Transport Asset Management Plans
We are working towards an agreed Transport Asset Management Plan (TAMP). The drivers for using Asset Management, in addition to LTP2 Guidance, are:
- 'Whole of Government Accounts', which require authorities to value their transport assets in order to assess replacement costs and depreciation rates
- 'The Prudential Code', which allows authorities to choose between revenue and capital intensive options for service delivery. The code also requires consideration of asset management planning when making capital investment decisions
There are two strands to the development of the TAMP. The first strand will be a Highway Asset Management Plan (HAMP), developed by the District Maintenance Engineers Group (DMEG). The Group has a long history of joint working. The second strand, being prepared in parallel by Centro, is an Asset Management Plan for public transport assets such as bus stations, Park & Ride facilities and bus shelters. We will consider other transport assets such as multi-storey car parks before producing a final TAMP.
Asset management is a strategic approach that optimises the allocation of resources for the management, operation, preservation and enhancement of the highway infrastructure. The process is systematic and takes a long-term view, considering whole-life costing, balancing competing demands and taking account of customer expectations. The process adopted follows the template proposed in the publication 'Framework for Highway Asset Management' (published by CSS).
This approach is essential in order to make the most effective use of limited financial resources in delivering the levels of service that each highway authority requires. Each authority is progressing its own HAMP to a standardised format agreed jointly at a series of workshops facilitated by Wolverhampton City Council and the consultant retained on the steering committee for the original framework document. The joint working follows the lead established by Coventry City Council and has succeeded in ensuring complete compatibility of approach across the Metropolitan Area.
Each highway authority has now completed a staged review of their assets with the exception of Birmingham City Council that has collated similar data streams earlier with the express purpose of developing a successful PFI bid. The first stage or gap analysis identified shortfalls in the data sets on how current practices align with the asset management discipline and where the opportunities for improvement exist. The second stage involved the identification of the tasks necessary for each individual highway authority to develop their own asset management plan. The third stage involved the production of the HAMP complete with a specification for the capture, storage and retrieval of the necessary supporting data. The fourth and final stage that is ongoing involves the inventory capture, which will be ongoing throughout 2006/07 and into 2007/08.