Welcome to this morning’s session, which is the third session in our joined-up journeys inquiry. Today we are going to be considering the relationship between transport integration and wider land use planning. We will be hosting two panels today. In our first panel we will be hearing from representatives of local and devolved authorities, and in our second panel we will be hearing from experts from across industry and academia. Please could I ask our first panel of witnesses to introduce themselves?

Good morning. I am the lead director for infrastructure and director of highways, transport and waste at Norfolk County Council. I am here today as part of my role with ADEPT, which is the Association of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning and Transport, where I am vice-chair of the transport and connectivity board.

Hello. I am a policy and strategy officer at Transport for West Midlands, which is part of the West Midlands Combined Authority.

Good morning. I am the transport strategy and policy manager at Kirklees council in West Yorkshire. We have a number of large transport projects in our area at the moment, such as the trans-Pennine route upgrade, and I am very keen to share any learning and evidence related to projects such as that.

Good morning. I am head of transport policy and strategy at the North East Combined Authority.

Excellent. My first question is a very general one: how important is integration as a goal when your authority is deciding what kinds of transport developments to promote?

That is a really important question. Transport integration is absolutely essential but really difficult to deliver. Norfolk, which I am representing, is a very wide mixture of very rural and urban areas, and those different areas require different approaches. One of the most recent examples where we have been able to fully integrate is with the transforming cities funding that we were successful with. That has enabled us to deliver a whole host of interventions on the ground, improving walking, cycling and bus infrastructure and introducing other modes as well; for example, we introduced a micromobility scheme as part of that. That has enabled us to pull all the different funding streams together and deliver really integrated transport solutions on the ground, which have been very successful. The challenge is doing that with the current funding streams, because we tend to receive funding for specific modes from the Department for Transport.

We will come to that. Sorry, the other part of the question is: what are your priorities for what you are seeking to achieve when you are thinking about integrating transport? Is it economic growth, social inclusion, accessibility, new developments—what are the priorities?

It is all those factors combined. Depending on the location and the specifics of the area, some will have a different focus. If you are in an urban area, the travel choice options and accessibility will be very important. If you are in a more rural area, improved safety might be more of a priority.

For us, integration is absolutely crucial and fully embedded within our local transport plan for the West Midlands. It is really important for those wider outcomes that we want to deliver. For example, there is a real link between good integration and people being able to take active travel to promote healthy lifestyles and improve their health. It is really key to inclusive growth. If you have a really good, well-integrated public transport system, people can get to opportunities and jobs that they really need. It plays a key role in tackling social exclusion. We have huge amounts of exclusion across various deprived groups. My area of work is about engaging with those groups, and transport is key to them being able to access those opportunities. On the health side, it can definitely play a big role in tackling loneliness, improving wellbeing, and generally getting people out of their cars and providing a sustainable mode. If it is done well, we can get more people doing active travel and using public transport, which is obviously a key driver within our local transport plan. To us, it is crucial and key.

Journeys stand or fall apart based on their weakest link. Very often when we have done consultations with members of the public, they have told us the issues that they face when they are connecting between modes and the impact that that has on their lives. We recently did our transport strategy consultation, and individuals told us of the impact of connecting buses not turning up, especially if they are on a low income; it can mean that they are reliant on taxis or do not turn up to work on time. This can create some real issues for our communities. Within West Yorkshire, there is an aspiration to bring together transport under the unified Weaver Network brand in a similar vein to what is being done in Greater Manchester, South Yorkshire and a number of other devolved areas that are coming forward. There is real potential now with devolution funding to bring not only the branding but the project management and the planning of transport projects across modes. Individuals travel in a multi-modal sense and people just want to arrive on time using a service that they can trust. There are a couple of other examples that we have been working on with Network Rail as part of the trans-Pennine route upgrade. They are real exemplars of joined-up transport planning, where we have been working with the Network Rail first-and-last-mile team to deliver transport and active travel improvements to stations. These are creating real, tangible benefits. Some are relatively low value for transport projects but can be quite life-changing for the communities that immediately surround those station environments.

Building on what other panellists have said, in a similar vein, for the North East Combined Authority, integration is at the heart of our transport plans. Our vision within our local transport plan is for a green integrated transport network that works for all. That whole transport plan is underpinned by the premise of needing to move to seamless door-to-door journeys. Clearly, customers—people, our residents—do not see transport across modes; they see it as needing to get from A to B, so it is about how we enable that. I have some helpful examples of work that we are doing at the moment to explore some of this, and I am more than happy to pick that up as part of the wider discussion today.

Thank you. Obviously, integrated transport and the vision for that are core to all your roles, but we are going to pose some questions on how it actually works in practice.

Several written evidence submissions pointed out how local authorities can approach transport integration in a way that complements and works alongside spatial planning. What is the approach that you use in your areas?

Norfolk County Council is the local transport authority, and within Norfolk, the district and borough councils are the local planning authorities. We work really closely with the districts and boroughs to develop the spatial plans and then implement them on the ground. From our point of view, they are key to making sure any new development in the area is as sustainable as possible. They are absolutely vital to that, and to securing improvements as part of developments to mitigate any accessibility issues and the likes on the ground. That is good from the spatial planning point of view and then the delivery on the ground, but the challenge we have with our highways and transport networks is that the majority of the building work is already there; people are already in houses, and the services and businesses are already located. The challenge comes in trying to pull all that together, and it comes back to trying to integrate the solutions and build on the areas that you can get delivered through the spatial planning process.

