PAPER C

Committee: Environment and Transport Select Committee

Date: 30 October 2002

Title LOCAL TRANSPORT PLAN

REPORT OF THE HEAD OF ENGINEERING SERVICES

Summary

The Isle of Wight Local Transport Plan (LTP) was prepared in the year 2000 and covers the five-year period 2001-2006.

It became a statutory document under the provision of the Transport Act 2000 and has four main functions. These are to:

Set out the approved transport strategy for the Area.
Illustrate how this local strategy fits with and interprets National, Regional and other local strategies, policies and guidelines.
Set a range of targets for improvement and indicators by which our performance can be measured.
Include a bid for government funding with which to implement the strategy.

It covers not just transport, but how transport impacts on and relates to other areas such as education, pollution, environment, development, employment, health, tourism, crime and disorder, rural issues, mobility and social exclusion.

The Plan has to be monitored every year through the Annual Progress Report and future funding will depend on how well we are delivering our transport strategy.

Links to other Plans and Strategies

The LTP sits under the Community Plan – “Island Futures” and Corporate Plan. It works with the Island’s other key policy and strategy documents, such as the Unitary Development Plan (UDP), Local Agenda 21 Strategy (LA21), Social Inclusion Strategy, and Island Plan for Health and Well-being (The Island’s Health Improvement Plan - HImP), Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty Plan (AONB) as well as other plans and strategies supporting improvement in other areas, such as economic development, education and community safety.

Aims and objectives

The Council's transport aims and objectives have been developed from the approach established in national, regional and other local statutory plans and policies and reflect our particular local needs and aspirations.

The broad aims were set out in detail in section A.1.2.3 of the five year LTP. These have now been re-examined following the production of the subsequent overarching Community Plan July 2002 and preparation of the Council's own Corporate Plan adopted in October 2002. The next LTP will echo the corporate and strategic approach to transport. The aims of which are as follows:

“Principally through our Local Transport Plan we will work with our partners to:

· Maintain our highways infrastructure to the highest possible standards.

· Encourage travel by sustainable means, widening transport choice minimising environmental damage and providing real alternatives for car owners.

· Provide and promote safe, reliable and acceptably priced public transport both on and off the Island.”

The Island's Local Transport Plan seeks to increase travel choice and address issues such as pollution, congestion, health, safety and social exclusion. The Plan sets out how this can be achieved in partnership with local people, transport operators, the business community, health providers and in tandem with a broad range of local and statutory plans.

The main aims of the LTP can be described as follows:

Increase travel choice and reduce reliance on the private motor car

It must be recognised that, to many, private car is an essential part of everyday life. The LTP therefore works with the UDP and other strategies to reduce the need to travel through the location of new development, reduce unnecessary journeys, provide realistic alternatives and with the LA21 strategy encourage the use of environmentally friendly fuels.

Make walking safer and more convenient

The LTP seeks to improve pavements, crossings, road junctions and street lighting.

Increase opportunities to travel by bus

Buses have an important role to play in integrated transport. The LTP seeks to increase passenger numbers by working with operators to increase services and reduce costs.

Increase opportunities to cycle

Cycling can offer, for some, a real alternative to the car. The LTP seeks to increase the number of trips by cycle by offering cyclists new and improved facilities.

Develop the role of taxis and Private Hire Vehicles

Taxis and Private Hire Vehicles are very important to those who do not have access to a private car and the LTP seeks to maintain and improve services by working with existing and future taxi operators.

Support travel by Powered Two Wheelers (PTWs)

The Council recognise that powered two wheelers offer a realistic alternative to car ownership. The LTP seeks to support those travelling by PTWs and to add to the range of facilities already in place.

Improve travel by train

The Island’s rail system plays an important transport function offering fast and reliable, traffic free connections between stations and ferry services. The LTP seeks to increase passenger numbers by working in partnership with the operator to maintain and improve the rail service.

