The Department for Transport (DfT) has put forward plans to have a presumption in favour of pavements rather than the road when it comes to burying utilities, in its latest shake-up of road works.
The move was part of a package of reforms - out to consultation until 13 September - which represent the final changes before the public launch of the DfT's new £10m Street Manager digital platform to plan and manage road works.
Street Manager has been available for local authorities and utility companies to use in a private Beta environment since May 2019 and will be available via public Beta from November 2019.
The plans would make it law from next April (2020) for local authorities and utility companies to have to use Street Manager, which is expected to save users millions every year compared to the current Electronic Transfer of Notifications (EToN) system, which has been around in various forms since the 1990s.
The DfT aims to create a new condition that would create a presumption in favour of laying utilities under the footway, while also giving due consideration on the impact on street trees and national infrastructure projects such as internet cabling.
The condition would be: 'Unless the Permit Authority consents to the placing of apparatus under the carriageway including to assist with the roll-out of national infrastructure projects or to enable urban greening and street trees, it is a condition of this permit that activities placing new apparatus underground should, where possible and practical, be placed under the footway, footpath or verge.'
This move was suggested previously by the transport secretary but was greeted with some concern by disability campaigners, who complained it would disadvantage their accessibility.
There are also planned reforms to the current restrictions on 'substantial' road works in newly resurfaced or reconstructed roads in order to protect the local road networks and local authority investments.
The DfT seeks the following proposed changes to the timeframes for substantial road works:
- Three [down from five] years in relation to substantial road works involving reconstruction.
- Two [down from three] years in relation to substantial road works involving resurfacing or an alteration in the level of the highway.
- One [no change] year in relation to any other substantial road works carried out in a traffic sensitive street or a street in reinstatement road category 0, 1 or 2 which is not a traffic sensitive street.
- Six [no change] months in relation to any other substantial road works carried out in a street in reinstatement road category 3 or 4 which is not a traffic sensitive street.
The wider reforms, which only apply to England, will help establish a unified, digitised system for booking and administering local road and street works under nationwide take-up of the permit scheme system.
The DfT states that following instructions from the secretary of state, by early 2020 almost all local authorities will be operating a permit scheme and 'we expect that all of them will have a scheme by the end of 2020'.
English local road network is subject to an estimated 2.5 million road works each year costing the economy around £4bn.
A user group will be set up to oversee the continuous improvement and the service development of the new system, which will include representatives from the Joint Authorities Group and Street Works UK.
Charges under the new system
Organisations will be asked to contribute towards the cost of Street Manager from April 2020.
From 2020 onwards it will cost around £2.6m for local authorities (non-business) and £1.1m for utility companies and contractors (business). This compares to £5.5m and £6m respectively under EToN licence and additional services.
Under the DfT's plans a new charging regime will be set up based on a transactional or banding model, 'so that heavy users pay more than light users'.
The consultation states: 'It will be on a cost recovery basis, with all charges being used to cover the cost of service support and improvement of street manager.
'We have proposed a charging band system for 2020/21 that is based on current estimates and works out at an average charge of £17,000 per organisation per year. These are estimates that will be updated once the procurement for the ongoing service support and improvement has been completed. From April 2021, we will use data from street manager to develop a fair transactional charging regime.'
The consultation states that this plan, which requires secondary legislation, would be the simplest method; however it does present an alternative, which would involve the DfT charging local authorities an additional element for every permit issued to utilities.
'This would, however, be an additional administrative burden for authorities and it means that the charging regime would be based on permit numbers rather than any other basis we might agree is more desirable. It would also restrict any flexibility to change the basis for charges.'
Register now for full access
Register just once to get unrestricted, real-time coverage of the issues and challenges facing UK transport and highways engineers.
Full website content includes the latest news, exclusive commentary from leading industry figures and detailed topical analysis of the highways, transportation, environment and place-shaping sectors.
Use the link below to register your details for full, free access.
Already a registered? Login
