and benefits. As more proposals come forward, this allows the priorities to be determined for inclusion in the programme. The current status of potential and actual schemes is shown in the appendix.

5. Personalised Travel Planning Programme

5.1 The County Council recently (March 2005) completed a large scale personalised travel planning project called `InfoMotion'. This direct marketing project (the largest of its kind in the UK), which included close partnership working with local bus operators, targeted some 115,000 households within walking distance of high quality bus services across Hampshire.

5.2 Personalised travel planning is a process whereby individuals (either householders, employees or visitors) are provided with tailored travel advice and information based on an understanding of their personal trip requirements. It can, as in the case of the InfoMotion project, also be complemented by the provision of incentives (eg trial season tickets) to introduce people to a new mode of travel that they may not have otherwise considered.

5.3 Of the 115,000 households contacted 38,000 responded. Of these 19% (7,720 households) were already regular users of public transport (and so did not participate further), 48% (18,240 households) were infrequent users of public transport who were interested in participating and 33% (12,540 households) were not interested in participating. Through a process of one-to-one dialogue the `interested' group was subsequently provided with tailored information and incentives to encourage greater bus use.

5.4 Monitoring of local bus patronage and participants' travel behaviour was undertaken. Bus patronage in one area of the county increased by 6% (peaking at 11% during the marketing period) while in another area monitoring found there had been a 21% increase in person trips by bus and a 9% reduction in person trips by car by those participating. The results from the travel behaviour element of the monitoring also showed a reduction, from 31% to 17%, in the proportion of people dissatisfied with local bus services.

5.5 The project therefore highlighted the effectiveness of personalised travel planning not only in changing travel behaviour but also influencing individuals' perceptions of public transport. The County Council will now consider the future role of personalised travel planning within the delivery of its Local Transport Plan.

6. Impact Assessments

6.1 This report provides a position statement only, therefore an impact assessment in terms of the Race Relations (Amendment) Act has not been undertaken.

Recommendation

That Members note the progress made with the delivery of the workplace and School Travel Plans and Safer Routes to School programmes in the East Hampshire area, together with the outcomes of the recent InfoMotion personalised travel planning project.

572/JF

APPENDIX

East Hampshire Highway and Transport Advisory Panel

School Travel Plan levels as at September 2005

Key:

0 Interest shown

1 Initial work on travel plan started

2 Draft travel plan completed

3 Final travel plan submitted and approved

C Contacted, awaiting response

() School Travel Plan Level at time of last HTAP. No change to level if not shown.

NB Treloar School is a non-maintained special school, approved by the DfES, with the majority of pupils being funded by LEAs.