Highway Infrastructure Asset Management - Resilient Network Plan

1.1 Background

The highway infrastructure asset is the most valuable single asset owned by the Council and is vital to local economic prosperity and residents' quality of life. Any severe disruption to the highway asset network can have a significant impact on the economic activity of the Borough through loss of income to our Town Centres as well as disruption to Local, National and Multi-national industries.

Following a succession of severe weather events, which had a significant impact on the highway network, the Department for Transport (DfT) carried out a review of the resilience of the transport network to extreme weather events and in 2014 they published the Transport Resilience Review.

In particular Recommendation 35 stated that 'Each Local Highway Authority should make an early start in identifying a 'resilient network' to which it will give priority through maintenance and other measures in order to maintain economic activity and access to key services during extreme weather'. This is further supported by Recommendation 20 of the 2016 Code of Practice - Well Managed Highway Infrastructure.

Whilst we already have an established Resilient Network, developed in response to the above reports and following a succession of severe winter weather events and salt shortages, this policy fomalises our development, management and ongoing monitoring of the resilient network.

1.2 Aim of the Resilient Network

The aim of a Resilient Network is to identify routes of strategic importance which will receive priority through maintenance and other measures in order to maintain economic activity and protect access to key services and infrastructure during extreme weather and other disruptive events.  We aim to have a Resilient Highway Network that is less prone to failure and robust in the face of extreme weather events, industrial action and major incidents through a combination of measures which may include:

• prioritisation of reactive maintenance resources in the event of an incident
• prioritisation of funding to mitigate deterioration of the asset
• increased frequency of cyclical and reactive maintenance
• network management

This methodology will be used on all of our infrastructure highway assets, including:

• carriageways and footways
• structures
• drainage
• street lighting
• traffic signals

2.1 Definition

Resilience is defined by the Cabinet Office as the 'ability of the community, services, area or infrastructure to detect, prevent, and, if necessary, to withstand, handle and recover from disruptive challenges' and they present a framework of four strategic components for achieving the desired level of resilience:

• resistance - preventing damage
• reliability - operation under a range of conditions
• redundancy - availability of backups or spare capacity
• recovery - enabling a fast response and recovery

The Resilient Network seeks to ensure existing resource is prioritised towards maintaining access and traffic flow on roads identified as being essential to support the social and business needs of both the local and national economy.

2.2 Development of the Resilient Network

The Council has a long established and well-defined Winter Service network, covering 46% of the highway network.  This formed the basis for the development of the Resilient Network, which covers 225km of our network (25%) and considers the following key services and infrastructure:

• main distributer and strategic routes, such as A1046 Portrack Lane
• access to and from Town Centre's and main shopping precincts
• emergency services depots and headquarters, such as North Tees Hospital
• main transport hubs e.g. Railway stations, bus depots
• key infrastructure, such as COMAH sites, National Grid substations, water treatment works, main industrial complexes
• access to outlying communities
• National Highways Strategic Network Diversion Routes
• Tees Valley Key Route Network
• major bus routes

3.1 External Communication

The Resilient Network will be published on the Stockton Borough Council website and will be communicated through the normal Council Communication channels.

3.2 Internal Communication

Internally, relevant staff will be made aware of the Resilient Network plan through normal asset management communications.

4.1 Planned Maintenance

The condition of the Resilient Network and its assets will be surveyed and inspected, and maintenance needs identified in line with the rest of the network. However, as far as is practicable, any potential infrastructure schemes on the Resilient Network will be prioritised. We will make every effort to carry out preventative maintenance to avoid more disruptive maintenance in future and maintenance schemes will be designed to provide resilience as described above.

4.2 Highway Inspections

Routine Highway Infrastructure Safety Inspections will be carried out in accordance with the Council's Highway Infrastructure Safety Inspection Manual. Additional reactive safety inspections may be required following incidents or extreme weather events.

4.3 Cyclic Maintenance

In terms of routine or cyclic maintenance activities, to help mitigate the risk of excess standing water gully cleansing operations will be carried out on an annual basis, with known high risk areas checked and cleared of debris in advance of adverse weather conditions.

Additional consideration will also be given to the monitoring and maintenance of all other highway infrastructure assets located on the Resilient Network including, but not limited to:

• vehicle restraint barriers - inspection and tensioning
• road markings - condition and refurbishment
• street lighting - structural testing, electrical testing and visual assessment

4.4 Reactive Maintenance

Reactive maintenance timescales will be determined on an individual basis following inspection by a Highway Technician, in accordance with the Risk Matrix detailed in the Council's Highway Safety Inspection Manual which both the impact and probability of a defect when determining repair timescale.

4.5 Network Management

Roads on the resilient network will, as far as reasonably practicable, be designated as Traffic Sensitive Streets under section 64 of the New Road and Street Works Act. For any roads that do not meet the criteria to be designated as Traffic Sensitive, we will look to use an alternative form of enhanced classification to ensure any promoters wishing to undertake works on the Resilient Network must give greater advanced warning of proposed works which may help coordinate activities and reduce disruption.

5.1 Review

To ensure the Resilient Network is kept up to date a review will be carried out biennially to ensure it reflects any changes to the network, or after any relevant events have occurred where lessons have been learnt, whichever is sooner.