Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Plan 2023-2025

Contents

Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Plan 2023-2025

1. Introduction

1.1 Principles and Context of the Plan

This Plan is part of a suite of Highway Infrastructure Asset Management documents which have been designed to align with the Well Managed Highway Infrastructure – Code of Practice (October 2016) and are tailored to the specific local needs in Devon. The Plan describes how the Council’s Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Strategy (2022-2025) will be delivered.

The Plan will be used by the Council’s staff, consultants, and contractors for reference when managing and maintaining the highway asset. It will provide Elected Members with the background to help decision making, and it is available to members of the public so that they can understand the challenges faced by the Council in managing the highway asset and the reasons for the actions being taken.

Along with the other Highway Infrastructure Asset Management documents, the Plan is available as an electronic document online. There will be live hyperlinks to places in the Plan and to other documents that are referenced.

The Plan will be updated as and when needed and will be reviewed on an annual basis.

1.2 Status of the Plan

This Plan covers a main planning horizon from 2023 – 2025 to align with the Council’s ‘Best Place’ strategy. Cabinet approval will be sought for this update however, following this, elements of the Plan will be updated dynamically to better match the changing environment we operate in.

A version control process is in place that allows changes to be tracked and help identify when key decisions were made. The process provides clarity about the currency of versions, which versions were in place at a particular time, and prevents superseded information from being used. To administer the process, individual owners have been assigned to the Plan and each of the twelve Annexes. They are responsible for managing the overall version control of these documents. Minor revisions that do not change the substance of the document, for example spelling or grammatical corrections, do not need formal approval. Major revisions which change the context, content, or substance of the document, require the document to be formally approved. An Asset Management Panel will meet at six-monthly intervals and, if required, will make recommendations for the Director of Climate Change, Environment and Transport to authorise in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Highways Management.

1.3 Maintenance Practice

The Council undertakes maintenance types that contribute in varying degrees towards the core objectives of safety, serviceability, and sustainability which are described in Section 4.4. The main types of maintenance activity are summarised in Table 1 below:

Maintenance Type		Function	Activity	Responsibility
1	Regulatory	Inspecting and regulating the activities of others	Highway Safety Inspections	Network Response Team
			Structures	Structures Asset Team
			Streetworks	Network Operations Team
2	Reactive	Responding to safety related incidents and reports	Defects, potholes, obstructions	Network Response Team Structures Asset Team Public Rights of Way
3	Resilience and Emergencies	Managing disruption and implementing recovery	Severe weather emergencies, civil emergencies, landslip or collapsed walls, oil spills, subsidence	Network Operations Team Structures Asset Team Neighbourhood Team
4	Winter Service	Maintenance in adverse weather	Gritting and snow ploughing	Winter Service Team
5	Routine	Regular scheduled works	Minor patching and drainage repairs	Highway Asset Programme Delivery Team
			Cyclical	Highway Asset Programme Delivery Team and Neighbourhood Team
			Lamp replacement	Traffic Management Group
			Bridge maintenance	Structures Asset Team
6	Programmed	Flexibly planned schemes primarily of reconditioning or structural renewal	Principal roads1	Highway Asset Team
			Non-principal roads2	Neighbourhood Team Highway Asset Team
			Footways	Highway Asset Team Neighbourhood Team
			Cycleways	Public Rights of Way Neighbourhood Team
			Public Rights of Way and Maintenance Category 12 roads	Public Rights of Way
			Drainage	Highway Asset Team Neighbourhood Team
			Patching	Highway Asset Team Neighbourhood Team
			Wet/Dry Collision Sites	Highway Asset Team
			SCRIM remedial sites	Highway Asset Team
			High Friction Surfacing (HFS)	Highway Asset Team
			Tree inspections	Highway Services Team Neighbourhood Team
			Structures	Structures Asset Team
			Preventative	Highway Asset Team

1 Principal Roads are A roads and motorways (Highways Act 1980)

2 Non-principal roads are B roads, classified unnumbered roads and unclassified roads

Fig. 1: Main Types of Highway Maintenance Activity

1.4 Scope of the Plan

The Plan includes Annexes for the key asset groups. Each Annex uses the same format and contains information on: Asset Inventory, Asset Performance, Maintenance Strategy, Levels of Service and Investment Strategy, Programme Development, Risks, and Improvements Actions. The 12 key asset groups are:

Carriageways,
Footways,
Cycleways,
Drainage,
Fences and Barriers,
Trees and Soft Landscape,
Road Markings and Studs,
Traffic Signs and other Traffic Assets,
Park and Ride,
Public Rights of Way,
Structures, and
Traffic Signals and Streetlighting.

1.5 Limitations to the Plan

The Plan does not provide detailed technical reference for all aspects of highway infrastructure maintenance, nor does it repeat technical guidance available elsewhere.

It refers to, but does not deal in detail, with:

Highway improvement and new construction,
Network management duty, including managing of utilities, and
Management of street cleansing.

2. Policy Framework

The Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Plan (‘the Plan’) is part of a suite of documents that define the Council’s approach to Highway Asset Management. Figure 2 shows how these documents fit into the asset management framework which is detailed in the Strategy. It is built around four areas:

Organisational Context – The context for highway infrastructure asset management, the organisation, and the environment within which the highway service is delivered, comprising National Guidance and Policies, legal and financial considerations, stakeholder expectations as well as Local Guidance and Policies, which include the Council’s Strategic Plan ‘Best Place’ and emerging Highways and Traffic Management Service Plan.
Planning – The key activities and processes for asset management planning, including developing the asset management policy and strategy, performance management, asset data, lifecycle planning, work programming.
Enablers – The enablers that support the implementation of the Asset Management Framework including communications, leadership and organisation, competencies and training, risk management and performance management.
Performance and Delivery – Delivery of the operational highway procedures and practices and the annual programme of work in accordance with the Highways and Traffic Management Service Plan.

