The major scheme bid is a relatively recent vehicle through which local authorities can apply for funding from central government. Over the past 3 or 4 years PDC have worked extensively with local authority clients on all aspects of the preparation of the major scheme bid documents and we are currently working to ensure the successful adoption of the schemes.
Here are some brief details about some projects we have conducted in this area.
Gloucestershire Major Scheme Bid
Date: 2005
This project was undertaken in conjunction with Halcrow Group who is Gloucestershire County Councils term consultants. The brief involved building a multi modal model of transport in Gloucestershire which would be able to forecast demand for a new park and ride site at Elmbridge court adjacent to a proposed new parkway railway station.
The work involved building a Visual-tm model of demand which drew upon an existing SATURN highway network model. A public transport network was built in Visual-tm which was connected to the SATURN model to ensure consistent speeds. Trip generation, distribution, mode choice and public transport assignment models were calibrated and set up to iterate until the transport supply/demand had converged to equilibrium. This model was then used to forecast demand for 2011 and 2026.
Outputs were taken from the model for input into TUBA for economic appraisal. Forecasts were produced for both the major scheme and a low cost alternative. TUBA was run to produce a cost benefit ratio and outputs were used for the major scheme bid document. This bid has been presented to central government and the client is awaiting evaluation.
Truro Major Scheme Bid
Date: 2005
This project was conducted in conjunction with Mouchel Parkman to develop a multimode model and use it to help design and appraise a transport strategy for Truro so as to support their major scheme bid for funds. The strategy involved a pair of park and ride sites feeding the city centre, major highway and junction improvements, new development sites, bus services and demand management measures so as to provide transport into Truro well into the future. We developed a multimode model integrated with the County’s SATURN model of Truro so as to investigate alternative land use and transport measures for 2011 and 2026. The model coefficients were obtained from a stated preference survey of 300 car drivers, which we undertook for the County.
The model forecasts were used to help design the transport measures including the park and ride system. The revenue forecasts were used to assess whether the scheme would be self funding and make a profit. The forecasts were also used for appraisal and to make the case for funding it.
The County also commissioned us to develop a parking model to forecast the demand and revenue streams from parking so as to investigate use of the long stay, short stay, on-street and non-residential parking stock with or without the park and ride. The revenue streams were returned to different organisations so there was a need to balance growth in parking revenue, with who gets it, who funds the park and ride and which parking should be converted from long to short stay (or vice versa).
Cheshire and Warrington Sub Regional Transport Model
Date: 2007 (Ongoing)
This project builds upon the county model developed by PDC for Cheshire in 2005. This project will expand this model and significantly improve its detail so that the model will be suitable for testing strategy and it is envisaged it will be used as the primary tool for devising a major scheme bid.
The model is being built in Visual-tm and will integrate with 3 highway models of towns in Cheshire. The model will be lin ked to the counties GIS system and will be used for monitoring and preparing the Local Transport Plan.