Public consultation on expressway plans

This page was updated in January 2021

This section of our website was written when Highways England was developing the Ox-Cam Expressway Corridor and Route Options. All work on the Expressway was ‘paused’ in March 2020, but the expressway itself has not yet been cancelled (as of January 2021). Indeed, some in the National Infrastructure Commission (NIC) which originally came up with the idea of the expressway and one million new houses still believe these should be the twin major goals of Ox-Cam Arc development. In light of the above we keep this section of our website as a guide to what will be the consultation process of any major infrastructure scheme run under the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project (NSIPs) process - a rather different ‘route’ to planning from the normal Local Authority-based route. NSIPs give the Government far more power (including, for example, of compulsory purchase) and control over local development. The Ox-Cam expressway was considered to fall under NSIP rules as, probably, will any new major settlement(s) across the Arc - such as new towns or cities.

Please read what follows in the light of the point in the NSIPs’ process at which it was written (i.e. when waiting for the announcement of several expressway routes within Preferred Corridor B). A very similar sequence of events is likely to be followed by any NSIP proposal for the Arc.

There are two sorts of public consultation on most development plans, non-statutory and statutory. If they happen at all, non-statutory consultations usually precede statutory ones.

What does non-statutory consultation mean, and will it have any effect?

The Ox-Cam Expressway proposals fall under the legislation of the Planning Act 2008 that applies to all national infrastructure projects such as motorways, power stations, ports etc. The Planning Act requires at least one period of consultation with the public for all infrastructure schemes; usually there is only one such consultation.  This gives the public limited powers to comment on, and possibly affect, aspects of infrastructure developments.   Because it is enshrined in law, such consultation is called ‘statutory’.  The Planning Act requires some notice to be taken of statutory consultation feed-back, before plans proceed to the next step of the Planning Inspectorate’s Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project, NSIPs process.  Plans that do not take sufficient account of feed-back may be challenged or even rejected by the Planning Inspector, causing delays to all subsequent stages.

In order to avoid such delays at a late stage of the process, Highways England tends to have an earlier consultation stage to iron out any wrinkles in its proposals.  This earlier consultation is not required by law, and is therefore called ‘non-statutory’.  Some view the non-statutory phase as a favour offered to the public by Highways England, but the truth is that by identifying and addressing possible problems at an early stage, Highways England is making its later work – the statutory phase – much easier.  Fewer problems should emerge from the woodwork during the statutory phase if the non-statutory phase has already revealed most or all of them.

The non-statutory phase is our opportunity to examine and comment upon the suggested expressway routes and their likely impacts on our heritage, wildlife and other sites of importance to us.  We must assume that Highways England has taken account of all such sites already recorded in publicly available databases (for example, those on the Natural England and Historic England sites) – although it’s a good idea to check.  But there are almost certainly other sites that are not yet recorded in such databases.  It is very important to make Highways England aware of such sites during the consultation period.  You will find this easier to do if you are already registered as a stakeholder.

Highways England has a three-step way of dealing with such important sites; avoid, mitigate or compensate.  Some sites might be easily avoided by re-routing the expressway.  Others may be ‘unavoidable’ (as is the case of many wildlife sites along the track of HS2), in which case Highways England is expected to make an effort in some way to replicate elsewhere what is destroyed by the expressway.  Net biodiversity gain is covered in The Environment.

Whether non-statutory consultation has the effect we might want remains to be seen.  Don’t forget that there will be many different criteria for route selection, probably similar to those used for corridor selection.  Only one of these concerns the environment.

Routes Option Consultation

First of all it is very important that all individuals and groups (such as Parish Councils) register as stakeholders for the consultation exercise.  The days of a very restricted number of stakeholders are over.  As a new stakeholder you won’t be invited to closed Powerpoint sessions with Highways England, but you will find it easier to find out about and respond during the consultation periods.  Registering as a stakeholder is very easy but there are two routes by which to do so; one for individuals and one for groups. Regardless of how you register, you will receive the same information at the same time as all other stakeholders. Find out how to register here.

Routes option consultation – what, where, when and how?

The following is NEG’s understanding of the non-statutory consultation process, based on discussions with Matt Stafford, Project Director for the Oxford to Cambridge Expressway, and others at Highways England’s offices in Bedford in July 2019.

All registered stakeholders will be given some advance warning of the start of the consultation process.  We do not yet know how much advance warning there will be.

The consultation process will be announced widely by Highways England in the local and national press.  Highways England has said it will send letters to every property within 2kms of every expressway route and will advertise in the local presses that cover communities up to 5kms away.  Announcements will also be made in the national press.

The consultation process will last for 10 weeks only. 

Highways England will present the expressway routes to the public in several ways:

a) on its dedicated website

b) by 60/70 or more consultation events across the corridor.  These are likely to be in Village Halls, involving displays, maps and Highways England staff/spokespersons explaining the proposals in more detail.

c) by a series of pop-up events in places like train and bus stations, shopping centres and malls.  These again should feature displays, maps and spokespersons from Highways England.

d) by travelling ‘chatty vans’ for members of the public to drop in and talk to Highways England staff/spokespersons.

We do not know all the ways in which we can feed-back our suggestions, but as a minimum this should include the dedicated website, probably also with a downloadable document for filling in and returning either electronically or by post; and printed feed-back forms (to be picked up at events b), c) and d) above) for those without internet access (which may be as many as 20% of some populations).

Can we say ‘No’ to the Expressway?

A small number of route options will be available for us to comment on, but there will NOT be a tick-box to say ‘None of the above’.  We regard this as a dreadful omission, given that Highways England has been instructed by the Government to assess public opinion about the expressway route options.

The ONLY way to express our opposition to expressway plans will be in a text box, probably near the end of the consultation response form, saying something like ‘Is there anything else you would like to tell us?’. 

This really is our ONLY chance for each of us to say “My preference if for NO expressway” or Yes, I am against the Oxford-Cambridge expressway in principle.”

We think it is VITAL that we all use exactly the same words to express our total opposition to expressway plans, because it is likely that responses will be processed at least in part by machine rather than by humans. Indeed, Matt Stafford (Highways England Project Director for Ox-Cam Expressway) told us that all consultation responses will be “coded up” for review.

After writing something like the above, please do add in your own words why you are against the expressway. Car-based and car-dependent transport will increase congestion and pollution, will strain our overstretched road network and will contribute significantly to Green House Gas (GHG) emissions, thus destroying any chance of the nation reaching a zero-carbon target within a reasonable time (see the section of the Environment for more details). Please mention these and any other factors that you consider will be adversely affected if these plans go ahead.

Also, Highways England want you to submit information about wildlife, heritage data, and any implications the detailed design work yet to be done of a route or junction. Remember, Highways England’s Ox-Cam project team are in an office in Bedford. They do not have your local knowledge. You need to advise them of every implication you can think of, be it potential for rat run traffic, splitting eco-systems, impacting routes taken by communities to get to local schools, shops etc. Highways England expect us to give this level of detailed feedback… sadly they haven’t told anyone that yet!