The immediate agenda - Transport Policy and Planning in Great Britain - page 402

Box 23.6 Indicators included in PSA5 (for 2008/09-2010/11)
1. Journey time on main roads into urban areas
this relates to journey times per person on key routes into the ten largest urban
areas in the morning rush hour.
2. Journey time reliability on the strategic road network
measured in terms of the average delay experienced in the worst 10% of journeys
for each monitored route, so as to focus on journeys which are significantly slower
than typical journeys and which most threaten unreliability.
3. Level of capacity and crowding on the rail network
linked to HLOS for CP4.
4. Average benefit-cost ratio of investments approved over the CSR07 period
measured against a baseline of 2004/05-2006/07. This is intended to demonstrate
how the recommendations from the Eddington Study are being implemented to
ensure that spending is focused on the projects with the 'highest returns'.
Note: Transport is also identified as a 'significant contributor' to PSAs for which other Government
Departments carry lead responsibility, viz:
PSA 20 Increase long-term housing supply and affordability (DCLG)
PSA 27 Lead the global effort to avoid dangerous climate change (Defra)
PSA 28 Secure a healthy natural environment for today and the future (Defra)
Source: HM Treasury 2007b
recommendations emerging from the Eddington Study. It therefore has the following
features which have been noted at various points previously in this topic.
• Transport demand is essentially treated as exogenous - the extent to which
Government policy, past and present has contributed to the present volume and
pattern of demand is not acknowledged.
• Sustained - and sustainable - economic growth is defined by incorporating only
certain readily identifiable environmental and social costs as 'boundaries' to the
pursuit of GDP growth.
• Because of these assumptions the task facing the Department is phrased in the
form of improving conditions 'relative to what they would have been otherwise',
not in terms of actual improvements. (Is the ambition for any other field of public
policy framed in such a way?)
• The Government remains preoccupied with transport problems as evidenced in
the operation of the transport system. Hence the 'needs of the travelling public'
signifies 'the interests of people who are currently willing and able to travel'; it
does not mean the needs of people who might wish to travel (or travel more or
differently) but are currently unable to.
Progress against the overall PSA target 'to deliver reliable and efficient transport
networks that support economic growth' is to be measured through four indicators
(Box 23.6). The indicator relating to the average benefit-cost ratio of investments
approved during the CSR07 period is an innovation. It may help ensure that spending
is focused on projects with the highest returns, but it may also handicap the prospects