Vision and Validate: Time for a shift in transport planning?
December 06, 2024
How can we help our changing transport needs get factored into planning? Look at 3 nuances of the proposed NPPF changes.
Following the release of the proposed National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) reforms, we’ve been hearing a lot of positive noise around the potential changes. This is especially true when it comes to the future of sustainable transport planning.
In my mind, this review has come not a moment too soon. Over the last few decades, our priorities for transport planning have shifted. We’ve seen targets adopted, technologies evolve, and the climate emergency become more urgent. We know we need healthier, less carbon-intensive, and safer ways of getting from point A to point B. But developers, communities, and local authorities need to understand what this future looks like.
Historically, the industry hasn’t been able to visualise a different way of travelling. That, coupled with long-established transport planning approval processes, has stifled the sector’s ability to drive real change. Perhaps now, across the built environment, we can use this moment to move towards a better future for transport planning.
Public transport has an increasing role to play in the future of mobility.
Interpreting the proposed NPPF
Looking at Section 9 (Promoting Sustainable Transport) of the proposed NPPF, it’s exciting to see policy catching up with best practices. Changes to the section point to a radical shift in transport planning. The revised NPPF moves away from simply planning for more highway capacity. It’s moving towards planning for more connected places, healthier communities, and a better environment.
Here’s the main point from the NPPF: ‘Planning for travel too often follows a simplistic “predict and provide” pattern, with insufficient regard for the quality of places being created or whether the transport infrastructure which is planned is fully justified.’ It rightfully asserts that the default assumption for our future is too focused on roads that have more private vehicles on them.
But surely that’s not the best future we can imagine. One with more traffic on the roads? Of course not. We need to test and understand what our desired travel patterns and behaviours look like in the future. And we must set out a workable vision for how tomorrow’s communities want their places to be, based on these scenarios.
Knowing this, we can then work backward. We can design transport and behavioural interventions to help us achieve the ideal. Along the journey, we can monitor and manage progress to help realise our vision. And we can modify our approach and strategies when needed.
This approach is known as ‘vision and validate’, and it’s something our team has been passionate about for some time.
What does our collective transport vision look like for tomorrow and beyond?
Using vision-and-validate principles for transport planning is a powerful tool. It allows us and our clients to reduce unnecessary infrastructure, support active travel, boost well-being in communities, and reduce car dependency.
We know, through our Bridging the Gap research programme, that to reach a net zero transport sector in the UK, we need to reduce our private car use by at least 20 percent by 2030. This body of work investigated three alternative ‘futures’. We tested the potential impacts of each of them and reducing car travel.
We can see major levels of health, environmental, social, and economic benefits through a vision and validate approach. And the strong hint towards it being part of the revised NPPF should draw unanimous support within the transport planning industry.
The proposed NPPF changes are remarkably positive. But there are three additional nuances we should consider in the context of vision and validate.
1. Local plan making
‘Vision-led’ planning is only directly stated in one section of the proposed NPPF. But it’s clear these principles should apply at the Local Plan Making stage. The NPPF states: ‘A consistent approach is taken to planning the delivery of major infrastructure’.
To realise an area’s ‘vision’, we must refocus Infrastructure Delivery Plans away from just highway capacity. We need to focus on sustainable transport schemes that can produce tangible benefits to an area. With a vision and validate approach, we need to look at these options early.
We know we need healthier, less carbon-intensive, and safer ways of getting from point A to point B.
2. Who defines the ‘vision’
For some time now, when we’ve held discussions with local authorities and land developers, we’ve faced this question: ‘Who defines the vision?’
The revised NPPF clearly refers to the need for residents, local authorities, and developers to work together to define this vision. But how do we do it? A vision and validate approach must include deep and meaningful community engagement. And it must include a diverse group vested in the long-term future of the area. The ‘readiness of society’ to adopt a new vision is a new challenge itself, as we plan for future demands and not current travel behaviours.
3. The omission of ‘validate’
It’s interesting to see that there is no reference to the term ‘validate’ in the NPPF. This is despite the transport planning approach known commonly as ‘vision and validate’ or ‘decide and provide’. For larger development schemes, once a vision is agreed upon, it should be validated (or proven) as developments progress.
This validation aspect is crucial for large sites. It enables the sustainable transport strategy to adapt as new opportunities are presented. How do we know if a site is successfully achieving its vision if we don’t check? We can only prove, or validate, the success of sustainable transport schemes after they are delivered. In my view, this isn’t just about scenario testing or predelivery. Scenario testing doesn’t prove anything on its own, it simply acts as an initial guide as to whether the vision is plausible.
Validation is important for the local stakeholders, too. Why? It allows local authorities to see that targets are met and not simply forgotten about after the committee’s decision.
The omission of ‘validate’ within the proposed NPPF reforms does present opportunities. It is particularly true for smaller sites. Here, there aren’t the timescales to incrementally adjust the strategy before the scheme is fully built out.
How much does the private vehicle feature in our future transport needs?
Building on existing vision and validate success
Vision and validate is not just a theoretical, new approach. While we haven’t used it much in the past—largely due to planning policy—it isn’t untested.
Our teams have supported schemes in leveraging vision and validate principles for some time. For example, we were involved with Arkall Farm in Tamworth, a mixed-use scheme with 1,000 dwellings. The site was brought forward at the outline planning stage in 2014 based on scenario testing of different levels of mode-shift. There was a commitment to monitor traffic flows as the development progressed to provide infrastructure but only if a scenario transpires that requires it. Tested at an appeal, a planning inspector in agreed with our strategy.
More recently, we supported the Gravity scheme in Somerset. To support this, we tested a range of potential travel pattern scenarios. We ended with a realistic vision that the highway authorities supported, subject to validating the vision. The site has captured headlines in recent months and is set to be an economic hub in the years ahead.
Recently, we incorporated vision and validate into a Maidstone Borough Council authority’s Local Plan. It seems it is the first of its kind in the UK.
Moving forward in the right way
Looking at the proposed NPPF reforms, it’s clear we are starting to move in the right direction in transport planning. Of course, there are going to be complexities on the road ahead.
Stakeholders will face some specific challenges from the NPPF reforms. We’re offering workshops with highway authorities and land developers as we seek to navigate those challenges. We’re excited to engage around the vision and validate approach.