Fig. 2: The Asset Management Framework

2.1 Development of Asset Management Policy

The Council’s Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Policy sets out the high-level principles of the management of highway assets in Devon to ensure the requirements of the Highways Act 1980 are satisfied in a way that helps tackle the priorities identified in the Strategic Plan.

2.2 Stakeholders and Communication

Underlining the importance of Stakeholder engagement to the Council, a Communication Strategy is being developed. This will set out criteria on how to communicate better with its stakeholders.

Section 6.0 of the Highway Asset Management Strategy identifies the Stakeholders with an interest in highway asset management, including elected members, employees, contractors, and agents, and explains how the Council engages them in two-way communication to understand their needs and build commitment and pride in the work it does.

The Council recognises through its network management duty that there are other organisations that undertake operations on the highway. In order to minimise disruption and maintain reputation, the Council encourages that coordination takes place as much as possible, particularly with districts, towns and parishes on wider aspects of road maintenance such as litter picking, winter service and grass cutting. For example, this is proactively encouraged on larger schemes, such as the A380 and A361, where we aim to deliver multiple maintenance activities to optimise occupation of the strategic network.

3. Strategy and Hierarchy

3.1 Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Strategy

The Council’s Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Strategy follows the UK Roads Leadership Group Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Guidance. The Strategy sets out the Council’s approach to highway asset management, which follow the principles of the Policy to ensure that high-level objectives are met.

The Strategy explains that the Council’s highway asset management framework is guided by national codes of practice and policies, and that it is also strongly influenced by the Council’s own policies and The Strategic Plan, including the Council’s commitment to the Devon Climate Declaration in response to the climate emergency.

The table in Figure 3 lists the key objectives that are stated in the Strategy and identifies where it is explained how they will be delivered, either in the Plan, the Annexes, or in the Annual Highway Maintenance Progress Report to Cabinet. The table also lists objectives from some of the linking documents where appropriate and identifies where these are referenced.

Objective of the Strategy	Where the Objectives are referenced
Objective of the Strategy	Plan	Annexes	Annual Maintenance Progress Report
Continue the development of a carbon calculator tool to identify opportunities and priorities for reducing the carbon emissions associated with the maintenance of all highway assets.	√		√
Regularly collect and maintain good quality asset condition survey data to inform the development of a Highway Infrastructure Asset Programme.	√	√	√
Take a long-term view using a systematic, risk-based approach based on defined levels of service for each asset.	√	√
Consider the whole life costs of maintaining an asset; we will look at what will provide best return on the money we spend in the long term, rather than a ‘worst-first’ short term maintenance treatment.	√	√
Encouraging and enabling communities to influence and undertake elements of the service.	√	√
Understand the lifecycle of each asset and use this knowledge to plan when is the best time to do maintenance to keep the asset in a safe and serviceable condition and when it is time to replace it with new.		√
Measure and review Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Plan performance to promote continuous improvement and influence spending on different assets.	√	√
Develop maintenance programmes using asset condition data as the starting point and utilising local intelligence where appropriate.	√	√	√
Present an Annual Maintenance Programme annually to Cabinet for investment decision making approval.			√
Work towards a carbon net zero position by 2030.	√	√
Contribute to increases in bus priority (Bus Back Better).		√
Create a step change in levels of cycling and walking (Gear Change).		√

Fig. 3: References to Strategy Objectives in the Plan

3.2 Network Inventory

Highway authorities have a legal duty to keep a register of roads that are maintainable at public expense, primarily for Land Charges searches. There is also a requirement to maintain information for the purposes of:

Identifying streets described as traffic sensitive, where work should be avoided at certain times of the day,
Identifying structures and other features described as special engineering difficulty, and
Identifying reinstatement categories used by statutory undertakers in the reinstatement of their street works.

Accurate inventory information is required to submit updated information to Government each year on road lengths maintained and is also used for valuation purposes.

Data management is also fundamental to the overall asset management process. There are three types of data that are required to establish a cost effective and adequate maintenance regime:

Inventory – the number, location, size, type, age and make up of each asset.
Condition – measurement and rating of the condition of the asset.
Use – details of how the asset is used.

The Council has therefore developed an inventory that enables it to:

Monitor and report on the condition of the highway network,
Assess the expected life of assets or their components,
Assess current levels of service and develop future levels of service,
Assess current and future performance indicators,
Model future maintenance options and identify future investment strategies,
Develop long-term forward work programmes and associated budget requirements,
Carry out valuation assessments of each of the assets and calculate depreciation, and
Monitor and report on inspection regimes.

Details of inventory collection and data management for each asset type are described in the Annexes.

3.3 Functional Hierarchy

The Council is responsible for a variety of roads and footways, from high volume dual carriageways in congested urban environments to single lane rural roads connecting small settlements and villages.

Constraints on funding and resources mean that it is not possible to maintain every part of the network to the same standard. However, the asset condition should be commensurate with the type and location of a road or footway, and there should be consistency throughout the county and as closely as possible with neighbouring authorities. For example, Primary Routes in the county that carry large volumes of traffic at high speed should be maintained to a higher standard than unclassified Service Roads in very rural locations that carry occasional traffic.

It is fundamental to the application of this concept that a network hierarchy is established. The network hierarchy is based on asset function and is the foundation of the Council’s risk-based maintenance strategy. It is crucial in establishing levels of service and to the statutory network management role for developing, co-ordinating and regulating occupation.

The Council’s hierarchy reflects the whole highway network and the needs, priorities, and actual use of each infrastructure asset and is determined by its functionality and importance. Individual asset hierarchies are defined within each asset group, but all are related so that each asset type can be considered in relation to others and to the whole highway network.

The road hierarchy is used to determine many of the asset management activities that take place on the network, such as the frequency and type of inspections, and response times and types of treatment. Figure 4 shows the Maintenance Categories of the Devon Highway Network. This is also available as a publicly accessible map.

