Issue - meetings

Report of the Head of Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste (HIW/18/35) on the key traffic management operational issues requiring development and implementation across the County, attached.

An Impact Assessment is also attached.

(Councillors Atkinson, Connett, Dewhirst, Greenslade, Hannaford and Shaw attended in accordance with Standing Order 25(2) and spoke to this item).

The Cabinet considered the Report of the Chief Officer for Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste (HIW/18/35) which provided an overview of key traffic management operational issues requiring development and implementation across the County in the coming years to ensure the safe and expeditious movement of traffic on the highway network, which had been circulated prior to the meeting in accordance with regulation 7(4) of the Local Authorities (Executive Arrangements) (Meetings and Access to Information) (England) Regulations 2012.

The Report highlighted that the Devon Network Management Plan had been adopted by the County Council in November 2008, the purpose of which was to provide the strategic direction of the Council in discharging its Statutory Duty of the Traffic Management Act.  The ethos of the Plan remained in ensuring the expeditious movement of traffic on the network, however, it was considered some key areas required revisiting to determine how the highway network was managed in the future.

The Report outlined four key proposals and well as other ongoing work streams which may require a change of policy position in the future, for example a refreshed Network Management Plan should a Roadworks Permit scheme be pursued, electric vehicle charging points, the impact of autonomous vehicles, national legislation on “pavement” parking and emerging technology.

The first proposal related to the Management of Roadworks. The Council currently worked to a noticing system where the Council was notified of planned works. An alternative approach was a highway permit scheme, whereby instead of giving notice of works, ‘approval to work’ was sought by works promoters from the highway authority to work on the highway and a ‘permit to work’ was issued, or not.  Permits had an associated fee, set within maximums prescribed by the Department for Transport (DfT) and various conditions could be attached. DfT estimated that Authorities introducing such schemes tended to see a reduction in disruption of between 5-10% due to a greater control of works by the Highway Authority.  The Report gave further background information on Roadworks Permit schemes at Appendix I.

The second proposal was in relation to persistent evaders of civil parking enforcement. The Council had been delivering Civil Parking Enforcement service in-house for four years and had evidence of a number of UK vehicles and foreign registered vehicles repeatedly found contravening parking restrictions and owners not engaging with the appeals process or paying their penalty charges and associated costs.  The potential value of the outstanding debt being in the order of £400,000.

The proposal was to extend the Council’s enforcement activity to be able to remove or seize any vehicle, where the owner / keeper was identified as a persistent evader, where appropriate and in accordance with The Traffic Management Act 2004, The Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 and the Secretary of State’s Statutory Guidance to Local Authorities on the Civil Enforcement of Parking Contraventions to tackle this antisocial behaviour.  Fees  ...  view the full minutes text for item 189