For us, the integrated settlement and the money we are getting through devolution has really helped; we have this one big funding stream, and then we have looked at how we align all our strategic documents together. Within the West Midlands Combined Authority we have the West Midlands growth plan looking at growth corridors, we then have our West Midlands local transport plan, and we are working on our spatial development strategy. When we take those three documents together, which will hopefully be fully aligned, we can consider some place-based strategies that our seven local authorities have produced to help draw out those areas where growth is happening that need investment. When we get this investment through the integrated settlement, we can really look at place-based initiatives that do not just look at things in silos, such as transport or health, but bring together all those different pots of money that we would have had to bid for separately. We can now focus on particular communities that really need all that help together. Often it is not just transport that is the barrier. I work with a lot of deprived communities, and they often face lots of other issues. Being able to combine pots of money and bring in land use and land use planning along with growth, thinking about our transport and where our investment goes—having the option to look at lots of different areas—gives us the opportunity to focus on the people and the communities that really need our help. That is what it should be all about; at the end of the day, we are there to serve our communities and I feel there are great opportunities. Just having one pot of money will allow us to do a lot more and work in the areas that really need the help—growth corridors and stuff like that. That is a bigger, more strategic view of it, I suppose, but that is how we see it.

Does anyone have any different views?

I welcome a lot of what has been said already about the importance of master planning and cross-departmental working in a national sense, but also through the single-settlement cross-disciplinary working in a city regional context. When we look at using the infrastructure that is already there and trying to bring as much development as possible to the transport stops that exist, we know that that is one of the best ways to ensure that sustainable travel patterns are embedded from the outset in new developments. There is also a symbiotic relationship and a feedback loop, because that can create extra fare box revenue and sustain improved transport services. In Kirklees, we have had over £1 billion of internal investment into our biggest town, Huddersfield. A lot of that is linked to the trans-Pennine route upgrade. These are cultural projects and regeneration projects. But things do still fall down. I will just give one example separate from residential, office or commercial uses. We have had feedback from local communities about the cultural institutions that they want to use in our towns and cities, and the fact that if a bus service ends on a Saturday or Sunday at 7 pm, they cannot go to the theatre or cinema. There are some elements of low-hanging fruit around subsidising a transport service that works for a larger degree of the clock face, to really try to ensure that people do not have to rely on private cars or taxis where alternatives simply do not exist.

Transport is a key enabler of a lot of the outcomes—the economic, health and environmental outcomes—we want to see, both within our region and nationally. As an example from our region, we know that one trip on our light rail network—our Metro system—derives £11.80 in wider economic benefits, so it is really significant. Like others have said, as a combined authority we are doing a lot of work to think about how we bring these things together and plan them cohesively. We have our spatial development strategy, local growth plan and local transport plan, and it is really important that our visions within each document are complementary and we are thinking about how we bring this stuff together. I want to give three examples of projects where we are trying to move to this more integrated process and think about how we join this up across different policy areas. Sustainable transport connectivity to future growth sites in our region is central to our ambitions. The first example is the work that we are doing around the Leamside corridor, which will unlock significant new housing and ensure strong public transport and active travel links for the communities. We are working across different policy areas there to make that ambition come to life. The second, and supplementary to that, is what we are calling the first stage of that piece of work, which is an extension of the Metro to Washington. That will enable 100,000 people to access opportunities using sustainable public transport linking Newcastle and Sunderland, so it is a pivotal scheme. As part of that, we are having to work across a number of policy areas to join up our thinking and make sure we are delivering on those goals. The final example I want to mention is on the roadside; we are doing a lot of work around the A19 and particularly Moor Farm junction in Northumberland. We have been hearing from our local authorities that planning applications have been put on hold because of the potential negative impact that some schemes might have on the National Highways network. We are working really closely with National Highways to think about how we can come together to enable the housing growth that we want to see, but also take on board any key factors and mitigate any risks for that project with them.

What barriers are there to local authorities co-ordinating transport integration when it comes to issues such as land use decisions? Grahame touched on that; Rory and Helen, do you want to say anything?

Viability is very often one of the biggest challenges. Ensuring that brownfield sites in some of the most well-connected areas, which Grahame mentioned earlier, can be brought forward is very often a question of viability. Even when there is assistance and leverage from agencies such as Homes England in place, there can be challenges to bringing forward development in some of the most sustainable locations. We know that there are wider benefits and positive externalities of having new communities based in the most connected areas where services already exist, and therefore of people living and working in areas where they are able to use sustainable modes as a key choice. One of our largest housing allocations, the Dewsbury Riverside site, is linked to a station on the trans-Pennine route upgrade line, which is going to be fully rebuilt. There is going to be an improved service to Leeds, Manchester and beyond from that station. We are using that as a model for sustainable development where private house builders can deliver a product that can be connected to sustainable transport. Similarly, as part of the spatial development work that we are doing and in a similar vein to what Helen mentioned, there is potential for strategic planning documents to provide backing and policy support to some strategic planning approaches. On our mass transit programme in West Yorkshire, we are working very closely with our combined authority on linking up some of our largest housing allocations to a proposed new mass transit line, but, as I say, viability can be one of the biggest challenges, not only for development but sometimes for transport projects.

