Better Transport

In order to build a road, local authorities need money and planning permission. The money almost always comes from the Department for Transport. To get the money from the department, the local authority needs to follow the department's rules and processes.

A local authority's 'battle plan'
The local authority will plan to (not necessarily in this order):

• Get the scheme into local and regional plans and safeguard the route from development.
• Include the scheme in the local transport plan
• Get the scheme prioritised in the regional funding allocation
• Put the scheme out for initial consultation
• Prepare the business case and send to the Government
• Get Ministerial approval of scheme into the local roads programme
• Consult on route choices
• Announce the authority’s preferred route
• Prepare and publish a planning application and environmental statement
• Allow for an objection period
• Prepare Officers Report for planning (development control) committee
• Resolve to grant planning permission
• Grant planning permission
• Wait to see if the Government will hold a public inquiry into the scheme
• Publish compulsory purchase orders for land necessary for the scheme and side road orders
• Announce public inquiry
• Produce and publish a statement of case
• Hold a public inquiry
• Produce a revised business case for the Government
• Get conditional approval from the Minister
• Seek tenders
• Get final approval from the Minister

This simplistic 'battle plan' combines two processes that local authority road schemes go through:

• Funding approval and appraisal process
• Planning (statutory) process

These processes – not official terms, by the way – run in parallel, and sometimes overlap. What's more, every local authority will do things differently and the processes are not linear – for example one council might go for planning permission before seeking Government funding, whilst another might do it the other way round. However, it is helpful if you see them as two different processes because they have different campaigning strategies.

The funding approval and appraisal processThe planning process

How a road's value is determined