Success for Kent County Council permit & lane rental schemes

THE CHALLENGE

Kent has one of the most extensive highways networks in the country. The County Council maintains over 5,000 miles of roads.

Below and above the majority of these are the pipes and cables that enable all the facilities of domestic, leisure and business life.

In 2010, Kent County Council was the first to gain Department for Transport approval for a road works permit scheme. Designed to give KCC more power to control and co-ordinate works permits this revolutionised the way local authorities control street works.

Building on the success of the Kent Permit Scheme, KCC was the first county council to run a ground breaking Lane Rental Scheme.

Designed to reduce congestion on the busiest roads at peak times the scheme allows for KCC to apply charges to companies for occupying more than 465 of the county’s roads which are deemed to be most susceptible to major roadwork disruption.

THE SOLUTION

KCC has been a long term user of Yotta’s Mayrise Street Works management software. The solution was used to support the introduction of the first permit scheme with the Council working closely with developers to create a solution to automate the permit application process.

Mayrise Street Works also facilitated the mapping and scheduling of proposed works, monitoring of works in progress and communication of planned works to other road users.

Designed to complement and build on the benefits of the existing Permit Scheme KCC’s Lane Rental Scheme is also administered using Yotta’s Mayrise Street Works software.

Advanced filtering tools allow for the automatic identification of works that will impact on the Lane Rental Network and these are then administered accordingly. Customised reports allow for Section 74 reporting (Section 74 of the NRSWA allows for ‘charges for occupation of the highway where works unreasonably prolonged’) with charges being automatically calculated and invoices issued.

THE BENEFITS

• The Kent Permit Scheme focuses 80% of its effort on the 20% of the road works that give rise to 80% of problems
• The Full Permit treatment is applied to all major works and Categories 0, 1, 2 and traffic sensitive streets – these equate to 19.5 % of all permits
• Swift reinstatement; working with contractors to explain Lane Rental charges has resulted in the average occupation time for urgent and emergency works dropping from 5 days to 3 days in the first six months of the scheme
• The Kent Lane Rental Scheme, (KLRS), focuses on 5% of Kent’s Network
• The chargeable regime times vary according to demand and the charges vary according to economic impact
• Outside the box solutions; making using of the whole highway by constructing a temporary footway within a verge instead of on the highway during sewer works saving 14 days of temporary traffic lights

FEWER WORKS AT TRAFFIC SENSITIVE TIMES

• “While a loss in revenue may not instantly be recognisable as a successful outcome what it actually means is that significantly fewer works are being undertaken on the Lane Rental Network at chargeable and thus traffic sensitive times.It also indicates that those that are being undertaken are being completed more efficiently and are therefore attracting less financial penalties. This has to be a good thing for all users of Kent’s roads,” concluded Latham.

  Surplus revenue collected through the Lane Rental Scheme will be put towards projects and initiatives associated with the objectives of the scheme. Funds will be applied equally to the following areas:

  • Transportation
  • Enabling infrastructure
  • Industry practices, research and development

ADDITIONAL STATISTICS PUBLISHED BY KCC FOR THE FIRST SIX MONTHS OF THE LANE RENTAL SCHEME WHEN COMPARED TO THE PERIOD BEFORE LANE RENTAL WAS INTRODUCED INCLUDE:

• 24% increase in the share of the total Standard work’s that were carried out, when works have been completed using traffic Management and have taken place out of hours
• 18% increase in the share of the total Minor work’s being carried out, when works have been completed using traffic Management and have taken place out of hours
• 12% decrease in the share of the total Standard works being carried out, when works have been completed using traffic Management and taking place during peak traffic hours
• 16% decrease share of the total Minor works being carried out, when works have been completed using traffic Management and taking place during peak traffic hours
• 10% decrease in the share of the both the total Standard and Minor works that have taken place during charge times with no traffic management