Consultation

Extensive consultation has been carried out as part of the production of both the LTP and APR. The full five-year LTP was developed taking into consideration comments received following the production of the first one-year “Provisional Local Transport Plan”. The APRs have been made widely available with nearly 500 copies of the document distributed to Government Departments, Elected Members, Town and Parish Councils, members of the Quality Transport Partnership, all schools, libraries, transport operators, transport user groups, other groups and individuals. Each report included a questionnaire inviting comment on all aspects of the document including the policies, strategies, clarity and ease of understanding.

Both the LTP and subsequent APRs are available on the Council’s web site at www.iwight.com/transport

Annual Progress Report

The Government requires every Local Authority to monitor the performance of its LTP and we must therefore now produce an Annual Progress Report (APR) to explain how successful we have been in implementing our transport strategy and achieving the targets contained in LTP.

Copies of the APR must be submitted to the Department for Environment (DfT) and Government Office for the South East for consideration in July each year and a formal decision letter, containing an evaluation of our performance and confirmation of funding is normally received in December. The Government has made it clear that future funding will now to a large extent depend on how well we are meeting our targets.

Progress towards meeting our targets.

The Council has embarked on an ambitious programme of highway improvements and has been able to progress the much-needed work on the Island’s most heavily used road corridors. Many of the Islands minor roads are receiving long overdue repair work and we are making headway on our Island-wide bridge assessment and strengthening work.

The Annual Progress Report was able to explain that clear progress in now being made towards meeting the targets set down in the LTP by making travel by public transport a more attractive option, increasing safety and encouraging walking and cycling. Sections J.8, J.9 and J.10 of the APR update progress on our Bus, Road Safety and Social Inclusion Strategies and the tables appended to this report illustrate our progress in each area.

Government Assessment

The Government reviews every LTP and APR. Our LTP was examined in detail by GOSE and DfT and scored against criteria set down in Appendix A of DETR document called “Guidance on full Local Transport Plans”. Our LTP was show to meet a number of the criteria for a “good” plan and nearly all the “minimum” requirements.

Government Office has noted a continued improvement in the quality of our plans and considered our full five-year plan to be a vast improvement over the Provisional Plan produced in 1999 and the APR to be an improvement over the LTP.

The LTP and Best Value

The Council’s Highways and Transportation Section was included within the first Best Value review (2000-2001). This process involved carrying out a thorough investigation of the service, our method of operation and value for money. The first Best Value Inspectors Report determined the service to be “poor” no star rating, with a “poor” prospect of improvement. Considerable effort has been made since to improve the service and an Improvement Plan produced to demonstrate the range of new measures and improvements that have been put in place. The service has been re-inspected and we have improved considerably, with a revised score of “fair”, 1 star service and ”promising” prospects of improvement.

The Best Value Inspectors took into consideration the performance of our LTP and noted in paragraphs 58-60 of their re-inspection Report (October 2002) that GOSE had complimented the Council on the “good progress” that we had made since the Provisional LTP two years previously and that they had described the plan as “effective and thorough”, “clearly presented” and an excellent response to comments in last years decision letter”. They noted that the plan was on a par with other authorities but that areas such as the development of Workplace or “Green Travel Plans”- one of our targets, appeared to have stalled. (Paragraph 123).

Financial implications

The LTP included a bid for government funding with which to implement the strategy. Government assessed each plan and an amount was allocated for the 01/02 and indicative allocations made for the following four years. The table below indicates the LTP bid and allocations.

LTP allocations

YEAR	01/02	02/03	03/04	04/05	05/06
LTP bid (£000s)	7155	10040*	9215*	6695*	6180
Allocation	6782	5832+
Indicative allocation			5096	5179	5263

Notes

*Bid for years 02/03, 03/04 include funding for improvements to Ryde Interchange. (Subject of major scheme bid this year)

+An additional £950,000 was received in 02/03 for the reopening of Undercliff Drive (total = £6,782,000)

It is possible to bid for additional funds through the LTP process and we have been successful in achieving money for a number of important projects. These include additional funds to address the damage caused by severe winter weather in 2000/01 and £950,000 to reopen the A3055, Undercliff Drive at St Lawrence.