I am interested in what you are saying, Rory, specifically given your experience with Homes England. I represent part of a city that has a lot of brownfield sites but also, on the urban fringe, a lot of greenfield sites that could be easier to develop than some brownfields. While the city has real ambitions to deliver on brownfield sites in the city centre, do you think this is an argument for more strategic cross-departmental work between MHCLG and Transport to make sure that the viability of those sites does not become the factor that stops development happening? Do you think that actually, rather than trying to make a rural area sustainable, we need to do more to develop those inner-city or brownfield sites that are right on the fringes of being sustainable but just need that injection of additional money?

That question was almost at the top of my list of points that I was hoping to make today. Strategic planning and transport need to be linked in a more integrated sense, not just in a policy sense but also when it comes to funding. When we are looking at well-connected greenfield or brownfield sites, there is some heavy lifting financially that agencies such as Homes England and MHCLG can do to help the wider partners, whether that be local councils, combined authorities or even transport providers, to encourage private development close to the most sustainable locations so that those sites are made more viable due to support through from public purse. The wider benefits that are then achieved feed back into the wider economy. When we are looking at people’s spending power, many local residents are on or below the average UK income. Running a car is expensive and if more individuals can live as part of a one-car instead of a two-car household—or a zero-car household should they choose to—there is real potential that that money can go back into the local economy and be spent in other ways. Just to summarise that point, the heavy lifting that can be done from a subsidy sense on housing in particular can support some wider cross-departmental aims.

We are often told that integrated transport is harder in the UK than everywhere else because our streets are narrower so it is hard to introduce trams or cycle paths and so on. That tends to ignore the fact that plenty of untouched medieval cities in Europe have both those things, but that is one for another day. The thing that frustrates me is that in new housing developments in my constituency are often poorly done when it comes to active travel, in particular, and public transport integration. How can we ensure that sustainable transport is planned into new developments from the start rather than having to be wedged in later, and what are the challenges in doing that?

That is absolutely key. You have already picked up that when you are starting with a blank canvas—a brand new development—that is the opportunity to get those sustainable transport measures embedded and ideally get that infrastructure in first before people move in and establish travel patterns. From that point of view there is obviously all the planning guidance and requirements, but that is where we as local authorities try to get as much as possible from the developers. It is always a challenge, though, from a developer’s point of view with some of these elements; there will be a trade-off between maximising the number of properties on the development and putting in a sustainable cycle path. There are those discussions between the planning authority and developers, but, like you say, that is the key time to get that in; if we lose that chance, it is so difficult to try to put that back in at a later stage.

In our region, one issue is how our transport assessments are done. Developers will often do a transport assessment, but as a transport authority we are not at the table at the very beginning when the site is selected. For example, transport operators are not necessarily at the table when the site for a housing development is chosen, and as the transport assessment is developed by the developer, it is all about how they are dealing with congestion and reliability and it does not cover the wider ambitions. It does not look at health data, deprivation or the wider outcomes that I mentioned at the start. We need to get our communities better access to opportunities, but it is not picked up there. When they design their site, everything is within the site; it does not necessarily look beyond the density of amenities that are close by. The NPPF talks about building lots of new homes by railway stations, which is great, but if local amenities that everybody needs to use day to day are not also within a really close, 15-minute walk, people will always use their cars. It is great for if you are commuting into a city or town centre, but not everybody’s journeys are to the big town centres in our region. Only 14% of trips are to our town and city centres; our deprived groups are working in business parks and industrial sites at the edge of town. We need our transport network to be a little more flexible and consider those orbital routes far more, because not all journeys lead to town and city centres. That is what I would pick up on: looking beyond the site and at how the transport assessment can be done better.

To add to that, and perhaps give a slightly different perspective, as a combined authority there is absolutely an opportunity through spatial development strategies for us to start to think about how we lay the foundations or principles around some of this. Having spent most of my career working in the north of England in various roles, I would say that there is something around recognising that the viability challenge in enabling sustainable transport on new housing varies geographically as well. The challenge becomes further exacerbated in regions where there is an oversupply of land and lots of ambitions around growth but, often, the balance in terms of negotiations with developers is quite different from an urban core where there is an undersupply of land and you can get developers to enable a lot of the infrastructure requirements that we would all like to see. There is just something more generally about how we plan for and recognise the issue across different regions. The picture in London or another core urban centre is very different from that in some other parts of our country, and the viability challenge becomes even more difficult, particularly when it comes to enabling sustainable transport and the outcomes we want.

You have all covered in generalities what good might look like, and we have had some good specific examples. In each of your authority areas, who is setting the parameters and requirements for integrated transport? Are the decisions being made in the right place? Helen talked about the developers coming in and everyone else having to react. Do you have good and bad examples of who is making the initial decisions on integrated transport?

Developers will follow what is mandated within the national planning policy framework. In response to the previous question, I want to add that some changes in the new draft NPPF that were shared towards the end of last year are very encouraging due to the way that the parameters are shifted. When it comes to the location of sites and what is mandated within those sites, there are some improvements around the prescription of how sites should look internally in terms of their structure and make-up. I just wanted to set that scene of the national planning policy framework mandating what local planning authorities and developers will follow, and the encouraging signs that we are seeing through the draft NPPF. Very briefly on the point about viability, oftentimes the design standards that are aspired to cannot be held to due to viability challenges, or at least that is what developers often argue. There is often a balancing act: local planning authorities need to consider everything that they would like to have and everything that can be afforded through planning contributions and the design of the development itself.

