19 June 2008
Our Ref JA/N1/11 & N13/4
Your Ref
Stewart Stevenson, MSP
Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change
The Scottish Government
St Andrew’s House
Regent Road
Edinburgh
EH1 3DG
Dear Minister
High Level Bus Forum: Key Outcomes
Thank you for your letter of 28 March to inform me of the key outcomes of a meeting to
discuss how to get more from buses. The set of 6 priority actions identified by the forum
have been discussed between Nestrans, Aberdeen City Council and Aberdeenshire Council
and I would wish to advise you of the current position within the North East in relation to
these actions and our future aspirations for progressing them as follows:
1. The comparative levels of car parking charges and bus fares and how they impact
on travelling decisions
We are aware that this is an issue and that bus fares are recognised as being high in the
North East. A preliminary meeting has been held between Nestrans and the 2 local
authorities regarding the development of a regional parking strategy and this group may
be appropriate for progressing this action. Aberdeen City Council also has an action
within their Local Transport Strategy to review parking policy, charges and systems,
including reviewing charges with respect to both inflation and comparison with bus fares
and another to promote the development of a pilot project to reduce bus fares within
parts of the City to achieve modal shift and improve social inclusion. Aberdeenshire
Council has not to date determined the impact the regional car parking strategy may
have on their car parking standards and practices, but these will be reviewed in due
course.
2. Using local regulatory powers to decriminalise bus priority traffic offences
Eight bus lane enforcement cameras are installed in Aberdeen using Public Transport
Fund award monies and the system was the first to become operational in Scotland in
January 2004. The system is operated in partnership with Grampian Police, who are
required to prosecute offenders as the contravention of bus lanes is still contained within
criminal law. The City Council is however currently in the process of seeking to extend
the primary legislation introduced in 2003 to decriminalise the enforcement of waiting
offences within the city to also include bus lane offences. A business case has been
prepared and a meeting held with Scottish Government officials. It is anticipated that the
necessary legislation and parallel operational preparation by the Council will take around
a year to complete. Aberdeen City Council is also supportive of introducing cameras on
board buses as an enforcement measure.
Aberdeenshire Council will be considering decriminalised parking in the future,
particularly in light of responsibilities under the Disability Discrimination Act.
3. Providing Park & Ride facilities
There are 3 existing Park & Ride facilities within the North East, namely adjacent to the
A90(T)/A92 at Bridge of Don and the A944 at Kingswells within the city and at Ellon
within Aberdeenshire. Further sites are planned in accordance with the Regional and
Local Transport Strategies. Aberdeen City Council has approved a preferred site off the
A96(T) Inverurie Road, west of Dyce Drive and preliminary design is now being
undertaken to permit the submission of a planning application and land purchase
negotiations. The Marr Area Committee within Aberdeenshire Council has also
approved proceeding with the design of a preferred site at Hill of Banchory adjacent to
the A93 North Deeside Road. Aberdeenshire Council are also to reconsider a possible
site on the A947 south of Newmachar following the AWPR order publication and the
identification of a preferred site off the A96.
The Access to Aberdeen from the South Study has identified Schoolhill, adjacent to the
A90(T) north of Portlethen, as being the preferred location in transportation terms for a
site to the south of the City. A group of officers from Nestrans and both Councils has
been set up to investigate the construction and maintenance of this site, as it is
envisaged that this will be developed on a partnership basis. This group will also be
looking at the most effective way of operating the P&R facilities throughout the North
East in the future. Talks have also been initiated with Transport Scotland regarding a
feasibility study for a High Occupancy Vehicle Lane on the A90(T) Stonehaven Road and
Large Vehicle Lane on the A956 Wellington Road. The HOV lane could be a
demonstration project in Scotland and allow a Park & Choose service to operate from the
planned site at Schoolhill.
In addition to the above bus based Park & Ride sites, Nestrans and the local authorities
are keen to promote Park and Ride at existing and proposed rail stations within the north
east and to therefore provide adequate parking facilities at rail stations to enable this. In
addition to the 20% contribution to the costs of reopening the rail station at Laurencekirk
in advance of the new timetable introduction in December 2008, Nestrans will be fully
funding the increased costs of constructing a larger car park.
As noted in our letter of 6 March to the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable
Growth (copy attached), the Nestrans Board request that consideration is given to
regionally important, but locally unaffordable projects. The provision of new Park and
Ride sites could fall into this category of providing major benefit to the Trunk road
network, yet entailing major costs to the Local Authorities that may not be affordable.
The RTP Chairs are considering the implications of the use of the Scottish Futures Trust
and may wish to discuss this further with you in future.