Maintenance Category	Definition on Devon Road Network	Function
1	Motorway	Maintained by National Highways
2	Primary National – Trunk Road	Maintained by National Highways
3	National Primary Route	National strategic routes for through and long-distance travel (A roads)
4	County Primary Route	Main access routes connecting principal settlements.
5	Secondary County Route	Main access routes to large settlements and recreational attractions.
6	Local Distributor	Main access routes to smaller settlements and recreational attractions.
7	Collector Road	Rural – Access routes to small villages and other significant traffic generators. Urban – Industrial main collector roads & through routes and Residential collector roads. Access to schools, hospitals, facilities for the disabled, main shopping areas, libraries, car parks and tourist attractions. Shared surfaces with heavy pedestrian traffic. Local roads serving limited numbers of properties.
8	Minor Collector Road	Rural – Roads serving small hamlets and scattered communities. Urban – Roads serving shopping areas, business premises, industrial estates and residential areas
9	Service Road	Rural – Local road serving only a few properties Urban – Narrow collector roads and shared surfaces
10	Minor Service Road	Rural – Local road serving only one property Urban – Cul-de-sac serving less than 20 properties.
11	Minor Lane	Rural – Serving fields only or duplicating other routes. Urban – Back Lanes
12	Track	Not used by normal vehicular traffic (Predominantly managed as part of Public Right of Way network)

Fig. 4: Maintenance Categories of the Devon Highway Network

The Annexes contain the hierarchy of other assets where applicable.

The core objectives for managing the highway asset are:

Network Sustainability – Minimising cost over time; maximising value to the community; and maximising environmental contribution.
Network Serviceability – Ensuring availability; achieving integrity; maintaining reliability; resilience; and managing condition.
Network Safety – Complying with statutory obligations; and meeting users’ needs for safety. Customer Service user experience/satisfaction; communication; information; and levels of service.

Focussing on these objectives and appropriate outcomes for the functional hierarchies of urban and rural carriageway and footway, Maintenance Standards have been established for each asset where applicable. This has been done by considering what each Maintenance Standard would look like to a road user, and then determining how they can be achieved on each Maintenance Category of route with the resources that are available. Figure 5 shows the four Maintenance Standards that have been used in the tables that can be found in the Annexes where applicable.

Maintenance Standard 1	Provision of Safety, Serviceability and Sustainability
Maintenance Standard 2	Provision of Safety and intermediate level of Serviceability
Maintenance Standard 3	Provision of Safety and minimal level of Serviceability
Maintenance Standard 4	Provision of Safety only

Fig. 5: Maintenance Standards

3.4 Resilient Network and Minimum Winter Network

A resilient network has been defined based on the Minimum Winter Network, which is defined in the Winter Service and Emergency Plan as:

‘A’ roads,
The main access to 24-hour emergency premises, and
The main access to the primary market and coastal towns.

This Network does not simply follow road classification or categorisation, but includes the routes crucial to economic and social life of the local and wider area, taking account of repeat events (e.g. flooding), and local factors. Maintenance and other measures are prioritised on the Resilient Network to maintain economic activity and access to key services during disruptive events.

The Resilient Network is periodically reviewed to ensure that it remains relevant and contains the most critical routes and highway assets.

3.5 Critical Infrastructure

Critical infrastructure assets are a crucial part of the highway network. Their failure would result in significant impact to the local and potentially national economy. One of the potential risks to the function of critical infrastructure is climate change, including impacts of flooding, rising temperature, changing sea levels, high winds, and drought.

The Council is developing a register of its Critical Infrastructure which will consider their position in the asset hierarchy and may assign maintenance categories that are different to similar but non-critical assets. This will include structures that are on the Resilient Network, road restraint systems protecting railways from road vehicle incursion, reservoirs, and the Slapton Line (A379).

3.6 Lifecycle / Designing for Maintenance

Asset management requires a sound understanding of how an asset is likely to behave and deteriorate throughout its lifecycle.

The lifecycle of a highway infrastructure asset covers the following stages:

Creation or Acquisition
Routine Maintenance
Renewal or Replacement
Decommissioning

By predicting the future performance of an asset, or group of assets, during each stage of the lifecycle based on investment scenarios and maintenance strategies, lifecycle plans can be developed that support the asset management strategy.

The Council uses lifecycle planning to decide which maintenance activities are required within what timescales to maintain the asset and ensure it provides the level of service that is required. Lifecycle planning also helps to support investment decisions and substantiate the need for appropriate and sustainable long-term investment.

The Council’s lifecycle strategies are included within the Annexes and contain the details of how highway assets are managed over the long term to deliver best value. With highway assets the focus tends to be on the Deterioration / Maintenance Cycle rather than Creation or Renewal as the vast majority of assets are historical (i.e., roads and bridges) which the Council has maintained for many years.

Understanding the corporate objectives and policies is vital to the development of lifecycle strategies as this determines the focus for funding. A complete inventory is necessary to document the assets that exist and their current condition, and this forms the basis of determining the standards that the Council would like to achieve. By comparing the current level of performance with the desired level of performance, a ‘gap’ can be established. This is considered along with an assessment of the future risks and demands on the asset to establish different maintenance scenarios. The cost of different types of maintenance treatments therefore needs to be appreciated to allow various investment strategies to be modelled as part of assessing best whole life cost.

The lifecycle strategies we have developed for our key asset groups can be found in the Annexes. The strategies are updated as information is gathered and analysed. They form a long-term approach for managing our assets, with the aim of optimising processes and providing the required performance while minimising whole life costs.

4. Risk-Based Approach

4.1 Principles and Considerations

The Council has adopted a risk-based approach to the management of highway infrastructure maintenance, including setting policy and strategy, establishment of inspection and condition assessment regimes, determining priorities and programmes, procuring the service and the management of all associated data and information.