Certainly at the North East Combined Authority and some other combined authorities across the country, we are starting to have more of a role in this. Our role in developing spatial development strategies is key to making sure that there is read-across between that, a local growth plan and a local transport plan, and how all those documents come together to set the parameters of what we want to see within our regions. I would also say that devolution is certainly offering our combined authority real opportunities to start to deliver real change in this space. Some of the work that our team have been doing to explore bus franchising as an opportunity, and to build stronger, more effective partnerships with the rail industry, is helping us to enable real progress in terms of integration. It is the start of a journey and we need to do more. Something that devolution is enabling us to do within our region is think about simplification of fares and ticketing. We have been introducing daily caps on single tickets for bus and metro, and we have just recently committed to rolling that out on to some aspects of our local rail network, particularly the Northumberland line. That is a really big step forward, and some of that has been supplemented by funding that we have received through our devo deal. In addition, we are exploring co-ordinated branding. Very much in a similar vein to what colleagues have mentioned about the Weaver and Bee networks, that—and simplifying and improving our customer experience throughout—is something we are looking towards over the coming year or so. The final step we have been taking on integration, as a first step within the powers that we currently have, is thinking about improvements around gate lines at rail stations, for both light and heavy rail. That is a vital first step for integration because it will enable tap on, tap off services, pay as you go and so on. We really are looking to utilise some funds and powers we have through devolution to start making inroads into the integrated transport network we wish to see, but there is further work that needs to be done. We need to think about what the role is and how we can even better enhance that role with some of the national networks. An integrated network is about journeys from A to B, which may go beyond geographical boundaries and outside the roles and responsibilities of certain parties, so we need to come together to think about it in that holistic sense.

Integrating transport and aligning it with spatial planning and development involves bringing lots of people and organisations—both public and private—together. Whose job is it to be the leader in this and do they have enough powers?

That is a really interesting question. Obviously, more powers would always be helpful, to make sure you pull everyone to the table. As you have highlighted, in a lot of these areas, there are so many different stakeholders involved, both public and private sector, and it is about pulling all those organisations together. For example, with some larger developments, National Highways, the key utility companies, developers, community groups and everyone else are at the table and it is really difficult. In many ways, there is no one lead for that, certainly in the structure where I am currently; as I mentioned, we are a county council with seven district and borough councils. There is local government reorganisation in train, and there is devolution in train as well, but we are not there yet. With both LGR and devolution, hopefully that lead will become clearer. From listening to examples from colleagues on the panel, it seems that in those areas that are further along on this journey than we are in Norfolk, trying to pull people together has been a real positive. You do need to pull those organisations together, because, even for some of the public sector organisations, the development might not be the key priority for them and their organisation.

For us, there is no one accountable body that I could say, “That person is responsible.” As a combined authority, we have the opportunity and we are trying to co-ordinate and look at modes—certainly multimodal—within our local transport plan. We have not just looked at each mode in silos; we have looked at how they should work together. With us doing bus franchising and rail reform, that gives us a lot more power in the long term. When we can take control of those networks better, we can connect our bus network to rail and our light rail and tram network. We would love to do more, but when we have different operators and we do not have that responsibility, it is very difficult, sometimes, to join everything up. I am thinking of the work I am doing with the Canal & River Trust, which has its own structure and ways of doing things, but we are bringing it to the table and working out how the canal towpaths in our region can be a better way to encourage active travel. Things like our place-based strategies and that holy trinity of documents—our local transport plan, spatial development strategy and local growth plan—if they are all working together and communicating the same message, can help bring partners around the table. I have probably said it throughout, but what is key is that engagement with our communities; that cannot be missed. The processes by which we do that are really important. We need to look at an area, make sure we do a health equity impact assessment, look at the problems that people are facing, and then make sure the solution that we come up with really supports those communities and is co-designed and collaborated with those groups of people. That is key, really.

Do you have examples? We have heard quite a lot of generalities, but some examples would be good.

Examples where we have done that? Chair: Yes.

When we were first designing our new railway stations, which are going to be opening this week and next, we did a health equity impact assessment. We did it with the bus franchising, too—that is probably a better one to give you. We looked at all the different communities and how they would be impacted, and the areas that could most benefit from bus franchising. We did it when we started the consultation, looking at those deprived areas. We could not look at the whole region, but if you go out and you just talk to communities, get their ideas and they are engaging—

We understand the principle of that. I do not know the bus routes well enough, but is anything going to change for the buses now the Kings Heath and Moseley stations are about to open?

Until we franchise—I do not know enough to say how the bus routes will change, but—

So that is an example of an aspiration for the—

But it is really important that we do not have bus routes running alongside an almost brand new train line. If people are using the train line, you almost want that bus to connect people to it.

Sorry to interrupt, but is that because you lack control? That is what Transport for West Midlands said in its evidence to us.

We do, because at the moment we do not run the buses. Until we franchise, we cannot really shape and set the routes. Our operators obviously focus on the commercial routes, and we would want to look at routes that maybe serve areas where there are high levels of social exclusion or people working in the night-time economy. Because those routes maybe do not make a profit at the moment, it is very hard for us to fund those. When we do own our bus network—like in Manchester—we will be able to shape a better network and support those groups that actually are not served by the bus.

You would hope that they were looking at that anyway, given that those long-overdue stations are about to open.

