Transport Insights

Confusion abounds over which local road upgrades are potentially going ahead with Department for Transport (DfT) funding, something that seems to originate with the department not being straightforward about the status of schemes that were culled in a recent review.

In the context of the government’s statement that it will cut the DfT’s capital investment budget by £700m to help pay for the Defence Investment Plan, the BBC reports:

Council chiefs fear a planned new motorway junction could be “sacrificed” in the government’s proposal to reallocate funds to defence.
…
County councillor Julian Tooke, who leads on infrastructure on the council, said: “We are very concerned that Gloucestershire’s need for improvements to junction 9 of the M5 and the A46 may get sacrificed.”

The Department for Transport (DfT) said it will not comment on funding prospects for junction 9 at this stage

The penny does not seem to have dropped that the scheme was effectively shelved when it was not among the 16 Major Road Network and Large Local Majors (MRN/LLM) schemes that it was announced in March would

continue following the 2025 MRN review

That was a reference to this announcement last July, when the DfT gave a list of 42 schemes “under consideration” – i.e. being reviewed. The M5 scheme was among them, albeit that it had only been listed for outline business case development costs.

By implication, it is not “continuing”. I don’t know why the DfT cannot just say that.

In April, Transport Action Network wrote to the DfT to ask for clarification of the 26 schemes that were in the original list of (42) schemes under consideration and not part of the “continuing” 16.

I understand that “confirmed” schemes in the MRN/LLM programme are not being looked at in the context of cuts but, as I have pointed out, many schemes that were “confirmed” or “green-lit” last July are still subject to business case approval.

With (I think) 44 schemes in total either “confirmed” last July or “continuing”, some of which were already in construction, competing over an unspecified share of just £1bn, it is obvious that a large number of schemes that were not culled are not happening any time soon.

As far as I can see, in the last year only one scheme that was “confirmed” has actually had confirmation of funding – the A259 King’s Road in Brighton.

But maybe the M5 scheme is, occasionally, alive in a box somewhere.