This is undertaken against a clear and comprehensive understanding and assessment of the risks and consequences and is in accordance with local needs (including safety), priorities and resources.

4.2 Developing the Risk Based Approach

The principles of the Council’s risk-based approach to highway infrastructure asset management are explained in Figure 6 below:

Principle	How we do it
Be aligned with the Council’s corporate objectives, legislative requirements, and corporate approach to risk and management of risk	The Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Strategy describes the Council’s approach to risk and management of risk, which is aligned with corporate objectives and legislative requirements, by using a Risk Recording \| DCC Risk Management (devon.gov.uk) that includes corporate and service area risk registers.
Understand risk in a highways service and its application to all areas of operations, including people, infrastructure, data, finance, and suppliers	The Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste \| Services \| Risk Recording (devon.gov.uk) contains details of the main risks in the highways service, their status and mitigation and is reviewed regularly. A risk-based approach is the foundation of all areas within the highways service, including response to defects, inspection regimes and lifecycle planning as set out in this Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Plan and the Highway Safety Policy.
Understand the potential risks and their likely significance to users, stakeholders, the authority and to the data and information held	The Council is continually collecting data on the highway asset through inspections, surveys and reports. Through analysis, this provides an understanding of risk which is used to develop the lifecycle strategies for each asset.
Understand the inventory, function, criticality, sensitivity, characteristics and use of the various assets comprising the highway network	The Council uses an integrated highways management system to collect, store, manage, and report on highway assets.
Establish hierarchies and maintenance standards with appropriate funding	Functional hierarchies have been assigned to carriageways in the county, which are outlined in the Strategy and Hierarchy section of this Plan and in the Annexes where applicable.
Implement the agreed levels of service	The Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Policy establishes the importance of levels of service in achieving the aims of the Council’s strategic plan. The Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Strategy explains how levels of service are established and defines the levels of service statements and how they will be achieved and considers cross-asset prioritisation. This Highway Infrastructure Asset Management Plan describes how levels of service will be implemented through maintenance standards, investment strategies for each asset, and provides a performance management framework for reviewing and monitoring.
Competencies used to develop and implement the risk-based approach	The minimum standards of training and development that are required to enable officers to operate competently has been evaluated and is held on a central register known as the Annual Training Matrix. An annual staff appraisal is undertaken to assess staff competency as part of performance monitoring against their job role, when training and development needs are also identified.
Regular evidence-based reviews	The Council continually reviews its policies and procedures, both formally as dictated by the periods stated within those documents, and informally as an ongoing process. Asset management data, functional hierarchies, and the application of a risk-based approach, including inspection types and frequencies, are regularly reviewed to ensure the most efficient use of resources.

Fig 6. The risk based approach to highway infrastructure asset management

4.3 Competencies and Training

The service has evaluated the minimum standards of training and development that are required to enable officers to operate competently. This is held on a central register (known as the Annual Training Matrix) and reviewed annually.

An annual Training and Development Programme is subsequently prepared and delivered, ensuring that the minimum standards in the matrix are met. Preparation of such a programme will consider the requirements needed to deliver Devon’s Asset Management Strategy, Policy and Plan.

4.4 Inspections and Surveys

The most crucial part of highway infrastructure maintenance is the establishment of an effective regime of inspection, survey, and recording. It is defined following an assessment of the relative risks associated of each location, agreed level of service and condition.

Inspections and surveys provide the basic information for addressing the core objectives of highway maintenance:

Network Safety – addressed through regular, planned Safety Inspections focussing on safety-related defects.
Network Serviceability – addressed through Ad Hoc Inspections, and part of Safety Inspections, in response to requests from a stakeholder and condition data, to ensure that an asset is providing the agreed level of service.
Network sustainability – through condition surveys undertaken in accordance with our lifecycle plans, to provide information on the current performance and an indication of the likely future performance.

The annexes to this Plan contain the inspection and survey regimes for each particular asset type.

4.5 Management Systems, Recording and Monitoring of Information

The Council uses an asset register to record inventories of its highway assets. In addition to maintaining an inventory, the asset register is also used for recording service requests, complaints, and reports or information from users and third parties.

The Council’s highway asset data is held in an Integrated Highways Management System (IHMS). The IHMS is comprised of:

Scheduling software and tools that allow the inspections to be completed, to be scheduled and then created/produced,
Mobile Inspection software which takes the scheduled inspections, completes them and creates ‘works’ within the Defects system as well as updating records in the inspection management system (inspection dates / inspector / driver etc.), and
Mobile mapping software is also used for things other than Inspections (e.g. scheme adjustment, surface dressing assessment, enquiry management and defect creation, grit bins and tree inventory).

This IHMS enables key asset data to be collected, stored, managed, and reported for the highway network, structures, and street lighting. The system is accessible to staff and members of the public via the Public Interface Portal (PIP), an open portal on the Council’s web pages, for the public to report enquiries. The PIP functionality is under regular review to consider aspects such as:

improved live information on the status of inventory items such as if a grit bin has been filled or when a gully was last cleaned, and
improved customer journey for the public to report issues with asset inventory items.

Records of inspection, reactive maintenance and customer contact are recorded on the IHMS. The data is used when undertaking any assessment and review of the highway asset. Surveys are commissioned across the network to obtain carriageway (road) condition data. This information is analysed using UK Pavement Management System (PMS).

