The vision-led approach and Transport Assessments
Director Andrew Whittingham reflects on the implications of the draft National Planning Policy Framework.
The consultation draft of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) reinforces the need to adopt a vision-led approach to Transport Assessments. It thus confirms what we have known for a long time, that the outdated ‘predict and provide’ model of ever-increasing highway capacity is a folly. There remains a need, however, for highway infrastructure to remove highway capacity pinch points, improve road safety, reallocate road space to active and public transport and to serve development where required.
The vision-led approach is now contained in many reference documents including ‘Planning for the future: A guide to working with National Highways on planning matters, October 2023′, which sets out the following:
- Identify the transport needs of the development and develop a vision of how they can be met
- Consider development and infrastructure scenarios
- Formulate and test transport infrastructure options (including mitigations)
- Produce a vision strategy
The consultation draft also emphasises the need to demonstrate that the residual cumulative impacts on the road network would not be severe, in all tested scenarios.
The skill of taking a vision-led approach is to identify and quantify the likely modal shift which results from aspirational and proposed transport measures. It is therefore important to establish and agree the test scenarios at the pre-application stage to ensure that council and developer objectives are met.
Please contact Andrew Whittingham at awhittingham@motion.co.uk if you would like more information about the practical application of the vision-led approach.