The conversation has moved on a little, but you asked for examples of where we have listened to the views of people and used that to shape thinking. As part of our local transport plan, the North East Combined Authority did a statutory consultation, which we are all committed to doing. We had 16,000 respondents, which is really significant and probably one of the highest nationally. For context, in a previous role I worked at Transport for the North, and we did a public consultation on our strategic transport plan and had 700 responses, so 16,000 is significant and a testament to how the team enabled that conversation. It is about how we have used that to shape the thinking and how we continue to engage with our residents to capture their lived experience on key issues and make sure we are embedding that in our thinking. There are a couple of pieces of work we are undertaking at the moment, which are key to our mayor and her manifesto commitments. The first is around exploring the safety of women and girls—both their perceived and their actual concerns about safety—on public transport. As part of that, not only are we undertaking a large-scale study, both qualitative and quantitative, to understand their experience, but we have commissioned the voluntary sector within our region to co-ordinate an expert panel for us. That will bring in the voices of people and make sure that any recommendations we are taking from that work to feed into our delivery plan are fully embedded and thinking about their priorities. Similarly, we are undertaking an accessibility review of our network, thinking about the needs in particular of those who are visually impaired or have mobility issues. Again, we are using an expert panel to bring in lived experience throughout. It is not just us as policymakers thinking that we know the right solutions; it is testing that throughout and making sure that is shaped. Building on what Helen was saying, ultimately all that engagement has been really helpful for us within our region, because it has helped us understand the barriers and issues to integration. It is about how we address those. For example, we know that there are multiple apps and websites within our region, which is really confusing to customers when they are trying to plan their journeys, and that is a barrier to integration. The different price points on ticketing and fares across different elements of the network add to that confusion and stops people thinking about sustainable transport modes, and if the car is there, they will revert to that. It is about how you use that intelligence and try to address those issues. The other big thing, which we have not really talked about yet this morning but is an important point when we think about integration, is that it cannot be a one-size-fits-all approach. Even within our combined authority region, we have a really diverse geography. We have urban cores but we also have really deeply rural areas. We need to recognise that the level of integration and what that looks like will look and feel quite different depending on whether you live in quite a rural part of Northumberland or County Durham or you live in an urban core such as Newcastle, Sunderland or Gateshead. That is another key point: the levels of integration and sustainable transport that are available to you, and what that looks like, will be quite different depending on your locality.

Is this all predicated upon goodwill or are everyone’s incentives aligned enough to achieve good transport outcomes?

The proof of the pudding will hopefully come over the next few years as mayoral strategic authorities come forward. Looking at the alignment of powers over strategic planning and transport that are coming to city regions, there is potential that a lot of these KPIs are going to be under one roof. There will be a real need for mayoral strategic authorities to ensure that these strategic aims are met across the inner-city regional context by one organisation. In answer to the last question, about who is leading, we also need to consider what is leading. Very often it is the KPIs of individual organisations, which can differ, so that can be a challenge. As I mentioned, there is a lot that can be welcomed from the NPPF and hopefully from the integrated national transport strategy. We also need to look at where funding is being directed and how funding is predicated to be spent, ensuring that the funding is aligned with those KPIs so that there can be some cross-disciplinary working between the development sector and the transport sector, as I mentioned at the very start.

Some foundations are starting to come together, and the integrated national transport strategy is a real opportunity to start to bring some of this thinking together and lay the foundations. We just need to be careful about the dispersed guidance and how we consider that. It is a complex landscape, so simplifying the process and trying to think about how we bring together housing, transport, growth and so on is critical. Equally, we need to consider that in the context of increased regional devolution, and at the heart of that is putting decisions in the hands of local leaders to shape their own destiny.

If I am a voter and I think that the transport in my area is rubbish and badly integrated, who do I vote out of office?

That is where our politicians are held to account.

Who should I be chucking out?

In terms of highways and transport, usually it is quite clear that the local transport or highway authority has that responsibility, so that will be the area. In Norfolk, we have 500-plus town and parish councils, and a lot of the highway improvement schemes that we deliver on the ground actually come from those local communities. We have a number of initiatives. There is local member funding and parish partnership funding; if parishes want large-scale highway improvement schemes, they co-fund with us, the county council, to make the funding go further. Those local community-generated schemes are basically what the local communities want on the ground. We have found those to be really successful and have delivered thousands of schemes over the last 10 years since we introduced that sort of fund. On the flip side of that, we have a couple of schemes that we have developed with Active Travel England to make cycling improvements in urban areas. Those types of schemes are less accepted by the local communities, and it is proving a real struggle to win over everyone’s hearts and minds and get the local support. As I say, if the scheme is generated from the local community, there is generally a high amount of acceptance.

Having thought about your question a little more, I think the answer is really complex. Voters do not see in this sense, but there are so many different aspects to integration and, when we talk about a truly integrated network, there are different levels of that as well. Are we just talking about integration between rail services, both local and national? Are we talking about integration into bus? Are we thinking about active travel and so on as part of all that? There are different levels to integration; it is a really complex picture. I recognise that members of the public do not see it in that sense. Again, it is about their journeys. Combined authorities have increased powers to start to enable some of this, but it is a bigger picture. In our area, we can do as much as we can with the powers that we have, and we have started to deliver on that in terms of laying the foundations for integration. It relies on links to national bodies such as Great British Railways, as that is established, Network Rail, the DFT and National Highways to think about how we make sure that our network is joining to journeys beyond our region. It is a complex picture, and for a voter that will not be clear. I am sure they will be looking at mayors and others to address all these issues, but we really need to think about how we work better with those national bodies to bring all that together.