The software modules in the IHMS include:

Customer Service System (CSS) – used for managing customer enquiries and assisting with the management of insurance claims.
Defects System – Management of reactive safety work instruction and the defence of insurance claims,
Environmental and Landscape Management (ELM) – used for managing tree inventory and inspections,
Financial and Contract Management – a module to enable costs for commissioned works to be managed and paid, integrated in the IHMS with the Works Ordering element.
Finest interface – A system link that enables automatic raising of invoices and payment direct into the Council’s payment system,
Inspections – used for managing safety, tree and other planned inspection types,
Inventory Manager System (IMS) core enterprise – for managing networks and storing asset inventory,
Mobile Mapping applications – used for various inspections and data inventory collection purposes,
Mobile Working & Inspections – Management of Inspections that ensure compliance with the Council’s Highway Safety Policy,
National Street Gazetteer (NSG) – used to store vital data for statutory undertakers (Utilities companies) to effectively programme their works,
Pavement Management System (PMS) & UKPMS – accredited systems for handling road and footway condition data,
Schemes Manager – uses road condition data to assist with scheme identification and management of schemes, also provides a tool for the management of schemes through review and works processes, integrating with the Works Ordering where appropriate to tie orders to schemes,
Street Works Inspections – A module that enables inspections against street works activities to be managed, which connects to Schemes Manager,
Street Works System – a historic works application system and payment module for permit fees and managing skip applications,
Structures Management System (SMS) – used for managing bridges and structures inventory and works,
Term Maintenance Contractor’s System interface – a system that sends a works order to a 3rd party works optimisation system, and also allows updates for works to be reported back into the IHMS, and
Works Ordering – for managing the repair of defects and planned works, integrated with the Financial and Contract Management system.

Other systems are operated for some specific functions, including:

Lighting Management System – used for managing inventory and works for street lighting, lit signs and bollards,
Drainage – an asset data system for operations, recording them on a stored inventory, and
Traffic Regulation Orders and Collisions – An interactive web app providing live access to data.

In order to store data effectively and efficiently it must be referenced geographically. The Council has developed and must maintain a number of digitised ‘networks’ which allows asset data to be captured and organised. Network referencing assets enables knowledge of the assets that are owned, what extent of the land is highway (extent of the Council’s responsibilities) as well as what condition those assets are currently in. It also helps in programming work. An example of this is how a safety inspector will record a highway defect against a specific road section so that a gang can be sent to the right location with the right materials to make the repair the first time. Hazards and risks at the location can even be identified so that the gang know what traffic management they will need to keep themselves safe whilst making the repair.

Two networks are maintained to represent the Council’s Highway:

the National Street Gazetteer (NSG), and
the PMS network.

The NSG is a record of all of the roads which is managed closely with the local district councils to ensure that it is updated as new roads are adopted from developers. This network is used for managing streetworks by utility companies as well as forming the backbone of our IHMS.

The PMS network is used within the IHMS specifically for managing road condition data from inspection records and annual road condition surveys as well as recording completed capital structural maintenance works. It is different to the Local Street Gazetteer because it is defined by the physical characteristics of the highway rather than junctions and street names.

The Council’s Service Data Management Strategy sets out how data is managed within the systems described above. An independent peer review of the Council’s asset data and systems was undertaken in 2021. The objectives were to:

Identify risks associated with the current processes in place for managing asset data,
Seek opportunities for improvements in the management of asset data that are aligned with the asset management objectives,
Establish whether the existing systems remain fit-for-purpose and whether these systems are likely to support the County Council’s needs now and in the coming years,
Establish how existing asset data and systems have been deployed to develop understanding of the asset through modelling and life cycle analysis, and
Seek opportunities for making improvements to this understanding.

The review found that comprehensive asset data is available to enable the Council to carry out the duties set out in the Asset Management Plan. The data is extensively shared internally and is available externally to Members and public through the Public Information Portal. The review identified that some improvements could be made and offered some recommendations which the Council is working towards implementing.

4.6 Safety Inspections

Highway Safety Inspections are undertaken in accordance with the Highway Safety Policy, which sets out the risk-based regime that has been developed with consideration to:

Frequency of inspection,
Items for inspection,
Type of traffic and intensity,
Method of inspection, and
Nature of response.

In addition to the Highway Safety Policy, the Council manages other risk-based inspections of the highway assets which follow the principles set out above to ensure that appropriate responses are identified and taken to any issues that are identified. These are described in the following Policies and Procedures:

Tree Safety Management Policy and Tree Safety Management Procedure,
Inspection of Highway Structures Policy,
Street Lighting to control street lighting levels with resulting energy and carbon savings,
Public Rights of Way, and
Skid Resistance Strategy and Skidding Resistance of Carriageways Policy and Procedures.

4.7 Defect Recording and Repair

The Highway Safety Policy explains the defect investigatory criteria that has been developed and how defects shall be recorded and the timescale for repair (where applicable). A level of response to defects that provide a risk to users is determined based on a risk assessment.

The annexes to this Plan provide more detail on the repair regime for each asset type where applicable.

4.8 Reporting by the Public

Members of the public are able to provide feedback on the highway network using multiple media methods, including online facilities such as the ‘report a problem’ webpage, general enquiry forms and by telephone.

5. Network Resilience

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.’ There are four components to resilience which are drawn on to reduce the risk of failure, especially on the Resilient Network:

Resistance – preventing damage (e.g. a flood wall),
Reliability – operation under a range of conditions (e.g. earthworks stabilisation),
Redundancy – availability of backups or spare capacity (e.g. a suitable diversion route), and
Recovery – enabling a fast response and recovery (e.g. temporary bridges).

Risks facing the highway network include:

Human diseases – especially with regard to their impact on business continuity,
Flooding – including pluvial, fluvial, groundwater and coastal,
Severe weather – both in the context of seasonal norms and sudden impact events,
Major industrial accidents – especially where they touch the highway network,
Widespread electrical failure – impacting technology resilience,
Major transport accidents – the ability to mitigate, respond and recover
Disruptive industrial action,
Terrorist, malicious or criminal attacks or civil protest,
Cyber security – a specific impact on intelligent and automated systems,
Severe wildfires, and
Severe space weather – such as solar flares, which could disable the electricity grid.

