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Surveyor Article: Highways Funding

Steve Kent, immediate past president of the Associa tion of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning and Transport (ADEPT) lays out the case for an approach to funding for local highways and how ADEPT plans to be at the heart of new thinking.

The Department for Transport (DfT) will shortly release a consultation document for Capital Highway Maintenance funding for the period 2015/16 – 2020/21.This gives ADEPT and other organisations a unique opportunity to seek a fundamental, long term change in how funding is allocated throughout the country.

Traditionally, funding has been distributed accordi ng to a fixed formula that has outgrown both its relevance and its usefulness – a figure was calculated to support a timeworn analysis of assets that neither encouraged nor rewarded innovation and efficiency. Each year funding would go up and down using the formula, based solely on availability of funding, rather than on an assessment of needs. As the damage inflicted on our road networks by extreme weather has highlighted all too clearly, this formulaic approach is no longer working.

ADEPT has long argued for change. While we know that full-blown ring fencing will not be on the agenda, we still need a system that recognises that different elements of our road infrastructure, particularly the less obvious such as drainage, foundations and bridges, need to be properly resourced. What is needed is a new analysis.

We must define wh at is the optimum condition for our road networks in terms of serviceability and resilience and from there determine what level of funding is required to bring all our local and national infras tructure to that level over a period of time. With that starting point we can then assess what future funding would be required to maintain our roads at that optimum level. Understandably, particularly with Local Authorities under pressure, much of the available funding has gone to the more visible elements of road maintenan ce that are high profile in the public perception. This has meant that the long term stability and res ilience of some of the highways network has been progressively undermined.

With the forthcoming consultation comes the opportunity to change this. Long term certainty in investment leads to sector confidence and an increa sed ability to lever funding from sources other than the public purse. Alongside this, in response to increased pressure the public sector is undergoing a drive for transformation, bringing increases in efficiency of delivery that also have the potential to bring positive change. We know that central government is keen to reward s uccess in areas like asset management, but unsurprisingly in any time of profound change, Local Authorities are in different stages of development.

The one thing we must ensure is that progressive improvement takes place across the entire road network rather than creating any form o f two-tier system. The recent welcomed increase in capital maintenance funding brings with it the promise of an initial period of relative stability, and the opportunity to develop a new, more sutainable funding mechanism for the future.The consultation gives us all an opportunity to influence change towards a needs-based approach, but one that also reflects effort and achievement. ADEPT is ready and willing to continue working with DfT, not least through the HMEP initiative, to improve efficiency of delivery and, over the next 5 years, to develop a robust bus iness case for sustained investment in the local road network of the future.

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