RIS3: Stuck on the wrong road?

It has been a busy time for roads campaigners: the Department for Transport published its £27bn 5-year roads plan (2026-2031, known as RIS3) at the end of March and on the same day also approved 16 local road schemes, including the controversial Norwich Western Link. While the RIS3 headlines focused on the (very welcome) increased budget for maintenance and renewals, it is important to look at the plans in further detail to see what is actually being proposed, and what may have been quietly pushed through or repackaged. 

Roads, roads, and more roads

Despite claims of prioritising maintenance and safety, a large number of roads are still being planned. This was sadly inevitable, with RIS3 being based on out of date traffic projections from 2022 where all scenarios assume traffic growth in a stable economic environment. 

Most of the roads to be built in RIS3 are from the previous roads plan (RIS2). That includes eleven road projects in construction and another five that were approved but not yet started. The amount earmarked for these ‘enhancements’ is £3.8bn. 

However, this downplays the true amount of roadbuilding that RIS3 will enable. In addition to this £3.8bn, a further £1.65bn is allocated for the Lower Thames Crossing, another £400m for road schemes supporting inward investment, £165m for the Growth and Housing fund (most of which will likely be for road expansions) plus the unspecified amount for small schemes that increase road capacity. So the actual total is likely over £6bn.

As if this was not enough, the DfT has told National Highways to get 14 new road projects ready for the RIS4 period from 2031. The cost of this is unknown.

Building to be seen?

The inclusion of the £650m A38 Derby Junctions and £2.2bn A66 Northern Trans-Pennine schemes in RIS3 was the biggest disappointment, as they offer such poor value for money. They seem to have been progressed by a government desperate to be seen to be ‘building something’, however senseless. Neither scheme has an approved full business case, and could still be scrapped. In fact, the A38 Derby scheme is not scheduled to start work until 2030! The Stop the A38 campaign has highlighted that costs have already risen by 200% on the £650m project and vow to continue fighting with our support.

RIS3 also throws up many contradictions and conflicts with other government policies. Whilst the emerging National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), and the just published integrated transport strategy, acknowledge that locating new development near roads risks increasing congestion and delivering poor health outcomes, the number one objective of RIS3 is growth and supporting new housing! The new Smaller Schemes National Programme also risks increasing capacity only for it to fill straight back up with increased traffic from new developments, causing wider network problems. 

RIS4 ‘pipeline’ of 14 new road schemes

• A19 Moor Farm (near Newcastle)
• A404 Corridor (Thames Valley)
• A5/M42 Junction 10 (near Tamworth)
• A5 Dodwells to Longshoot (Hinckley)
• A5 Gibbet Hill (Leicestershire)
• A50 Corridor (Midlands)
• M1 Junction 28 (near Alfreton)
• M27 J3 (Hampshire)
• M6 J15 (near Stoke)
• A11 Fiveways Junction (Suffolk)
• A12-A14 Capdock Interchange (Suffolk) 
• M1 Junction 13 (near Milton Keynes)
• A14 Junction 10a (Huntingdon)
• M62 / A57 Link (Greater Manchester)

Local road schemes granted DfT funding (not in RIS3)

• Norwich Western Link (opposed by the Stop the Wensum Link campaign and destroys internationally important habitats of rare bats in the Wensum Valley)
• A140-A1120 Earl Stonham (Suffolk)
• A10 Corridor Scheme (Broxbourne, Herts)
• Vauxhall Way Improvements Phase 1 (Luton)
• Shalesmoor Gateway (Sheffield)
• A650 Tong Street (Bradford)
• A426/A4071 Avon Mill/Hunters Lane improvements (Rugby)
• A43 Northampton
• A379 Bridge Road (Exeter)
• M5 Junction 28 (Devon)
• Northam Rail Bridge (Southampton)
• A229 Blue Bell Hill improvements (Kent)
• A259 South Coast Corridor (East Sussex)
• A326 Waterside improvements (New Forest)
• Wigan East West
• Sunderland Strategic Transport Corridor Phase 4

Safety suffers again

While the government has set an ambitious target of a 65% reduction in the numbers of people killed and seriously injured by 2035, it has allowed National Highways to get away with a paltry 7.5% reduction by 2031. Previously National Highways had an admittedly overambitious target of reaching zero harm by 2040, but now it won’t achieve that until at least 2090 at this rate. However, the bigger casualty (apart from those killed or seriously injured) will be the government’s Road Safety Strategy when its headline target is undermined like this.

The lack of prioritisation of road safety can be seen by the fact that it has only been given around £464m from the overall £27bn budget. As transport journalist Chris Ames points out, this is less than 2% of the overall spend on what is supposedly National Highway’s “top priority”! This is important because it signals – unless National Highways reveals otherwise in its summer delivery plan – that the third of ‘smart’ motorways lacking sufficient emergency refuges will not be retrofitted to meet the new standards. We suspect the government is hoping that this will go away as an issue, despite in lane stopping casualty rates being higher on ‘smart’ motorways.

All is yet to be revealed

Despite RIS3 being a 92 page document, it is remarkably thin on detail in some areas. For example there is no funding defined for day to day maintenance, as opposed to renewals. There is no budget set for Designated Funds where most of the funding comes from for things such as active travel infrastructure, improved truck stops, EV charging stations, and pollution control measures (for air, noise and water). There is also £5.2bn of capital with no detail as to how it will be spent. Some of it may well be towards the measures listed above, and some is likely to be used for preparing RIS4 schemes, but the lack of clarity is surprising given how long it has taken to prepare RIS3.

Campaigning successes

On the plus side, RIS3 has significantly increased funding for renewals on National Highways’ existing roads, which is something we have long argued in favour of.

Together with local communities, we breathed a sigh of relief when we saw many controversial road schemes excluded from plans for RIS4, post 2031. This includes the A27 schemes at Arundel and Chichester, the A628 in the Peak District, the A47 Acle Straight in the Norfolk Broads, and the A36/A350 schemes in Wiltshire. Congratulations to all those who campaigned for years to defeat these schemes. 

With this government committed to building 1.5 million new homes and new poor value for money road schemes still on the agenda, tackling car-based development will be a key focus for TAN over the next few years. Getting in early is key to winning, so please get in touch if you have concerns about the roadbuilding being proposed in your area.

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