At a corporate level, the Council has a Climate Change Strategy and has undertaken a Weather Impacts Assessment (WIA) to raise awareness of the importance of planned adaptation to weather under a changing climate amongst officers, senior managers and elected members. Although the WIA highlighted a small selection of vulnerabilities, it found that generally the Council is resilient to extreme weather because its existing business continuity and emergency planning arrangements function well and there is an overwhelming desire and commitment from staff to maintain service continuity.

The impact of climate change is considered in the highways service risk register which identifies the capacity and capability available to respond to extreme weather events. The evidence continues to build for more extreme weather at increased frequencies.

An assessment of service resilience was undertaken in 2014 following flooding of the Council’s highways. The document, Service Resilience in a Changing Climate, considers how the Councils Highway Management could be affected by gradual changes in weather and more intense severe weather over the 21st century. The assessment concluded that climate change will have widespread negative effects on the Highways Management service, which will increase the maintenance backlog.

Severe flooding events, storm surges, coastal tidal issues and high winds were experienced in Devon and the wider South West peninsula during December, January and February of 2013-14. Initial clear-up costs were £3m. Rail links to South West severed at Dawlish transferring more pressure on the road network during the 2 month rebuild. The ‘Beast from the East’ and storm Emma snow events in March 2018 caused severe disruption to schools, hospitals, and businesses with Met Office red weather warnings being issued. Coastal storm damage affected highways with the A-road at Slapton being washed away, with an estimated repair bill of £2.5m.

Despite mitigation controls such as strategic planning, preparedness, and careful monitoring the risk remains a high risk to the authority.

The Council is continually adapting its practices to make it more resistant to climate change. An example is the potential to trial smart gullies, which may be run in three critical areas prone to flooding, identified by the Environment Team, that have been overlayed with data from Highways showing gullies that receive enhanced or reactive cleansing. The results could show how technology could be used to inform policy and transform reactive and cyclical maintenance.

The Council is also working on ways of adapting to climate change and finding alternative solutions that complement traditional engineering techniques. An example of this is in Exton where flooding of the highway (A376) causes significant access problems. Natural Flood Management (NFM) solutions are being explored upstream, along with small scale highway improvements to alleviate the ponding.

The Council’s Winter Service and Emergency Plan describes the procedure for dealing with Major Emergencies and sets out the role that the highway service will have alongside other agencies who may include Police, Maritime and Coastguard Agency, Health Service and Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

6. Performance Management

6.1 Performance Measures

At the strategic level, the Council has adopted an approach to performance management that is closely aligned to the Department for Transport’s Incentive Fund against which we have been self-assessing since it was established in 2015. The Incentive Fund aims to improve local authority asset management capabilities, with allocations determined by self-assessment questionnaires based on available evidence demonstrating performance and levels of maturity. The Council has selected eight key measures from the Incentive Fund questionnaire to create a performance management tool that follows national guidance and identifies: the model evidence required to be successful, the current status and priority actions. This is shown in Figure 7 below.

The tool uses three shades of green to rate our current status:

Colour

Rating

Attainment of Measure

Model Evidence

Light Green

Measure has not been met

Model evidence is not in place

Mid-Green

Measure has been met

Most model evidence is in place, and/or is in place and could be strengthened

Dark Green

Measure has been met

Strong model evidence is in place

Measure

Model Evidence

Current status

Priority action 

The asset management approach has been communicated and is understood 

Published documents 

Stakeholders identified 

Regular communications 

Opportunities to comment and feedback 

HIAMP documents available. Formal communication arrangements with key stakeholders in place such as performance dashboard at regular scrutiny and parish and town council website and newsletter.

Feedback has been received and acted upon e.g. defect response and works programmes. 

Determine fixed milestones each year to review base documents including Annexe owners.

Formalise point of contact for stakeholder engagement, communications, comment, and feedback.

Review stakeholder list and formalise contact point.

Review, update public interface information.

The authority has the competence and training required to deliver highway asset management effectively 

Assess organisational competence  

Identify key roles and training needs  

Review resilience  

Enable succession planning  

The national guidance has been followed in undertaking an Authority competence review in July 2020. The review demonstrated a good level of competence and resilience within the authority but identified resource capacity as an issue delaying regular review and updating policies.

Review and update competency matrix for principal AM roles and align with HMEP competencies.

Develop training framework to ensure future resource resilience as essential posts become vacant.

There is an asset investment strategy linked to funding and levels of service 

Asset valuation annually 

Asset condition assessment annually 

Cross asset prioritisation approach 

Scenarios considered 

Outcomes identified including forecast of future condition 

Annual review of asset group performance in terms of condition depreciation and level of service which together with risk informs funding allocation across asset groups 

Continue to provide asset valuation annually using CIPFA interim solution and use until DfT provide alternative valuation tool.

Improve data access tools for the practitioner to aid efficiencies in prioritisation, delivery, and cost.

Use improved whole life costing (WLC) models to better inform and model future network scenarios using funding, condition, and potential risk as the drivers.

Levels of service are set and performance reviewed 

Levels of service identified  

Stakeholder engagement in identification and setting of service level 

Annual review to assess if these are being achieved or exceeded 

Levels of service are identified in the HIAMP linking to the Corporate Strategic Plan. Identified maintenance service standards with details of what a road user can expect. 

Review current funding allocations to confirm, amend current achievable service delivery levels against expectations. Identify gaps, risks, and mitigations.

Prepare contingency arrangements on service levels against current cost models.

The risks associated with delivering the Asset Management approach have been identified and are monitored 

Risks are identified 

Controls are established 

Risk owners identified together with how frequently each should be reviewed 

Risks have been identified within revised Plan and associated Annexes.

Undertake review of gap analysis to establish any changes in potential risks through changes in service delivery.

