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MAIDSTONE BOROUGH COUNCIL
RECORD OF DECISION OF THE Cabinet
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Decision Made: |
10 March 2010 |
ALL SAINTS LINK ROAD
Issue for Decision
To consider whether to progress the plans for the All Saints Link Road.
Decision Made
1. That the implementation of the All Saints Link Road not be pursued as there is not a clearly identified mechanism to deliver it.
2. That the saved Maidstone Borough Wide Local Plan Policy T18 (iv) be reviewed through the LDF process.
3. That Kent County Council’s Cabinet Member for Environment, Highways and Waste, either directly or through the Joint Transportation Board, be recommended to consider deleting the All Saints Link Road as an adopted road scheme.
4. That officers be instructed to examine the feasibility of creating an environment which is less dominated by motor vehicles and more sympathetic to pedestrians in this area.
Reasons for Decision
The All Saints Link Road (“ASLR”) is a proposed new road linking Bishops Way, Mill Street and Knightrider Street as shown at Appendix 1 to the report of the Assistant Director of Development and Community Strategy. Its purpose is to take traffic out from the Archbishop's Palace, Gatehouse and Carriage Museum complex and reduce the traffic in Palace Avenue and Lower Stone Street. Its construction would bring significant environmental benefits to Palace Avenue and Lower Stone Street, on which there are many Listed Buildings, and significantly join together some of Maidstone’s most valued historical assets of the Palace and the Barn again bringing about considerable environmental improvements.
The purpose for the new road was explained in the adopted Borough Wide Local Plan in 2000. It considered that the road could have wider benefits stating, “This connection will complete a good quality highway route around the south of the town centre thereby providing the opportunity to relieve High Street and King Street of through traffic. The removal of traffic from the precincts of the Archbishops’ Palace/All Saints Church area, and from the historic listed buildings in Lower Stone Street, would considerably improve their setting and would generally improve access from the south of the town to the benefit of the commercial viability of Maidstone town centre. The achievement of this scheme is a high priority and the Borough Council will pursue all possible avenues to obtain funding, having regard to the considerable economic and environmental benefits of the scheme.”
The route of the link is safeguarded under policy T18 (iv) in the Local Plan and is an adopted road scheme by Kent County Council (“KCC”). The plan goes on to say that the Council would seek to exploit external funding sources in order to implement its construction.
A joint working group between Kent County Council, Maidstone Borough Council and Town Centre Management was established post 2000, to consider environmental improvements to Lower and Upper Stone Street, Wrens Cross and the All Saints area.
In 2006 Maidstone Borough Council secured Channel Corridor Partnership funding to produce a Regeneration Strategy for the High Street Ward. Urban Initiatives were commissioned to undertake the work. The consultants recognised the environmental, heritage and regeneration benefits of the ASLR but considered that the proposed alignment did not address townscape and accessibility issues successfully. It described the proposed ASLR as “…a sweeping road alignment that ignores the traditional street, block and plot layout found in historic urban area and creates problems with fronts and backs of properties as well as creating an awkward island site. Land is used inefficiently… the highway is effectively dominating this area of town”. Urban Initiatives proposed a new alignment (ASLR Option 2 or ASLRO2), which is shown in Appendix 2 to the report of the Assistant Director of Development and Community Strategy. The new alignment was considered to offer a better balance between traffic movement and pedestrian accessibility. It created street frontages and offered the possibility of opening up new development sites.
Both alignments of the ASLR result in the need to redesign the junction at Wrens Cross, where Knightrider Street, Lower Stone Street, Mote Road and Upper Stone Street meet. The scale of this junction would affect the listed building at Wrens Cross. Wrens Cross and land extending from this corner of the junction (about 1 acre) is derelict and in need of renewal. KCC own the site and have been working with MBC on plans for its redevelopment.
In September 2008 the Regeneration and Sustainable Communities Overview and Scrutiny Committee requested the Cabinet not to allocate further funds on commissioning the detail designs of the ASLO2 until the costs of constructing the road were known and the resources to pay for it were clearly identified.
In December 2008 Cabinet agreed to progress the concept designs produced by Urban Initiatives which would enable cost estimates to be produced. MBC and KCC jointly commissioned Jacobs to produce an outline design of the whole of the ASLRO2, which would enable an initial signal design at each of the junctions to be carried out and the data from this and the proposed new junction at Wrens Cross tested using the Maidstone Town Centre Traffic Model. This work was expected to confirm that the ASLRO2 route was suitable to be included in the Core Strategy.