In a word, the answer to your question should be mayors. In the way that devolution has been set up, there is a real understanding in the city regions that have devolution that the buck stops with the mayor. In combined authority regions that have strategic powers over transport, mayors are using that as their big-ticket item when it comes to elections. Local individuals should not have to wait four or five years to express their distrust, frustration or lack of support for local transport. In Greater Manchester, there are some really good examples of real-time feedback. Individuals can rate their bus journey on the Bee Network app; there is a smiley face, a neutral face and an unhappy face, and individuals can click whichever one they see fit. In that context as well, the Mayor of Greater Manchester has a weekly phone-in. Ninety per cent of the individuals who call into that are talking about individual problems on bus routes, and most of the time, the response that that particular mayor gives is that he will take the query away and try to resolve it for the person who has phoned in.

Of course, Grahame is from a non-mayoral authority area where the situation is more complex.

I want to add to what Lucy said. It is really complex. Integration is not just about how one or two modes connect and interchange; it is also about what local authorities do. They play a really big part, because it is things such as your parking management and transport demand measures as well. A good example is that we have done a brilliant bus lane, but we do not have any enforcement officers working there, so on my journey to work there are lots of cars parked in it. It is the role of the local authority. We cannot do enforcement; as the combined authority, we have no traffic wardens. That is a crucial part of the integration for me to get to the train station on time. Things like speed enforcement in residential areas and who is responsible for speed bumps are important. That can also play a really big part. Those sorts of measures—living in a nice environment where speed is reduced with 20 mph zones and speed reduction measures—are part of helping to achieve integration. Again, that is a local authority role. It does not answer your question, but local and combined authorities should be working together on trying to deliver good integration. We both play a role and we are both responsible.

That is a useful point about enforcement. In London, parking in bus lanes can be enforced.

I suppose the point on parking is that if it is the combined authority that put the lane in, it should have the power to enforce. I want to ask about the integrated national transport strategy. I sat on both the Bus Services Bill Committee and the Railways Bill Committee, and it is very disappointing that the strategy did not come forward before we legislated on franchising and GBR and all those things. We always look at the link between active travel, buses, the railway and how they all join up, but the conversation and the answers you have provided highlight that there is potentially integration needed between the different levels of government. I would argue that it is not just mayors who are responsible. If National Highways will not deliver what a combined or mayoral authority wants, then the whole thing gets put in a box and cannot be delivered. On the integrated national transport strategy, is there anything more that the Government should be using, other than just integrating modes of transport, to ensure that transport can be integrated properly? Do you think that some of those things should be reflected in the strategy at a kind of vertical level rather than just that horizontal mode level?

You have hit the nail on the head. There are so many other actors and bodies that have such key roles and responsibilities to play. It comes back to what I said earlier about needing everyone pulling in the same direction. Sometimes that is really challenging. Anything in the integrated national transport strategy that supports authorities to not hold others to account but get everyone working as one is vital.

Lucy, you mentioned that you have been bringing people together to do that. It is one thing to bring people together. Is there any action coming out of that, in terms of how you are working—in particular with National Highways, I think you said—that might be a model that could be taken forward?

It is a great example. The way we have been working with National Highways has been really collaborative, and they are really open to thinking about how we can better strengthen the business case for that particular scheme by bringing in the additional aspirations around housing in that area and, in particular, aligning that to the Government’s wider missions and ambitions on housing growth. They are open to exploring with us how we look to strengthen the business case and perhaps which aspects of the current business case do not fully capture the wider benefits that we think that project would enable. We are in open dialogue with National Highways around how we work together to strengthen aspects of the appraisal process and the business case to make sure that it fully reflects the wider benefits of the scheme. It is fair to say that as much as that has been a really positive experience and it is really open to that conversation, there is a limit to how far that goes. Certainly at the national level, whether with National Highways or Great British Railways, this is a barrier we are starting to see play out a little for combined authorities. Yes, we have devolution and powers to shape some of this, but in some respects our role is limited, and even where there is potentially a statutory role in some of this space, sometimes the reality of what that looks like is quite different. As much as we have a say around influencing some of this, it does not necessarily mean that the recommendations or thoughts of the local area or the priorities of the mayor will be taken on board. As a combined authority, whether it is through GBR or further devolution, we are keen to strengthen our role in that space and be really clear about what the mayor’s roles and responsibilities are and how those national bodies will take fully into account the views of the regions in terms of what they want to deliver.

What do you think the strategy should say about spatial planning and land use? What would need to change to improve that from your local authorities’ perspectives?

The strategy should look at how transport agencies can be encouraged by Government to boost development around stations. We are seeing a few examples of transport agencies and actors in the transport sphere—such as TfL, Transport for Greater Manchester and, in many cases, Network Rail—are acting and liaising more closely with developers. Some teeth in respect of promoting the efficient use of land around stations is a potential key one. Given the Government’s ambitions to deliver more housing and more economic growth, perhaps there should also be some encouragement in there for transport actors to act as promoters of growth and actors that help speed up development projects. There can be instances where some national agencies or transport actors are a barrier to growth and development.