Works are identified planned and programmed effectively 

Two-year Works programmes are developed for each asset group  

Detailed programmes at scheme level are designed in advance 

Programmes are regularly reviewed and reprioritised appropriately in response to competing in-year pressures 

Two-year Programme funding allocations scenarios are considered and agreed. Annual programmes are developed and schemes identified for work functions up to a year in advance. For planned work, Design briefs are issued, and design is undertaken, and orders issued to enable a 17-week lead-in. 

Establish a longer term works programme for the principal road network using improved WLC and scenario modelling.

Work towards establishing a 3-year outline programme on the minor road network.

Minimise scheme deferment and improve delivery certainty on published programmed schemes

Our plans and processes are fully embedded to ensure least whole life carbon generation when selecting suitable materials/processes. 

The authority has declared a climate emergency 

A toolkit is being used to measure carbon output 

Carbon reduction is being achieved through process changes and material selection decisions 

Devon has declared a climate emergency and has a target of net zero by 2030. A design toolkit is being developed in partnership with Exeter University. Contractors are trialing a toolkit to measure carbon output on road works schemes. Vehicles are being replaced with electric /alternative Fuel options. Increasing use of recycling materials and warm asphalt 

Use carbon emission outputs when developing network scenarios for future works programmes

Develop process to assess carbon outputs at scheme/contract selection stage.

The asset approach is reviewed regularly  

Peer reviews 

Compliance with national standards and guidance 

Benchmarking with other local authorities 

Review of HIAMP documents 

Peer review maturity assessment completed with WSP and benchmarked against 9 other local authorities 

Gap analysis of CoP Well managed highway infrastructure completed. 

Annual benchmarking through peer group National Highway and transport network reviewing customer survey and efficiency.

Increase liaison with peer authorities to understand areas of good practice.

Undertake annual review of CoP WMHI to establish mitigation and actions.

Determine fixed milestones each year to review HIAMP base documents including Annexe owners.

Ensure any departure from national standards and guidance is formally documented

Establish project plan and resource commitment to review all policies and formalise annual review process going forward.

Fig 7. Performance Management Tool

The Council utilises several tools to help understand the performance of not only the network condition, but also the service delivered to its communities. Some examples include:

NHT Survey,
ALARM Survey,
Condition Surveys,
Streetworks Audits, and
Incentive Fund.

The visualisation of performance is a key factor to Devon as it helps aid intelligent data led decision making practices. Devon currently achieves this by using PowerBi and other software mapping layer solutions, such as in Figure 8.

Fig 8. Example of data visualisation software

6.2 Performance Measures

A further commitment to embed a robust performance management system across the entire service has been made. To aid this journey, a cross authority project with Oxfordshire County Council, aims to develop a set of service key performance measures. Such measures will be linked from business and customer needs, as well as driven from the developing Service Plan.

7. Financial Management, Priorities and Programming

7.1 Financing of Highway Maintenance

The approach to funding and investment is identified in the HIAM Strategy Highway Asset Management Policy and Strategy – Roads and transport (devon.gov.uk). As can be seen from the gross valuation below most of the annual depreciation occurs in carriageway and structural assets. It follows that the investment approach identifies that most of the available funding is targeted to these main asset groups. For both, there are well developed financial models that review different investment scenarios and predicts the impact these will have on conditions in the forthcoming years. There is more detail on this in the corresponding annexes. The approach to funding and investment strategy is less well developed for the remaining asset groups and the methodology is described in the individual annexes. The information informs the operating demands and the replacement and renewal needs for each asset. These demands are considered annually and met from the available revenue and capital budget respectively.

7.2 Asset Valuation

The highway infrastructure asset is the most valuable asset owned by the public sector in the UK. The significant levels of funding for the management of this asset are under continuous scrutiny, with increasing pressure from government and the public for transparency, accountability and more efficient use of the limited resources available.

Asset Valuation information has been provided to the Department for Transport (DfT) on an annual basis and provides both the Gross Replacement Cost (GRC) of the authority’s assets (what it would cost to rebuild from scratch) and the Depreciated Replacement Cost (DRC) (what it would cost to return the assets to new from their current condition) This data not only gives the government a detailed overview of the country as a whole but it is also a useful benchmarking measure between the County Council and neighbouring or similar sized authorities.

Highway infrastructure assets are measured at historical cost rather than at the asset measurement basis described as ‘current value’ and are generally inalienable assets, expenditure on which is only recoverable by continued use of the asset created. They work as a part of a continuous network that is maintained in a relatively steady state, though there may be distinctive parts of this network.

Since the figures for 2020-21 financial year highway infrastructure assets (reported DfT in 2021) were submitted, the national requirement for Highway Authorities to report to DFT on subsequent years has stalled and a review of the reporting model is currently underway. As an interim measure to cover the next 2 years the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy (CIPFA) has prepared an interim Accounting for Infrastructure – Temporary Solution to accompany the changes to the Code of Practice on Local Authority Accounting in the United Kingdom (the Code)

Within Devon since 2021 we have continued to estimate our GRC and DRC highway asset values using estimated rates, past data and for structures current data through their Structures Asset Valuation and Investment tool (SAVI), this has provided an indicative overall asset valuation. This provides a GRC of £14.6 Billion and a DRC of £12.8 Billion. The intention is to adopt the CIPFA interim solution issued in January 2023 which will provide some level of comparison across the UK.

7.3 Priorities and Programming

The Council has different processes in place for decision making and lifecycle planning, which vary over the network hierarchy. Some examples of the asset systems and data are as follows:

Principal Roads
Systems and data-based approach,
Scheme Manager within the IHMS,
Lifecycle model (hosted on the IHMS) Developed to include all Road types, and
Overlap with Local Asset Capital Programme (LACP described below).
Footways
Scheme Manager analysis of footway network condition data in PMS (hosted on the IHMS).
Non-Principal Roads
LACP, and
Although LACP is intended for minor roads, this process has some overlap with the A Road and Footway processes.
Drainage
Cleansing frequencies determined by risk at a local level,
Gully renewals and repairs compiled from inspection reports, and
Overlap with LACP in identifying and prioritising drainage improvement schemes.

