09.06.05: The TSLM official response to the Local Transport Plan:
Lancashire County Council recently published their draft Local Transport Plan for 2006 to 2010. It will form the basis of transport planning in Lancashire for the next 5 years. It includes the Heysham M6 Link Road as the County's major scheme. They asked the public to respond to it.
We understand many people who support TSLM sent in letters, describing how damaging the road would be, and asking for other alternatives to be considered. We thank them for that. Here is the considered response from the TSLM group as a whole.
Heysham-M6 Link road and the 2006-2011 Local Transport Plan
Transport Solutions for Lancaster & Morecambe strongly object to the inclusion of the Heysham-M6 Link road in Lancashire’s 2006-2011 Local Transport Plan for 7 key reasons:
1.The objectives for the scheme are unclear.
There are only vague and unsubstantiated reasons for the road (e.g. “Substantial economic, environmental and safety improvements will follow from the construction of [the Heysham-M6 Link] …” (p7)), although this justification is not explained or developed.
What are the objectives? Congestion relief? Access of goods and people to the Heysham peninsular? Economic development and regeneration? One of the council officers at the May 2005 exhibitions explained that the objective “…was to complete the link road”. How does this fit with any part of any current policy guidance?
For each objective, there are a range of solutions. By implying that building the Link road is an objective rather than one possible solution, there is no consideration of other viable solutions.
2. The problem is poorly specified.
Traffic congestion in the Lancaster-Morecambe area is recognised as a problem (p16 "...the great concern there is over traffic congestion in Lancaster"), but the problem is not clearly defined. It is specifically peak-time congestion resulting from local journeys within the area (an estimated 80% of the total). It is not caused by the small proportion of road-based traffic accessing the port from the motorway (an estimated 2% of the total). So it is a problem that the construction of the Link Road will not address.
3. An alternative solution to the road has never been suggested
An alternative set of solutions to a link road has never been presented to the public and elected members. This means that an informed choice has not been possible. It is probably related to the vagueness of the objectives, especially if the unwritten objective is to “complete the link road”.
The LTP outlines very clearly a whole range of options that together would contribute effectively to tackling the traffic and transport problems. The ambitions for demand management of local traffic coupled with traffic management, (3.1, p32), multi-modal freight facilities (3.5 p34), “… an integrated, efficient and sustainable freight transport system…” (3.5 p32), and "[promoting a...] modal shift from road transport wherever possible" are all very welcome.
TSLM therefore calls on the LTP to be modified to
- re-prioritise the presence of these solutions relative to the link road in the LTP, i.e. these should be done first to tackle the real problem. We are baffled as to how an expensive link road could ever be part of a “sustainable” freight transport system.
- Calculate costs and benefits of these alternative solutions and present these alongside the proposed road scheme to the public and elected members.
4. There has not been a public consultation about the solutions.
The LCC exhibitions were not a formal consultation, and did not present an alternative set of solutions.
TSLM carried out a “voting” survey at all of the LCC exhibitions as well as at TSLM’s alternative exhibitions. As people left the LCC exhibitions, they were asked to “vote” for one of four options:
- LCC should carry on to build the link road
- LCC should present an alternative to the link road before proceeding
- LCC should abandon the link road and proceed to an alternative solution
- LCC should do nothing
The figure shows the responses from the LCC exhibitions and the TSLM exhibition
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It is quite clear that there is a strong message from the public that they are demanding a real choice of options to tackle the transport problem. The fact that the majority of responses were calling for a real choice (rather than being anti-link road per se as represented by options 3 & 4) is highly significant.
5. There is a mis-match between public priorities & council objectives.
The results of the TSLM voting-card survey are further substantiated by survey results presented in the draft LTP Introduction/Overview section. The data as presented (not the LCC interpretation) suggest that the public:
- are more satisfied with transport/traffic in the Lancaster area than elsewhere (41%, p15 repeated on p17)
- rate the construction of new roads as the lowest priority compared to improving and enhancing existing roads and other transport infrastructure (p15)
Yet the Council's main proposal for the area is to build the Link road.
6. What would the Lancaster & Morecambe area actually get out of the LTP?
While the draft LTP contains many exciting and imaginative initiatives, it is unclear which of these might apply to the Lancaster and Morecambe. Many of these would be effective as part of a package to tackle the local transport problems and be elements of an effective alternative solution to the link road. Specifically:
- Park & ride (3.6, p34) – how many sites, where?
- New rail stations (p7) – where?
- new or improved rail/bus interchanges & bus stations (p7) – where?
- improvements to quality & frequency of local rail services (p8) – which?
- improvements to support a Quality Bus network (p8) - which?
- Rapid transit system (p8) – why not Lancaster-Morecambe?
- What will be done in this area to increase Public Transport patronage and walking?
- Real time bus information (3.3, p30)
Furthermore, why does the roll-out of personalised journey planning have to wait until the evaluation of the Preston CIVITAS pilot when there is now a substantial bed of consistent evidence from the UK of its effectiveness?
7. In a general sense, we are concerned that the draft LTP is very highways-focussed. This does not mean that non-highway issues are absent, but that the highways infrastructure and development take priority, and other issues are then designed around them. There are numerous examples of this, such as in the assessment of SCOOT (section 3.2) – what implications does SCOOT “improvements” have for pedestrian & cycle wait times at crossings?
There is considerable and increasing opposition to the road. The TSLM group comprises 360 people, and 547 people visited the TSLM alternative exhibition. The campaign is routinely featured in the local press and has had local and regional radio and TV coverage. The concern is not just by those who will be directly affected by the road, but is more broadly felt by others living in the Lancaster and Morecambe area.
Until an alternative to the road is formally proposed with its costs and benefits outlined, and these presented to the public and elected members, we demand that the Heysham-M6 link road is taken out of the 2006-2011 Local Transport Plan.
For Transport Solutions for Lancaster & Morecambe
D Gate (Chair)
2 June 2005