Jacobs reported in March 2009. A number of concerns were raised by the work. The land necessary to construct the ASLRO2 impinged upon a greater number of properties than previously indicated in the concept designs. A significant part of the Mill Pond required a bridging structure to be built. The report concluded the road, if constructed, would have a negative impact on traffic movements throughout the town centre.
Jacobs were subsequently asked to look at 2 further variants of the ASLRO2 scheme.
1. An adjustment at the northern end to bring the alignment closer to the east side of the Carriage Museum, in order to reduce the impact of the scheme on the River Len Mill Pond.
2. A reduced scheme which consists of a route for northbound traffic only to the east of the Carriage Museum. South bound traffic would continue to use Palace Avenue and Lower Stone Street and Knightrider Street would remain unchanged.
In addition to providing plans of these two variants of Option 2, Jacobs were asked to provide cost estimates.
Variant 1 resulted in only a slightly reduced impact on the Mill Pond, but with the negative consequence of the road sweeping closer to the Carriage Museum. Variant 2, a reduced scheme, resulted in a greater impact on both the Mill Pond and the Carriage Museum.
Jacobs produced Early Cost Estimates to implement the whole ASLRO2 and the Variant 2 reduced scheme. Costs were presented as a range due to the uncertainty regarding aspects of the valuations, particularly statutory undertakers’ ducts and plants.
The costs of construction and purchase of the necessary land and property to build the whole of ASLRO2 was estimated to range between £17,364,000 and £21,939,000. Costs for implementing Variant 2 ranged from £8,942,500 and £10,759,375.
ASLRO2 is a highly desirable regeneration project. However recent reports from Jacobs lead to the conclusion that the road is not deliverable and its continued promotion should not be supported for the following reasons:
a) The land necessary to deliver the road is considerably greater than previously indicated and would impact unacceptably upon many properties along its route e.g. bridging structure over the Mill Pond.
b) There is no identifiable means of funding the scheme. The ASLRO2 main purpose is an environmental improvement and regeneration scheme. KCC has made it clear that it is not suitable for transport funding. The availability of Government grants and external funding is in the future, likely to be restrained due to the current difficult economic conditions and resulting pressures on public finances. In line with the Council’s Regeneration Statement 2009, using its land as a catalyst for regeneration has been considered. Whilst the ASLRO2 opens up the potential for some development land to be created it would not release enough value to cover the cost of the scheme. Opportunities for other developments that may benefit from the construction of the ASLR to contribute appear limited.
c) Traffic Modeling work demonstrates that, as currently proposed, the ASLRO2 would have a negative impact on traffic movements throughout the town centre.
Without a clearly identified mechanism for delivering the ASLR02 it could not be carried forward through the LDF process.
Alternatives considered and why rejected
An alternative approach would be to continue to pursue the ASLRO2 in the hope of identifying a funding mechanism sometime in the future. This option has been rejected as it is a requirement of the Local Development Framework process that infrastructure identified in the Core Strategy is demonstrated to be deliverable and that a way of funding the infrastructure is made clear. If this is not produced then there is a danger that the Core Strategy will fail the tests of “soundness”.
To delay a decision would result in uncertainty regarding the future of the Wrens Cross site.
Background Papers
Jacobs Report Number B1065600 Wrens Cross Junction All Saints Link Road – Option Variants - Early Scheme Estimates June 2009.
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Should you be concerned about this decision and wish to call it in, please submit a call in form signed by any two Non-Executive Members to the Head of Change and Scrutiny by: 19 March 2010 |
MAIDSTONE BOROUGH COUNCIL
RECORD OF DECISION OF THE Cabinet
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Decision Made: |
10 March 2010 |
MAIDSTONE 2020 SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITY STRATEGY (SCS) PERFORMANCE REPORT
Issue for Decision
To consider progress in delivery the Sustainable Community Strategy adopted in April 2009.
Decision Made
1. That the variation in performance be noted and referred to the Local Strategic Partnership Board and its sub-groups for further action.
2.
That,
although the performance of the Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Hospital
Trust appears to be improving, considering its pivotal role in the community,
the Hospital Trust be invited to join the LSP Board.