4. Using Bus Route Development Grant (BRDG) to stimulate new and improved bus
services and facilities
Aberdeen City Council and Aberdeenshire Council have both previously had success in
bidding for Bus Route Development Grant awards and a brief summary of the schemes
implemented to date and their success is attached at Annexe A.
It is noted that BRDG funding will now be transferred to local authorities under the new
operating framework and may therefore be more difficult to identify and will have to be
considered in line with other Local Authority priorities for expenditure. Nestrans has
however had input to the Single Outcome Agreements and it is hoped that this and the
Bus Action Plan that is being developed will help to secure monies for bus route
development in future.
It is also important to recognise that the bus industry is facing severe financial pressures
in the current year with a cap in Bus Service Operators Grant (BSOG) i.e. 'fuel duty
rebate'; the cap in concessionary fare payments in 07/08 and associated uncertainty in
08/09; and high transport inflation, particularly fuel prices. Stagecoach Bluebird has
already this financial year intimated various service cuts. Any additional transport
authority revenue investment in the coming year may well be 'soaked up' in maintaining
existing service provision rather than achieving service improvement. This financial back
drop has the capacity to stall any desirable bus improvements as local authorities and
operators struggle to maintain the recent improvements and existing levels of service
and this could put pressure and stress on partnership arrangements.
5. The positioning of bus improvement measures within the Single Outcome
Agreements
It is very difficult to include specific bus improvement measures within the SOA’s as they
are at a high level, but both SOA’s for the North East include mention of requirement to
deliver Regional and Local Transport Strategies in relation to buses, mode shift and
travel planning against a number of the National Objectives.
Nestrans are also in the process of developing a Bus Action Plan in partnership with
Aberdeen City Council, Aberdeenshire Council, Stagecoach Bluebird and First
Aberdeen. The Bus Action Plan will identify and prioritise actions to increase bus
patronage; achieve modal shift towards more sustainable modes of transport; improve
accessibility and enhance the performance and quality of bus services across the region.
As well as actions to improve bus journey times and their punctuality and reliability
throughout the area, the Action Plan will also set out measures on a range of region-wide
supporting themes, including but not restricted to bus route enhancements, information
strategy, interchange, marketing and incentives as well as sections on particular themes
such as Park and Ride and Demand Responsive and Community Transport. The Bus
Action Plan will also require to recognise the respective roles of commercial and
supported bus service provision.
The actions from the Bus Action Plan will be compiled with those from the Rail, Freight
and Health & Transport Action Plans and various consultancy studies (such as Access to
Aberdeen from the South and the AWPR Locking in the Benefits) to create a prioritised
and costed Delivery Plan. This programme of works will require to be agreed with the
two local authorities and it is intended that it will then form the basis of future bids to the
Councils Capital Works Programming.
6. The benefits of partnership working between local government, bus operators and
where appropriate, the regulatory authorities in raising quality and increasing
passenger growth.
Nestrans strongly believes in the benefits of partnership working and some examples of
the existing good working relationships that Nestrans and the local authorities in the
north east have already developed to work towards this are highlighted in Annexe B as
attached.
Nestrans and the City and Shire are pleased to note your Bus Policy Actions Statement as
contained in Annex B of your letter dated 28 March 2008 and await further developments
with interest and are ready to engage with you on this. In particular we note the desire to
develop integrated ticketing and would be keen to participate in any pilot project.
Nestrans would welcome the opportunity to host any future event and will be happy to report
progress on our actions for the next meeting of the Forum.
Yours sincerely
Derick Murray
Director
Enc
Our Ref
Your Ref
RGM/SOD/N10
6 March 2008
John Swinney MSP
Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth
The Scottish Government
St Andrew’s House
Regent Road
Edinburgh
EH1 3DG
Dear John
North East of Scotland Transport Partnership
Regional Transport Strategy
Thank you for your letter of 7 January. The Board had the opportunity to discuss the issues
raised at its meeting on 20 February.
The Board were pleased to hear that you foresee the RTP’s playing a valuable part in
improving Scotland’s transport infrastructure. Nestrans and our two local authorities do work
very closely together and with other colleagues, most noticeably the Health Board, to jointly
ensure that services across our area support the outcome of increasing sustainable
economic growth.
In regard to the Regional Transport Strategy it was agreed to amend the Strategy as you
had outlined at the 11 December 2007 meeting. A revised strategy will be brought back to
the Board at our meeting on 16 April for approval before re-submitting to you.
Nestrans are currently developing a series of Action Plans from our strategy to develop
costed programmes of work. This in conjunction with a number of studies either recently
completed or underway will produce our proposed delivery plan. This will then be discussed
by the Board and our constituent Councils to provide the priority needed to have affordable
proposals.
Nestrans officials are working closely with Aberdeen City and Shire officers to ensure that
the regional strategy components are understood within the context of the national outcomes
and also the local priorities.
