2006-2011 Main LTP

The Local Transport Plan Process

This is the second Local Transport Plan (LTP) for Warwickshire, and provides details of how the County Council and its partners intend to improve transport and accessibility over the next five years. The document also begins to set out the types of improvements that will be needed over the next 15-20 years to deliver the quality of life that the County Council would like to see for all its citizens.

In July 2000, the County Council submitted its first full LTP. The Plan was put together following the publication of the 1998 Government White Paper, ‘A New Deal for Transport: Better for Everyone’. The White Paper was designed to create a better, more integrated transport system both nationally, and at a local level. The Government has since reiterated these messages in the 10-Year Transport Plan issued in 2000, and more recently the 2004 White Paper 'The Future of Transport'.

The first LTP covered a period of five years from 2000 to 2005. The Plan has been thoroughly reviewed to incorporate recent changes to national, regional and local policy, and in particular the Government’s four Shared Priorities for Transport. 

This document is the Final Local Transport Plan 2006/2011. A Provisional Local Transport Plan was submitted to the Government in July 2005.

Progress to Date

In line with Government requirements, the County Council has submitted an Annual Progress Report (APR) for each of the five years of the first LTP. This has set out the progress that the County Council has made in conjunction with its partners in implementing the measures promoted in the Plan, and the impact these measures have had on meeting agreed targets.

Details of the County Council’s achievements over the last five years will be set out in the LTP Delivery Report, which will be published in July 2006. The Department for Transport (DfT) has commended the County Council for making significant progress in the following areas:

• Local safety improvements, resulting in a reduction in the severity and occurrence of casualties on the highway network;
• Improvements to walking and cycling facilities;
• Implementation of a rolling programme of Safer Routes to School;
• Provision of improved bus services through the purchase of new vehicles to operate County Council tendered services (including school services and services in the rural areas of Warwickshire);
• Provision of better multi-modal facilities at interchanges at a number of locations across the County;
• Traffic management measures to address local and area-wide issues;
• Better facilities for people with a physical, mental or sensory impairment; and
• A rolling programme of road and bridge maintenance across the County.

The proposals contained within this LTP aim to build on these successes and deliver further improvements across the County.

Warwickshire County Council’s second Green Transport Plan has recently been launched.  The Council will continue to lead the way with sustainable travel initiatives in order to show what can be achieved and set an example to other organisations.

Stakeholder Consultation

The first Warwickshire LTP followed an extensive review of the County Council’s Transport Strategy during 1998/99, and a major consensus building consultation exercise with a wide range of stakeholders. This approach aimed to break free from traditional consultation exercises, and to ensure that the LTP had a wider ownership across the whole community. Special efforts were made to target a number of groups within the community who may otherwise have been under represented in the process, including ethnic minorities, young people and the elderly. This exercise had a major effect on the content of the first LTP, both in terms of agreeing the principal objectives and targets, and identifying support for the various measures that were to be taken forward over the period of the Plan.

The County Council has continued to consult on the development and implementation of the LTP throughout the last five years. More recently, specific work has been undertaken with the LTP Wider Reference Group and the County Council’s Local Strategic Partnership (LSP) Transport Theme Group to assist the development of the LTP. The five District/Borough Councils in Warwickshire have also provided valuable input to the Plan.

This new LTP has been put together as a development of the original LTP submission. Through early consultation with key stakeholders, it became apparent that a fundamental review of the Transport Strategy and the main objectives, targets and policies in the LTP was not required for the new Plan. However, there was a clear recognition of the need to respond to new and emerging policies and priorities at a national, regional and local level.

The Provisional LTP was used as a tool for an extensive public consultation exercise during Autumn 2005, which formed a key input to the development of the Final LTP. 

Full details of the consultations carried out are provided in Annex 1.

Evidence and Analysis

In addition to the input from stakeholders, a wide range of other evidence has shaped the Local Transport Plan.  This has been used to provide a factual foundation from which the strategies and policies in the plan have been developed. 

Census data has provided information on the existing situation and background trends in population, migration, travel patterns, prosperity and deprivation, employment and car ownership.  This has been supported by material from various other sources including Department for Transport, the Office for National Statistics, the County Surveyors Society and the County Council’s own Research Unit.

Transport modelling is carried out by the County Council to provide background data and to help test and develop schemes.  Each major town/urban area is covered by one of the County’s own transport models which are supported by a programme of regular traffic surveys and cordon counts.   In addition, congestion monitoring has been undertaken in Warwickshire’s main towns each year for the last seven years by carrying out repeated timed journeys on set routes.

The County Council is in the process of moving from QVIEW models to micro-simulation PARAMICS models, to develop and test numerous transport improvement schemes. A PARAMICS model has been used to help inform the identification of a location for a Park and Ride site to serve both Warwick and Leamington Spa. 

The Council also has access to wider strategic area models such as the West Midlands PRISM model. A SATURN model has also been used in partnership with the Highways Agency to develop proposals for improvements to Junction 15 of the M40 and the immediate area. 

 A range of assessment software such as ARCADY, PICADY, LINSIG and TRANSYT are employed to develop and design local highway improvements.

The DfT’s Accession accessibility modelling tool is likely to evolve into a key instrument for helping to develop policy, and guide schemes during the lifetime of the LTP.  Warwickshire County Council has established a dedicated team to drive forward utilisation of the software.

The County Council, by itself or in conjunction with other interested parties, carries out or commissions studies and research assignments that are used to inform scheme and policy development.  Key projects of this nature that have supported the development of this LTP include the North/South Corridor Public Transport Options Study and the Coventry/Solihull/Warwickshire Transportation and Regeneration Study, as well as work to assess the effectiveness of policies and schemes in LTP1.  The 'Smarter Choices' work and other studies of ‘soft’ transport interventions have helped to inform the development of similar measures in Warwickshire.

A key purpose of both the studies and transport modelling is to allow a range of options to be developed, tested and assessed.  In this way a scheme, strategy or policy is derived initially from the evidence and then the most appropriate solution can be selected from a number of tested alternatives. 

Full details of the main studies that have contributed to this LTP are provided in Annex 1.  The application of evidence to specific localities is provided in the area chapters.