3. That a summary or report card highlighting good and poor performance be published in the Downs Mail be agreed.
Reasons for Decision
In August the Cabinet agreed the process by which the newly adopted Sustainable Community Strategy (“SCS”) Maidstone 2020 would be implemented and performance managed. This stated that the performance management would be based upon the following principles or objectives:
· Utilise a single universal performance management system (Excelsis) to monitor the objectives, actions and targets in the SCS
· Utilize the sub-groups of the LSP to monitor and manage performance utilizing the council’s RAG system.
Currently the council is in the process of purchasing an improved performance management system Covalent, but in the interim Appendix A to the report of the Assistant Director of Development and Community Strategy has been produced using the existing Excelsis system which is also utilised by the borough council for its own performance reporting.
With the exception of the Safer Maidstone Partnership, it has not yet been possible to utilise the sub-groups of the LSP to monitor and manage performance in the themes. This will be developed as the sub-groups are established. In the interim, all Red, Lower Median and Bottom Quartile performance are highlighted.
Where possible, the intention has been to report progress utilising the National Indicator (“NI”) set developed by the Audit Commission. However, it should be noted, that the majority of these are available only on an annual basis (59), while only a small number are currently available quarterly (12). Where no NI is available, some other measure of performance is utilised, for instance, for performance of the hospital and Primary Care Trust the Care Quality Commission’s assessment. There are some gaps in reporting where data is not yet available at the district level – generally where the responsibility is with the county council – and processes are not yet in place to disaggregate the data to district boundaries.
There is some duplication of reporting with the council’s own Strategic Plan, for instance Park and Ride. Where this is dealt with in the report on the strategic plan, an explanation is not given here.
While the Maidstone Hospital has reported improvements in performance, compared to the last publicly available report available from the Care Quality Commission, given the recent poor performance and its pivotal role in the well being of residents of Maidstone Borough, it is felt that further engagement is sought with this important service provider by inviting them to join the LSP Board.
Annual figures
Of the NIs where data is only available annually, the following are in the bottom quartile:
· Satisfaction with local bus services,
· People killed or seriously injured in road traffic accidents,
· Tackling fuel poverty,
· Use of public libraries
· Residual household waste per household
· Percentage of household waste sent for reuse, recycling and composting
The following reported in the top quartile:
· Percentage of people who think that drug use or drug dealing a problem in their local area
· Children killed or seriously injured in road traffic accidents (3 year rolling average) – as opposed to the adult figures
· Visits to museums and galleries
· Flood (and coastal) management
· Congestion – average journey time per mile during the morning peak (although comparable data with other authorities isn’t available, the 19% reduction is noteworthy).
· Improved street and environmental cleanliness for litter, graffiti and fly-posting.
· Percentage of development of brown-field sites as a percentage of all development
Quarterly figures
Of the performance indicators where data is available quarterly, there are no reds.
Performance is particularly strong
for:
· Number of schools in the borough with school travel plans
· Reduction in all recorded crime in the borough
· Percentage of residents feeling safe walking in the area where they live after dark
· Number of affordable homes delivered (gross)
· Number of energy efficiency surveys
· Percentage of household waste sent for reuse, recycling or composting
· Improvements to the accessibility of parks, gardens, recreations grounds and other open spaces as measured by footfall
Alternatives considered and why rejected
An alternative approach to the one advocated is to enter into dialogue with the agencies that are leading on the indicators where performance is poor. However, the advantage of taking the information to the LSP Board, the approach that was agreed in the report to Cabinet in August 2009, is that the agencies around the table will be able bring to bear collectively a greater range of experience and resources than the bi-lateral approach.
While it is not yet possible to report on all of the indicators and on some of them only the annual results, it could be argued that it is premature to take this information to the public in the form of a report card. However, it is considered good practice to report back to the public on progress on the Sustainable Community Strategy through the media on information that is mostly in any case within the public domain. This was last done in September when a summary of the adopted SCS was published.
Background Papers
Maidstone 2020, the Sustainable Community Strategy 2009-2020
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Should you be concerned about this decision and wish to call it in, please submit a call in form signed by any two Non-Executive Members to the Head of Change and Scrutiny by: 19 March 2010 |
MAIDSTONE BOROUGH COUNCIL
RECORD OF DECISION OF THE Cabinet
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Decision Made: |
10 March 2010 |
CORPORATE IMPROVEMENT PLAN
Issue for Decision
To agree the new format of, and updated recommendations in, the Corporate Improvement Plan and to note the comments against recommendations.
Decision Made
1. That the new format of the Corporate Improvement Plan as shown at Appendix A of the report of the Director of Change and Environmental Services be agreed.
