GM Moving response to consultation on the draft GM Transport Strategy 2050 and GM Transport Delivery Plan 2027-2037

Following the consultation on the draft GM Transport Strategy 2050 and GM Transport Delivery Plan 2027-2037, GM Moving have several recommendations.

1. Bring together elected members from a broad range of portfolio areas to engage in and contribute to a holistic conversation about the role of transport in their areas, with TfGM enabling and supporting these conversations as part of achieving the vision for a city region with lower motor vehicle usage.
2. Build a workforce development and support plan to help with culture change and the necessary changes in governance and process to apply a people first, community-led and whole-system approach to transport planning and design. This can support a thriving city region where everyone can live a good life. This could be an additional Delivery Plan under Ways of Working.
3. Influence the appraisal of projects to add more emphasis on health, social, environmental, and economic considerations, adjusting the weighting of factors beyond modal shift from cars towards cycles, to better reflect the broader value of transport interventions have to the GMS outcomes.
4. Develop mechanisms for sharing learning, listening to, and gaining deeper community insight and understanding of inequalities to inform improvement and maintenance plans. This includes GM and local engagement mechanisms to capture, and value lived experience to augment online survey responses.
5. Strengthen the contribution to improving roads, bridleways and paths that are not part of Streets for All guidance or for ‘transport walking’ as part of the Bee Network. This could be delivered through the development and resourcing of a GM walking plan that improves access to greenspace, addresses inequalities and delivers health and wellbeing improvements. TfGM should have a role in this to lead and resource some elements.
6. Build in approaches to use walking street assessments in neighbourhoods to inform low cost, multi-point improvements. These would address inequalities in access to streets, improve neighbourhoods for walking, wheeling, and cycling locally, while contributing to the Right mix ambition.
7. Establish a neighbourhood fund that can be used by local authorities to support Live Well ambitions, Ageing Well, and accessibility to key services and assets separately to the infrastructure pipeline programme. This fund, which would align to the Network principles, would offer shorter term flexibility whilst still contributing to the ambitions of the Transport Plan.
8. Allocate resource to support the development and implementation of a GM walking plan that supports people to walk more regardless of purpose and supports Right Mix and Transport plan ambitions.
9. Develop plans for secure cycle parking, cycle delivery solutions (and parking for adapted cycles) in towns, district centres, and the regional centre.