The Board did note though that your letter noted “….funding in the light of the resources
likely to be available as agreed by the partnership and its constituent Councils.” We would
wish to note that our strategy includes policies which have produced projects financed
privately including a new bus station for Aberdeen, new freight yards at Craiginches and
Raiths Farm, widening and deepening the harbour access to Aberdeen Harbour and
extending the runway and major terminal improvements at Dyce airport. We would further
note that there are a number of policies producing projects within our strategy where the
Scottish Government have direct funding responsibility particularly rail and trunk roads.
Some of these projects are newly completed and some already have funding committed and
we look forward to seeing these begin construction in the next few years. However in this
funding issue the Board wished to highlight two areas of concern which you may be able to
address as you consider budgets over the next few years.
Firstly there is the area of direct Scottish Government funding responsibility. Clearly in this
area the STPR will be of considerable assistance to you in defining national priorities. Our
Regional Transport Strategy is supportive of projects in other regions which improve access
to/ from our area and projects like the Forth crossing come into this category. However the
Strategy does advise against putting all the eggs into one basket in terms of concentrating
solely on these major expensive projects. The Nestrans Board would recommend having a
proportion of the budget set aside to advance regionally important projects which just dip
below the nationally important radar. These projects will tend to generally be less expensive
than the big nationally backed projects.
Secondly the Boards view is that consideration should be given to regionally important but
locally unaffordable projects where funding is the responsibility of the Local Authorities but
where they have traditionally looked to Government for assistance in pressing forward.
Again if a proportion of the national budget could be set aside for such projects this would be
very welcome in all parts of the nation.
I look forward to being able to submit a revised Regional Transport Strategy as you
requested and to hearing your views on the funding issues highlighted. Thank you for your
consideration.
Yours sincerely
Councillor Kevin Stewart
Chair
Bus Route Development Grant Awards in the North East
Annex A
Aberdeen City: No 5 Torry – Dubford, Bridge of Don Service
An award was made in 2005 that allowed an increase in frequency from 30mins to 15mins
on the above service operated by First Aberdeen. Both First Aberdeen and Aberdeen City
Council publicised the enhanced frequency. The patronage growth over the first year was
44%, which is reportedly one of the highest achieved through the BRDG in Scotland and this
uptake has since been sustained. First Aberdeen is operating this service on a commercial
basis in this final year of the scheme and it is expected that they will continue to do this
thereafter.
Aberdeen – Stonehaven / Montrose Quality Corridor
Service improvements to the Aberdeen – Stonehaven/Montrose corridor, including frequency
improvements and a re-instatement of through journeys to/from Montrose were
implemented, in partnership with Stagecoach Bluebird, in April 2006. These service
improvements which are marketed under the ‘Coastrider’ banner are supported by the
Scottish Government’s Bus Route Development Grant (BRDG) ‘Kick-Start’ Fund.
Related BRDG funded infrastructure improvements were provided along the corridor, new
low-floor DDA compliant vehicles were allocated through Nestrans funding and a high profile
awareness campaign, including telemarketing, undertaken by Stagecoach Bluebird to
complement the investment. The project is subject to on-going monitoring with key
outcomes to date: 18.7% patronage growth in 2006/07; 45% of users are commuters; 82%
are satisfied with the improved frequency; and, 84% satisfied with vehicle quality. Further
patronage growth of 6.4 % was achieved in 2007/08 (to Jan 2008).
This quality partnership initiative was awarded the 2007 ‘Bus Award’ at the Scottish
Transport Awards.
Aberdeen - Westhill Quality Bus Corridor
This corridor has been progressively improved through a series of quality partnership
initiatives since April 2000, involving enhanced frequencies, investment in low floor DDA
compliant vehicles and complementary public transport infrastructure and information
improvements.
BRDG funded public transport infrastructure improvements were completed in July 2007.
Further improvements to services and improved route penetration of the town were
implemented on 18 February 2008 with BRDG funding, which involves the provision of a 15
minute core service to/from Aberdeen via Queens Road complemented by a 30 minute
service via Aberdeen Royal Infirmary. In addition to the service improvements, all vehicles
are low floor DDA compliant and a high profile awareness campaign, including
telemarketing, will be undertaken by Stagecoach Bluebird. The core service is branded as
‘the X17’.
Aberdeen – Banchory Quality Bus Corridor
Service improvements to the Aberdeen – Banchory/Braemar corridor, including frequency
improvements and route extensions to better serve Hill of Banchory and Lumphanan were
implemented, in partnership with Stagecoach Bluebird, on 9 July 2007. These service
improvements which are marketed under the Discover ‘Royal Deeside’ banner are supported
by the Scottish Government’s Bus Route Development Grant (BRDG) ‘Kick-Start’ Fund.
