Getting the Most out of the London Street Network through Integrated Performance Measurement

With the growth that London, already a world city, will undergo in the next two decades, the need for getting the most out of the street network is as vital as ever. The capacity issues already experienced on the network and the forecasts of growth compel authorities to search for more efficient approaches to street assessment, design and monitoring. Some of the fundamental considerations are to encourage sustainable travel choices, promote street as a vital public place and a community space, while maintaining traffic movement as the life blood of a city’s economy. In the last two years, a concept of Link (street as a conduit for movement) and Place (street as a destination in its own right) [1] provided a new perspective to street planning and design in London. Unraveling the complexity of balancing competing Link and Place demands provides an ability to more successfully integrate street requirements and assess street performance. Transport for London has trialed Link and Place concepts in establishing an integrated approach to street network development. The underlying concept of this approach is that a well developed multi-modal project delivers more benefits than could be delivered by the sum of individual modal projects within an analogous area. As part of this approach, a cross-modal Evaluation Framework (EF) has been developed. Based on key performance measures, the EF provides an opportunity to assess provision for Link and Place users, by evaluating the needs for movement (key transport modes) alongside safety, pedestrians, environment, accessibility and urban realm. The concept of the Link and Place provides a basis for balancing the needs of street users. The EF communicates performance information to the decision-makers in an objective way and assists in identifying re-design priorities on the network, setting of strategic corridor objectives and evaluating design interventions put forward to address the identified problems. The trial work indicated that application of a multi-functional performance assessment framework, that is based on balanced considerations, can greatly assist in understanding of the network problems and can lead to more innovative performance-led scheme generation.