Building on that—this is something that is required as part of the integrated national transport strategy, but there also needs to be a relevant hook in the national planning policy framework, which is currently being consulted on too—it needs to define the role of combined authorities and local partners, and strengthen strategic planning authorities’ role in providing supplementary planning documents for the delivery of major investments and growth opportunities. That would be really beneficial for our Leamside investment corridor, our north-east investment zone and so on; it would firm up and define our role in that space and allow us to have much more of a say in shaping that, particularly linked to our key growth investment areas.

I am conscious of the time, so can we have brief answers—or none at all if somebody else has already said effectively the same thing?

I should draw the Committee’s attention to my registered interest as a serving Norfolk county councillor, as we have a senior officer from that authority here—don’t panic, Grahame! Lucy just mentioned the NPPF. It is almost as if transport does not fit neatly into any departmental box. That comment aside, I assume that, like me, you have looked through the NPPF and have a lot to say about it. What is your personal top thing in it that will make a difference when it comes to aligning transport integration with wider planning and development goals? I will start with you, Rory, because I was interested in what you said earlier about it being only as good as the weakest link.

An encouraging thing that is in there at the moment is the reference to internal site layouts and structures. That is a change from previous NPPFs; developers and local authorities are given more guidance about how sites should look internally and how sustainable transport can be promoted. Perhaps there could be some more in there about how transport can be supported through contributions, for when we are looking at how contributions can be used to sustain bus services or provide mobility hubs and that type of thing.

I like the fact that it mentions local transport plans and that vision-led, people-first approach; that is really positive. The DFT’s new connectivity tool is great as long as it is used to its maximum—not just for deciding where a site goes but for setting density levels, the wider site allocation and understanding areas a bit better in terms of deprivation, air quality and so on. Those would be my two big things. I see potential in developing near railway stations as long as it is not just housing; you should look at amenities, too, and whether the development is close to existing amenities. That would be my only issue with it, really. The other thing is that it does not mention much about bus. It is great for railway stations, but 80% of our local residents use the bus as their main form of transport. We are doing a lot in terms of cross-city bus, so there could be a bit more focus on not just rail but those really key bus corridors that we are investing in. Why not build around the bus network as well?

You mentioned LTPs. Do you think the Government should give clearer guidance? Very briefly, please.

On local transport plans, yes, certainly. I have seen a version that has come out just recently, and yes, that guidance is needed. In the West Midlands we have written ours, but that guidance will help when we amend and revise it. Integration needs to be key in that. I have read the draft guidance and the word “integration” is only used once, under ticketing. It is still laid out in silos: car first, cycling, bus. Within that guidance there is a great opportunity to show some best practice and where good integration has happened.

The top thing for me is any more teeth it can give in terms of getting contributions. Getting the travel behaviours in as soon as people move into new developments is absolutely fundamental; otherwise, they form habits that are really difficult to change or influence. For argument’s sake, if it is a semi-rural area and you can get the bus service going from day one, before they move in, hopefully you can get that established and then it becomes financially sustainable as well. For me, it is the financial contribution.

I will go back to my earlier point: the NPPF probably needs to recognise more that viability issues vary depending on geography. That is a really big factor in how we enable the transport solutions we need. There needs to be recognition of what works for a highly urban area and the fringe around it, and therefore how you can get developers to deliver the good placemaking we want to see, but also of the fact that there is a lot more leverage there than in an area with an oversupply of land and lots of growth aspirations, where the developers hold a bit more power. Trying to figure out how we balance that and give enough say to local planning authorities on how we integrate and get the good placemaking that we need is critical.

Does anyone have any particular thoughts on whether the vision-led language is useful or hollow, what you need to deliver that, whether vision-led actually means car-free, and whether that is viable in all parts of the country? I do not need an answer from everyone, but perhaps I could gently encourage Grahame to answer, as a rural representative, and perhaps you have some views on that too, Lucy.

On that last point, that is certainly the challenge for rural areas of the country. In rural parts of Norfolk, it is really difficult. In a lot of those communities there are no footways, and there is not even any bus service. When we are talking about integrated transport, the only options tend to be dial-a-ride services or use of the private car. Those are really difficult areas to tackle. That is where we hope the NPPF document and local transport plan guidance will give us, as local authorities, some tools to try to change behaviour and offer travel solutions. The bus service improvement plan funding, which has now moved into bus funding, has been really welcome. In Norfolk we have seen something like a 26% increase in bus passenger numbers through that additional Government funding, which is phenomenal and has been vital. How can we build on that going forward?

We may still need to start our journeys in a private car, at least in some contexts. Lucy, do you have a view on this?

The only thing I would say is that the vision and validate approach is central, and it is great to see it starting to filter through national Government policies but also at the local and regional levels. That is really important. In this space maybe 10 years ago, we were in a place of predicting and providing transport, and that does not help us deliver the outcomes we want. That is a really key point. The other big benefit of a vision-led approach to some of this is that it enables us to think about transformational services. It moves us away from just small, intermittent changes and really helps us think about what we need for our people and communities and to enable the outcomes we want.

It is a cultural shift as well. You can have the policy in place, but we also need that the thinking to change, away from just thinking about the junction improvements that need to go alongside the housing. It is about being brave and planning authorities sometimes almost saying, “No, we want a better bus service here; we want that active travel.”

Is that changing—yes or no?

Probably not at the moment, no.