The works on the Banchory corridor, which are also funded by the Scottish Government’s
BRDG Fund, commenced in January 2008 and are scheduled for completion by July 2008.
The quality partnership agreement with Stagecoach Bluebird also provides for the operator
undertaking a high profile awareness campaign, including telemarketing.
Patronage growth to Jan 2008 was 20.1%, with further evidence of ongoing growth.
Partnership Working Examples
Annex B
The Quality Partnership for public transport in the North East was formed in 1998 by
Aberdeen City Council, Aberdeenshire Council, Stagecoach Bluebird and First Aberdeen.
Representatives of each member within the partnership meet on a regular basis through the
Local Authority Bus Operator Forum (LABOF) and there is a good working relationship.
Nestrans also attends LABOF meetings and accepted a formal invitation to join the Quality
Partnership in 2007. It is intended that the Bus Action Plan mentioned above be adopted for
delivery by the partners and LABOF members are overseeing its development.
The successful partnership between Aberdeenshire Council and Stagecoach Bluebird in
developing passenger growth on targeted corridors using BRDG awards is demonstrated in
the attached summary. In addition to the partnership working between Aberdeen City
Council and First Aberdeen on their BRDG award, they earlier formed a ‘TwinTrack’
partnership that had success in 2 rounds of the Public Transport Fund Awards that resulted
in a range of bus priority measures, bus lane enforcement cameras and infrastructure quality
improvements (including new shelters, raised boarding kerbs, Real Time Passenger
Information in shelters and public places and new buses) being provided within the city.
Aberdeenshire Council provides Demand Responsive Transport services such as A2B and
Dial-a-Bus and Community Transport in partnership with various groups depending on the
area (such as Stagecoach Bluebird, taxi companies, voluntary sector organisations and the
local community). Although the popularity of this varies by area these services offer travel
opportunities to people who would otherwise have limited options.
Nestrans has a close working relationship with the 2 constituent Councils, who have each
undertaken feasibility studies and delivered a number of bus related schemes using
Nestrans Capital and Revenue funding.
This has included quality infrastructure
improvements such as new shelters, real time information and raised boarding platforms and
bus priority measures such as technology improvements where the traffic signal control
system is linked to the real time passenger information and priority can be given to late
buses. Nestrans has also funded the purchase of additional vehicles for the Dial-A-ride
service within the City and A2B/Dial-A-Bus within Aberdeenshire.
Nestrans are currently working with Aberdeen City Council and the British Airports Authority,
who are co-funding a study to look at short term measures to improve journey times for
public transport (buses and taxis) entering and leaving Aberdeen Airport in advance of the
AWPR being in place. The 3 parties are also working with Dyce Travel Management
Organisation to investigate the necessary funding to provide a shuttle bus service between
Dyce rail station and the Airport. The partners will then attempt to secure funding to
establish a service in advance of the December 2008 rail timetable improvements.
Nestrans is working in partnership with NHS Grampian to develop a Health and Transport
Action Plan. This recognises the close interdependence between transport and health, both
in terms of the accessibility of health care facilities, and the impacts that transport can have
upon the health of individuals and communities. The draft action plan is currently being
consulted upon. It focuses on three themes: Active Travel, Public Health and Access to
Healthcare. The consultants developing the Action Plan have assessed the current
situation, reviewed good practice elsewhere, identified key issues and objectives and
developed actions to meet these. The responsibility for delivery of the actions is spread
between Nestrans, NHS Grampian, local authorities, Scottish Ambulance Service and
others.
Aberdeenshire Council has worked in partnership with operators to develop Aberdeenshire
Connect which is a multi-operator through ticketing arrangement between mainline and
connecting services (and vice versa) whereby participating operators honour through tickets
issued by other operators, the cost of the through ticket being that of the equivalent two
singles subject to a 10% discount. Aberdeenshire Connect permits travel on one ticket
through designated interchange points across Aberdeenshire and the Council are currently
in the process of rolling the ticketing arrangement out across Aberdeenshire, with currently
55.2% of bus services incorporated in the scheme.
Aberdeen City Council is currently working in partnership with Grampian Police, taxi and bus
operators to implement a night time transport zone to facilitate the safe and efficient
movement of people home from the City Centre on Friday and Saturday nights. This
involves centralising transport options by moving taxi ranks from side streets to 3 ranks on
Union Street that are well lit, policed and monitored by CCTV. This will provide an
intervisibility between taxi ranks and the existing bus stops on Union Street that in
conjunction with increased publicity for night time bus services and timetables and the ‘Night
Time Transport Zone’ branding should help to maximise bus patronage.
Nestrans and the City and Shire Councils all have a good history of working with Transport
Scotland and there is a shared desire within the North East to increase this partnership
working.