2. That the comments against existing recommendations in the former version of the Corporate Improvement Plan at Appendix B of the report of the Director of Change and Environmental Services be noted.
3. That all recommendations at Appendix B of the report of the Director of Change and Environmental Services, apart from those noted in the report of the Director of Change and Environmental Services, are now embedded and will therefore be removed from the Corporate Improvement Plan going forward be agreed.
4. That the added recommendations and related actions in the Corporate Improvement Plan at Appendix A of the report of the Director of Change and Environmental Services be agreed.
5. That Corporate Management Team authorise recommendations and related actions to be added to the Corporate Improvement Plan as they emerge throughout the year for update at Cabinet be agreed.
Reasons for Decision
The purpose of the Corporate Improvement Plan (“CIP”) is to identify and monitor progress on key areas of improvement, primarily related to inspection recommendations but also taking into account any internally or externally identified areas for improvement.
New format
It was proposed at the last update of the CIP that a review of the plan was undertaken to ensure that it is operating as effectively as possible. The review identified a number of key points in relation to the reporting format. Firstly, a need to become more targeted in the approach to responding to recommendations. The new format has therefore identified actions and timescales for implementing the recommendations. Secondly, improving the ease of use for officers and Members. This has been achieved by including a status column which easily indicates whether the actions are on track to be achieved and reduces the need for lengthy and technical comments.
Removal of recommendations
The review also highlighted that there was a need to improve the reasoning behind and the frequency with which recommendations are closed down. Currently a large number of improvement actions have been in the plan for a number of years, as they have been considered as important though not necessarily, not implemented. However the addition of actions to deliver recommendations should help in identifying when areas for improvement have become ‘business as usual’ and need to be removed.
Currently the comments at Appendix B of the report of the Director of Change and Environmental Services show that the vast majority of existing recommendations as being ‘business as usual’, this is supported by the most recent organisational assessment which demonstrated a strong performance across the Council. The recommendations identified as still being areas for improvement are listed below:
· Improve areas of weakness where Audit reports have shown a level of assurance lower than substantial, one area remains outstanding since March 2009: Aspects for section 106 Agreements;
· Further work is required to build on work currently undertaken by the Council with partners on delivering outcomes for the public;
· The Council Considers and tracks with its significant partners the impact on users when making decisions on reducing costs;
· Progress and monitor action plans to improve satisfaction on those services where one in five people were dissatisfied with the service;
· The authority has made a commitment to carbon reduction and has established a climate change strategy is successfully implemented over the next three years;
· The Council should seek technical advice when accounting for complex capital transactions. The proposed course of action should then be discussed with the external auditor at an early stage so that the accounting treatment can be agreed prior to production of draft financial statements.
These actions are now included in the new format Corporate Improvement Plan at appendix A of the report of the Director of Change and Environmental Services and actions to continue to implement these areas for improvement alongside timescales have been identified.
Inclusion of recommendations
Last year the Council received its first assessment under the new Comprehensive Area Assessment (CAA) which has replaced the Comprehensive Performance Assessment (CPA). The Council received the results of the new assessment in November 2009 and its Annual Audit letter in December 2009. The recommendations from both these documents have been included in the plan.
The review of the CIP identified that to work most effectively the plan should be an evolving document and updated on a regular basis, to reflect any changes in local and national context, not just twice a year as is currently the practice. Examples of recommendations that will be emerging after the agreement of the CIP are the Annual Governance Statement, the recent IDeA productivity peer review and the Climate Change Action Plans. Actions should be developed to implement these as soon as possible.
The report of the Director of Change and Environmental Services proposed that CMT be authorised to add recommendations and actions to the plan before it is presented to Cabinet, in order that work begins in these areas immediately that they are identified. The Cabinet will then be informed of the new additions and progress on actions will be given within the same report.
Alternatives considered and why rejected
The Cabinet could decide not to produce a CIP but not considering progress against the plan could mean improvement work is not progressed. This would have a detrimental impact upon service delivery and external assessments of the authority’s performance.
Alternatively, the Cabinet could decide to retain the old format of the Corporate Improvement Plan, however, this was not thought to be appropriate as the new format offers the opportunity to ensure that the recommendations are more closely monitored and fully embedded.
Background Papers
Corporate Improvement Plan June 2009
Organisational Assessment November 2009
Annual Audit Letter December 2009
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Should you be concerned about this decision and wish to call it in, please submit a call in form signed by any two Non-Executive Members to the Head of Change and Scrutiny by: 19 March 2010 |