There is more work to be done. We have touched on funding, but Rebecca has a short, sharp question.

What are the barriers to simply pooling different funding streams at local level to fund integration? Would dedicated budgets or incentives for integration be a better way of supporting joined-up networks?

To a degree, we have the ability now to pool those funds. What is really welcome is that just before Christmas, the Department for Transport issued a multi-year settlement for local authorities. For many authorities, this is the first time in 10-plus years that we have had a multi-year settlement. That is really welcome and enables us to plan and co-ordinate schemes over the short to medium term, so we can get efficiencies from that point of view.

Is it now cross-modal? Does the new funding incentivise integration?

Yes, it does, because it is part of a consolidated pot now as well. By introducing the consolidated pot, the Department for Transport has allowed us to move the funding around from funding streams such as Active Travel England funding or bus funding.

Do we have the right criteria for local authorities to measure whether things they do and developments they play a part in actually improve integrated transport?

That is a really interesting question. We have really blunt metrics such as bus passenger numbers, so you can look at it globally, but on an individual, development-by-development basis, that is really difficult. You could spend a lot of money trying to evaluate and get some figures and it still might not give you anything meaningful. Interestingly, as part of this consolidated pot, the Department for Transport has also introduced the local transport outcomes framework, which has 21 metrics that local authorities will now be reporting on. They are the blunt metrics such as bus passenger numbers, so it is really difficult.

At some level, that would have to track individual user behaviour to make those statistics meaningful, would it not? You are going to be double-counting or missing things out.

Yes. As I say, that is the difficulty with trying to do it on a development-by-development basis. It is really tricky.

I could talk all day about the issues of the appraisal system, monitoring and evaluation, the data that is available, and so on. There is a challenge with some of this in terms of integration. As part of our local transport plan, we have committed to monitor and evaluate against some KPIs. There is also the outcomes framework that a lot of the combined authorities are being asked to measure against, but they are preset criteria and a lot of the data is nationally available in DFT datasets and so on. That is great, but a lot of what derives some of those factors—even thinking about customer satisfaction with the bus or rail network—is very mode-specific and often depends on the different aspects of a journey. For example, some surveys that derive that data are based on national rail journeys and do not consider local rail journeys or the bus element. A lot of the data that is available is piecemeal at best and does not really reflect the whole journey. There is something more that could be done nationally, or funded nationally, around a large-scale survey that considers the end-to-end journey.

This inquiry has certainly covered that aspect of the problem as we see it. If the mechanisms do not necessarily deliver the answers at the moment, do the inputs and outputs get captured? Are the costs and benefits of schemes adequately captured within the current framework, at the very least?

That is a difficult question to answer. As you know, the Green Book has very recently been revised; the new iteration was published in January. It is too early to say whether that will deliver the meaningful change we hope to see. There are some really encouraging aspects of what has come out in that guidance, particularly the place-based approach and thinking holistically in that sense. As I say, it is a bit early to say whether that will materialise in terms of cost-benefit analysis and the schemes that get brought forward.

Are there any other comments on measurement?

All I would say is that if it is about being vision-led, people coming first and the journey experience, having good-quality data about customer satisfaction and how the customer feels is really important. It is important to cover congestion, reliability and all that, but the customer does not necessarily care about some of that; it is about how they feel and the fact that they want to keep coming back and making repeat journeys. Good integration is putting the customer first and having good-quality customer service that will make a person want to keep coming back to use our transport networks. That is key, and I do not think it is really captured at the moment.

That is the people side of it. The policy side of it, for local authorities—you mentioned them all at the beginning—is about growth, addressing deprivation, isolation and so on. Do the Green Book changes give you those opportunities?

In principle. I guess the question is whether that plays out in reality in terms of how you see the business cases coming forward. The other thing to think about at the local combined authority level is that some of the data that is available is not disaggregated very well by region. A lot of it is about how the data is captured, but if you try to look at what it means for your region, the sample size is not good enough to give you a strong indication. Sometimes that is quite challenging when it comes to how we make the case for this stuff, but also for how we monitor our progress over time.

I am going to ask you the wave-your-magic-wand question, and I would like one-sentence answers. Taking into account the current barriers—policy, governance, silos; anything at all—what is the one thing that you would like to do in your area to promote integrated transport that you cannot currently do? Let us start with Lucy.

Do I have time to ponder that? It is a great question.

I am sure you would all have liked that, but I am sure you will do very well.

For us it builds on what I said earlier. We are making really good inroads and starting to enable this integrated network, but there are certainly barriers we are facing, particularly because we can do so much within our region but integration extends beyond our region too. How do we think about that in the things that are delivered by national agencies and bodies? We really need to address that.

The liaison between regional and national and tying the threads between regional bodies?

Yes.

You mentioned that National Highways is one.

I will say greater funding for development around transport stops and in our most located locations. That is one of the ways that we can achieve housing growth, deliver the sorts of housing products that people are telling us they want to see, and embed sustainable transport into new developments and travel patterns.

For me, quite simply, it is giving the 27% of our region’s households that do not have access to a car the right transport so that they can access opportunities.

More funding to enable us to deliver more and larger interventions to hopefully get sustainable transport, achieve modal shift and do what we need to do but on a larger scale.

Thank you to all our witnesses. That brings our first panel to an end. Thank you for the time you spent presenting evidence and preparing for today. I will suspend the meeting for a few moments while our next witnesses take their places.