Selecting and Applying Indicators for Transport Project Appraisal

Dr Greg Marsden [email protected]

Outline

• • • • Project Appraisal Limitations with current approach New indicators Next steps

Project Appraisal

• • • “Appraisal is the process of checking that value for money is achieved in delivering Government aims” (UK DfT) “to help design and select projects that contribute to the welfare of a country” (World Bank) “to develop sound and objective information necessary for informed decision making” (FTA)

Project Appraisal

• • Transport appraisal UK - Required for all schemes > $9.6M

Current Situation Do Nothing -50 Option A -40 Option B -30

Project Appraisal

• • • • • Environment – 10 sub-objectives (local air quality, noise, greenhouse gases, biodiversity, heritage…) Economy – 5 sub objectives (VfM, consumer and producer benefits…) Safety – 2 sub-objectives (accidents, security) Accessibility – 3 sub-objectives (options, severance, physical) Integration – 3 sub-objectives (interchange, land-use, other policies)

Strategic Environmental Assessment

• • • • • Since July 2004 (parallel to EIS) Applies to plans and programmes Only requires environmental assessment Process – Baseline, problems, indicators, alternatives… Report on – positive / negative – – – – – – – scale magnitude time scale frequency duration, direct/indirect cumulative

Limitations

• • • • • Appraisal hides absolute impacts Limit guidelines ignored Cumulative effects ignored Long term impacts ‘discounted’ Many aspects of sustainability ignored – – – 12 indicators reported 3 indicators strongly related 24 indicators not considered

Public's experience Easy to Measure Understood by public Understood by politicians Cost effective Consistency (LTP) Consistency (transport and SD) Consistency (transport and planning) Year-on-year improvement Use in target setting Use in benchmarking

Limitations

0% 20% 40% 60% % Respondents 80% 100% Very satisfied Fairly satisfied Not very satisfied Not at all satisfied Don't know/equiv.

Limitations

Walking Cycle use PT patronage Traffic levels

X

Townscape Road safety

X

Street environment PT user satisfaction

X X

Health Distributional Congestion

X

CO2

X

Noise Air Quality Accessibility 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% % Respondents 70% 80% 90% 100%

Selection

• • • • Good measures of sustainable

outcomes

– Total CO 2 , CO 2 /capita, CO 2 /trip Capable of measurement – estimation/forecast • Sensitive to spatial change – e.g. air quality levels vs. toxic emissions Capture distributional impacts Understandable/rational

Application

• • • • • Importance of a core common approach – National guidance Outcome indicators are vital – – Avoid specifying solutions Allows for more consistent benchmarking Supported by meaningful process (output) indicators Absolute and relative changes Importance of changes

Questions

For further information: http://www.its.leeds.ac.uk/research/ [email protected]