Carbon Neutral Roadmap

WQ.467/2023

WRITTEN QUESTION TO THE MINISTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT BY DEPUTY R.J. WARD OF ST. HELIER CENTRAL

QUESTION SUBMITTED ON MONDAY 20th NOVEMBER 2023 ANSWER TO BE TABLED ON MONDAY 27th NOVEMBER 2023

Question

“Further to the amended allocation of £1.7 million for Active Travel with Section TR10 of the Carbon Neutral Roadmap, will the Minister advise –

1. how much of this allocation has been spent to date;
2. which projects has it been used to fund;
3. whether all or any of the funded projects have had an impact; and, if so, how this has been assessed;
4. how the application of the funding has been evaluated; and
5. what plans, if any, are in progress for any unspent monies?”

Answer

1. how much of this allocation has been spent to date;
2. which projects has it been used to fund;

All figures are from project inception to October 2023.

 

Year	Project	Value
2022	Misc Capital infrastructure Projects for example, St. Lukes School and St. Aubin Prom Widening.	£236K
2023	Misc Capital infrastructure Projects for example St. Lukes School, La Haule Cycling and Walking improvements	£98K
	Engagement officer running Active Travel Community engagement projects like Love to Ride and WOW (a walk to school programme for primary schools).	£43K
	Draft St Helier Mobility Plan	£26K
	Total	£403K

3. whether all or any of the funded projects have had an impact; and, if so, how this has been assessed;

The school street implemented at St Luke’s Primary School was evaluated throughout the project. Surveys gathered input from Elizabeth Street residents, school staff, and parents/guardians. Results showed that 81% (70% strongly agree, 11% agree) support making the School Street pilot permanent.

Within behavioural change programmes we can gather various data depending on the initiative being undertaken. For example, the Love to Ride programme has shown that up to the end of September 2023 more than 1,800 islanders engaged with the programme. Over 1,300 of those have actively logged at least one ride. 42% of the active riders classed themselves as new or occasional riders. Over 72,000 total biking trips have been logged (a total of over 610,000 miles) and almost 30,000 of these rides were marked as commuting and shopping travel as opposed to leisure rides. It can be assumed that some of these trips would have been undertaken by car had this programme not been delivered, raising awareness of the benefits of cycling as an alternative to commuting by car.

Other behavioural change projects which have been delivered in 2023 since the engagement officer has been in post include:

 

World Car Free Day (September 2023)	Complete
Love to Ride 2023	In progress
March: Ride into Spring	Complete
May: Bike Month Challenge	Complete
September: Cycle September	Complete
December: Winter Wheelers	In progress – planning stage for delivery in December 2023
Secondary school multi-mode journeys	In progress – research stage currently being undertaken
“Try-a-bike” events	Complete (successful events held August & September 2023, with more to be planned)
Helmet Hair public engagement	Complete
Alternative Transport Week public engagement – May 2023	Complete
Try a bike & public engagement WellFest – October 2023	Complete
Love to Ride champions engagement event – September 2023	Complete
Cycle-friendly workplace guide	In progress – delivery Autumn 2023
Bicycle maintenance workshops	Complete (with courses continuing to be delivered as Business as Usual)
Living Streets WOW – the Walk to School Challenge for primary schools	Ongoing – launched in 5 primary schools September 2023, with option to expand to more in 2024

The mobility plan was drafted ensuring the recommendations for improving mobility around the ring road and within the town centre aligned with both the aims of the sustainable transport policy as well as the expectation to reduce carbon emissions to support the active travel policy within the CNR to increase cycling and walking. The recommendations will be used to inform an island-wide cycling and walking infrastructure programme which looks to develop cycling and walking opportunities for Islanders over the next ten years. Individual schemes which are developed as a result of this draft mobility plan will be evaluated as per good practice for capital project evaluation.

4. how the application of the funding has been evaluated; and

The allocation will be evaluated across the programme by utilising the annual traffic count surveys, where we are looking to increase by 2030 the figure of 19% of people cycling and walking within these counts to 29%.

Any plans for unspent monies

5. what plans, if any, are in progress for any unspent monies?”

• Whilst there remains unallocated budget within the policy currently, discussions are already underway with the delivery arms of government transport projects and behavioural change engagement to understand their forward programme of work for years 2024/2025.

• Future projects identified for the behavioural change programme to deliver include (but not exhaustive):

• Multi-modal journeys – secondary schools' awareness campaign
• Try a bike programme
• Love to ride 2024

• Multi-modal journeys – Island-wide public awareness campaign
• Bike maintenance / repair café events
• WOW – the Walk to School Challenge for primary schools
• Walk to school month
• Walkable neighbourhoods (concentrating on key walking zones identified as part of the active travel workstream)
• Workplace walking challenge

• Future projects identified for cycling and walking infrastructure are currently being assessed as a wider piece of work looking to accelerate development of the eastern cycle network and implementation of the strategic corridors identified for cycling from the active travel workstream. A draft programme of delivery is currently being developed which will identify initial funding requirements.

• As these projects are resourced and developed, costings will be identified and go through normal governance to allocate funding from the remaining budget.