This is an exciting time for the highways and transportation sector and its role in shaping the future. The government is focusing on:

• The levelling up agenda.
• Active travel funding and it’s Gear Change strategy and the setting-up of Active Travel England.
• The need to decarbonise transport and improve air quality.
• Making transport more inclusive.
• The push for our urban areas to be adaptable and resilient; and
• The need to provide connectivity and opportunity in rural areas.

A recent CIHT/WSP round table, chaired by Matthew Lugg CIHT past President, considered - How can we make sure that the highways and transportation sector is equipped to support positive change through better engagement?

The key conclusions from the discussions were that.

• the sector needed to engage with communities in a longer-term conversation about transport as well as simple consultation on individual projects. Longer term dialogue would produce the evidence and justification for the future as well as demonstrating the social value of investment in transport.
• Engagement needed to embrace digital technology and be resourced properly over the life of infrastructure, utilising wider range of skills than those traditionally used on project consultation.
• There was an opportunity now to frame a national conversation around the need for change in highways and transport to meet the challenges of climate change, present a vision for the future and examine how transport could be funded and delivered. That national conversation would enable local authorities and those supporting them to engagement positively with communities.

WSP is a Strategic Partner of CIHT's Partnerships Network. Please visit their website here.

...we’re moving from planning for vehicles to planning for people…that might take several years of difficult conversations and require political leadership but we have to engage the people…

Rupert Clubb, TFSE

Rupert Clubb, from East Sussex County Council and Transport for the South East, highlighted how we are in a process of moving from planning for vehicles to planning for people which bought out some very complex areas and conflicting views – dealing with these views was not possible in a short time frame and needed to be reflected in a strategy for change, which included the recognition of a 2-3 year period of difficult conversations before the benefits became apparent.

John White from Leeds City Council outlined how they had taken a different approach to engagement on their Connecting Leeds Bus infrastructure project which required delivery of a range of schemes in a relatively short time to improve bus use. Rather than use an engineer or project manager for individual schemes to do consultation they bought in a dedicated resource to carry out ongoing engagement. This utilised an online engagement portal which allowed a wide range of people to engage and allowed conversations between people with different perspectives over an extended period rather than a fixed consultation period. This improved the delivery of the overall project as issues could be resolved quickly across the programme. He also described a Council wide engagement piece – the Transport Conversation which was a long-term programme to understand and influence people’s views in transport.

…there was a proper brand campaign around the whole Connecting Leeds and a different way you approached the project, a different focus on consultation I think has resulted in a very different project that’s been really successful, and I think there's lots of lessons that other people can learn.[1]

Katherine Bright, WSP

Katherine Bright from WSP highlighted issues with traditional consultation which was often seen as too difficult and getting in the way of delivering schemes. It was also rarely covered in terms of adequate resourcing. She also highlighted that, given the difficult decisions that politicians were faced with, better evidence gathered by longer term engagement would be valuable.

Jeremy Galpin from Costain endorsed the use of digital technology to engage over a long period of time, highlighting its use on the Thames Tideway project[2], this gave the benefit of gathering data about the social value of infrastructure assets. This not only benefitted the development of the individual project but also enabled long term improvements in how infrastructure was planned, and providers procured, using outcomes arising from engagement.

….the stakeholder conversation has to start at the beginning and carry on throughout the operation, maintenance and decommissioning of that asset. We validate the basis on which we made the decision to build it over the lifetime of the project .To build trust with our communities that we deliver on our promises, digital technology enables that dialogue.

Jeremy Galpin, Costain

Sally Gibbons from DfT shared her experiences of engagement over the introduction of Active travel during the pandemic and how the experience of engagement could be improved and how good practice could be embedded across the sector.

Stephen Edwards from Living Streets described how the organization worked with many communities across the UK both engaging over time and undertaking behaviour change programmes. He confirmed the value of digital platforms but also virtual reality to help people understand what changes might mean. He explained how that long term local involvement paid dividends in progressing change with significant and sustained changes in behaviours[3].

…we do lot of behaviour change programmes, we're working a lot with schools with the support of the Department for Transport in particular through the walk to school outreach programme, which basically engaged a large number of local authorities and combined authorities across the country to get more children walking to school and decrease congestion…

Stephen Edwards, Living Streets

 Andrew Hickford from Leeds City Council described how his team worked across Council areas on reducing carbon and the range of techniques they used to engage as wide a range of people as possible, including groups that are traditionally hard to reach.

 Rupert Clubb outlined how a national strategy for transport was needed, the development of which would enable key issues around carbon reduction, sustainable development and future availability of funding to be explored.  This strategy would allow a better conversation with the public to be had about changes and would allow authorities at a local level to frame the needs of their communities within that strategy. The sector could assist by developing a vision for Highways and Transport, working with government to outline areas where change was required and a timeframe for engaging. The strategy would reflect that different choices might be needed in urban and rural areas.

…what's the vision that we want to create of how transport works for communities…. can we do that at a national level so that local authorities can then engage their communities around that?

Andrew Hugill, CIHT

Andrew Hugill CIHT’s Director of Policy and Technical Affairs explained how developing better engagement with communities was something that as a professional membership body, CIHT was keen to explore, particularly at a time when transport was undergoing a lot of changes and therefore professionals needed to understand that they had to change to reflect what society needed. The development of a national strategy for transport would facilitate that change and development of the profession. Also having a long-term conversation, open to the public would allow “myths” about proposed changes to be rebutted.

 The key conclusions from the discussions were that.

• the sector needed to engage with communities in a longer-term conversation about transport as well as simple consultation on individual projects. Longer term dialogue would produce the evidence and justification for the future as well as demonstrating the social value of investment in transport.
• Engagement needed to embrace digital technology and be resourced properly over the life of infrastructure, utilising a wider range of skills than those traditionally used on project consultation.
• There was an opportunity now to frame a national conversation around the need for change in highways and transport to meet the challenges of climate change, present a vision for the future and examine how transport could be funded and delivered. That national conversation would enable local authorities and those supporting them to engagement positively with communities. 

 [1] Connecting Leeds

[2] Thames Tideway

[3] walk-to-school

Partnership Opportunities

WSP is a Strategic Partner of CIHT's Partnerships Network. If you are interested in CIHT's partnership opportunities and the chance to put your brand at the heart of the key discussions, contact Sally Devine at sally.devine@ciht.org.uk or call 07963 934892.