The LTP and subsequent APRs have included proposals to improve the multi-modal interchange on Ryde Esplanade and a detailed scheme has been developed and major bid submitted to government as part of the APR in July 2002. A summary of these proposals is included in Sections J.5 of the APR.

Future funding

The Government has made it clear that it will be now “rewarding Councils that can demonstrate they are performing well or have shown considerable improvement”. The Government have made clear that a well performing Council should be able to demonstrate that it is delivering on the ground and is making progress towards its objectives, targets and outputs.

We are confident that we have the structure and management systems in place to deliver the LTP strategy and the APR is showing real progress in reaching our targets and outputs. Our focused approach to transport delivery is now showing real progress on the ground.

Conclusion

Our Local Transport Plan is a statutory document; it sets down the transport policy and strategy for the Island and works with other plans and policies. Government have made it clear that they are committed to the LTP process and are already encouraging Local Authorities to start looking at the production of the next five-year plan to be submitted in 2005.

The APR is the mechanism by which we can explain how well we are meeting our strategy and the government are clear that they will only reward those Authorities which are meeting, or striving to meet their targets.

Our APR has been well received by Government and we are showing real improvements on the ground and it is important that we maintain or improve on this standard. Our Best Value Report highlighted some areas where future work is required and these are in hand

We must now wait until December to find out how well the APR has been received and how much money will be made available for transport funding and the development of the Ryde Interchange.

Recommendation

That this report be noted

Hierarchy of Plans

Table A - LTP main targets.

ISLE OF WIGHT’S HEADLINE TARGETS

	Local Objective	LTP Target	Latest Figures
	To achieve minimal traffic growth between 2000 and 2010	Between 2000 and 2010 to: · Limit growth to an average of 1% per annum in North East Triangle Strategy Area; · Limit growth during June, July & August to an average of 1% per annum in Coastal Resorts Strategy Area; · Limit growth to an average of 1.5% per annum on classified roads in the Rural Strategy Area; · Limit growth have no growth on unclassified roads in the Rural Strategy Area.	Comparisons between 2000 & 2001 showed: 0.8% increase in 2001 1.7% decrease in 2001 0.9% increase in 2001 1.6% decrease in 2001
	Make Island roads safer	By 2006 to: · Achieve a 20% reduction in the number of people killed or seriously injured in road accidents, compared with the average for 1994-98; · Achieve a 25% reduction in the number of children killed or seriously injured in road accidents, compared with the average for 1994-98; · Achieve a 5% reduction in the number of slight casualties in road accidents, compared with the average for 1994-98.	Average 1994-98 data compared with 2001/02 data: Average 1994-98 = 122 20% target reduction = 98 2001/02 = 132 Average 1994-98 = 15 25% target reduction = 11 2001/02 = 12 Average 1994-98 = 568 5% target reduction = 540 2001/02 = 560
	Increase public transport patronage	By 2010 to: · Achieve a 20% increase in travel by public transport.	Comparisons between 2000/01 to 2001/02 showed: 1% increase in train passenger journeys. 2.7% decrease in bus passenger journeys
	Increase cycle trips	By 2010 to: · Triple the number of cycling trips compared with 2000 base.	Comparisons between 2000 and 2002 (cycle trips recorded on 3 main cycle tracks) showed an increase of 57%
	Increase number of journeys to work made on foot.	By 2006 to: · Increase percentage of pedestrian journeys to work from 17.8% to 20%.	No data currently available 2001 Census data expected early 2003.
	Work place travel plans	By 2006 to: · Achieve the implementation of at least 4 work place travel plans.	2 plans currently under development 2 additional plans secured as part of planning agreements.
	Unification with planning decisions	By 2006 to: · Ensure that at least 85% of new dwellings approved are located within defined development envelope boundaries.	2001/02 – 98.3% new dwellings within defined development envelopes.