Minister endorses co-ordinated approach to MAAs

16 July 2008

The Government has signed off agreements which could see the Highways Agency and Network Rail agreeing to local authorities’ long-term transport strategies.

Communities secretary, Hazel Blears, endorsed multi-area agreements (MAAs) for seven conurbations which commit councils and government departments and agencies to greater joint working to promote economic growth.

Five of the seven – in South Hampshire, Bournemouth/Dorset/Poole, the Leeds City Region, Tyne & Wear and the Tees Valley – entail ‘freedoms and flexibilities’ for councils on transport.

The South Hampshire deal commits the Highways Agency and the conurbation’s local highway authorities to agreeing a ‘whole route’ approach to tackling congestion under a protocol and joint highway policy framework.

Keith Willcox, Transport for South Hampshire project director, told Surveyor: ‘We need to look at local and national roads together, rather than taking a more localised approach.

‘Neither the HA nor local authorities can improve journeys in isolation.’ Increasing capacity at junction 9 of the M3, for instance, ‘would transfer the bulk of congestion to other parts of the M3 and M27, and to local roads serving them’. Instead, the parties plan to consider the whole corridor from Winchester to Southampton, including the potential for transferring peak-time local traffic to other modes, routes or times.

A comprehensive traffic-management system for strategic and important local roads, possibly with a joint control centre, will aim to ‘optimise overall network operation’. This will include introducing motorway hard shoulder running.

The eight local highway authorities in the Leeds City Region gained agreement for Network Rail to ‘participate in the development of a cross-modal 10-15 year strategy by 2009’.

James Flanagan, project manager at the Leeds City Region, said that while the councils had together agreed a long-term transport strategy, Network Rail had not revealed its investment decisions beyond this year. ‘We want to have greater certainty because rail capacity has a significant impact on productivity in the city region.’

The Highways Agency would also be involved, seen as important because its investments are brought forward on a scheme-by-scheme basis, ‘without reference to the city region’s desired transport outcomes,’ according to the multi-area agreement.

The Bournemouth /Poole/Dorset agreement, meanwhile, includes a commitment from the councils to seek joint management of the highway network, possibly with a new integrated transport authority.

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Minister endorses co-ordinated approach to MAAs

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