Local Asset Capital Programme (LACP)

The Local Asset Capital Programme (LACP) is a new way of prioritising schemes predominantly the Non-Principal network, introduced by the Council. It is a digitised process that brings different data sources and local knowledge together. It is an iterative process to identify and prioritise works, involving both the Council, Parish Councils and other local stakeholders. As the process is being deployed, the Council is capturing the lessons learnt and adjusting the process.

Figure 9 summarises the resources and data input of the LACP Process.

Fig 9. LACP resources and data inputs

The aims and benefits of this approach include:

Putting more weight towards customer and political input rather than solely actual asset condition.
Enable work planning by road and route to avoid repeat visits for different work types, increasing efficiency and reducing disruption.
Increasing confidence in the data and its usage.
Making asset management principles more ‘lived’ rather than an on the shelf policy document.
Increasing local team knowledge on the combined annual works programme. and
Developing a three year forward list of priorities for planned work.

It is anticipated that this will be refined further during the life of the Plan taking account of resource capabilities. More detail, in relation to application of the LACP for Carriageways, can be found in Annex 1.

Asset Groups

Each annex describes the asset group approach to programme selection and prioritisation. This is developed from the maintenance strategy and investment strategy outlined within the annex. The service promotes some flexibility in approach encouraging teams to work collaboratively where efficiencies or improved customer experience can be achieved by bringing different strands of work together. For example, a road closure for safety inspection repairs may be utilised for a street lighting or road restraint replacement.

8. Sustainability

8.1 Sustainability and Highway Infrastructure Maintenance

The six priorities of the Council’s ‘Best Place’ Strategic Plan 2021 – 2025 are linked by the theme of sustainability, and this aligns with the Local Transport Plan 2011 – 2026, which sets out the strategy to deliver a transport system that meets economic, environmental and social challenges.

The Council’s Environmental Policy Environmental policy – Environment (devon.gov.uk) establishes nine commitments, and is implemented through a set of themed action plans, including:

Carbon Reduction Plan,
Waste Management Plan,
Plastic Strategy,
Procurement Strategy,
Countryside and Heritage Policy and Action Plan,
Environmental Risk Strategy and Action Plan, and
Water Strategy and Action Plan.

Progress against the environmental objectives of the Environmental Policy, including the Carbon Reduction Plan, are monitored and reviewed on an ongoing basis. Details are published through highlighted reports prepared for the Council’s Environmental Performance Board, available at Environmental performance progress.

Consideration of the economic, environmental, and social impacts is a key part of the planning and carrying out of highway maintenance and the Council’s approach is under constant review and development.

An example is the guidance on decision-making principles for carbon cost versus scheme costs. In 2020, Devon began developing a carbon calculator in conjunction with Exeter University. This tool is used on schemes to estimate both carbon emissions and carbon cost against various treatment solutions. The tool also offers a calculation for the whole life cost of carbon so the longer-term impacts can be considered. This is a vital tool that can help us ‘reduce or design out carbon’. Work is also emerging with software suppliers to embed this approach into our core asset management systems mentioned in a previous section (here). Strict rules for managing the weighting of scheme cost against carbon savings are purposely not imposed during the ‘learning phase’ while sufficient carbon data sets are built.

Another example is the Council’s carbon web form, which was launched in July 2022. This tool will help the service visualise carbon emissions at a granular level on data dashboards leading to informed data intelligent decisions making for reduced carbon operations, including material selection and treatment types. The approach includes a whole life costing of carbon approach, embedding asset management principles at the core of the system.

Whole life carbon costs are considered when selecting materials. Warm Mix Asphalt (WMA) uses less energy than hot mixes and has the potential to reduce embodied carbon by up to 15%. Its use is increasing in Devon and WMA is the default surfacing material on the Council’s Term Maintenance Contract. The lower temperature material offers practical benefits too, enabling projects to be delivered faster as the asphalt takes less time to reach trafficking temperature which means roads can be opened to traffic earlier.

In 2022, the Council made a bid to ADEPT for Live Labs 2 funding from the Department for Transport to support the transition to zero carbon local roads. In 2023, it was awarded a share of £30M funding towards the A382 (including Jetty Marsh Link Road) project, which will be the UKs first carbon negative highway. More can be read about the project here.

The Council has a Technical Appraisal Panel (TAP) that assesses and trials new innovations in highway maintenance and repair. The main focus of the group is to address corporate aims, such as carbon reduction, by establishing and approving a wider selection of treatments that can be used at various stages of the lifecycle. This may also bring about cost benefits compared to traditional forms of maintenance.

As part of the Council’s commitment to operating its fleet in a low-carbon and sustainable manner, a programme to replace fossil fuelled vehicles with electric vehicles (EVs) has been established. Six EVs have been purchased by 2022. Opportunities to utilise alternative fuels, such as hydrated vegetable oils (HVO) have also been pursued, with a secondary project commissioned to collaborate with supply chains to share existing supplies. All HVO sources are sustainable and are only manufactured from food waste sources.

8.2 Materials, Products and Treatments

Devon’s landscape character assessment (DLCA) describes the variation in character between different areas and types of landscape in the county.

Maintaining and improving the character of places can be of significant value to communities and to the local economy. The impact of highway maintenance on character, in terms of risk and opportunities, are considered as part of the lifecycle planning. Streetscape guidance is referred to and followed where feasible.

There are designated and un-designated heritage assets across the county, which can be within designated areas such as conservation areas, registered parks and gardens and world heritage sites. In the planning of highway maintenance, the Council refers to the Highway Asset Register and Environmental Viewer (Historic Environment Records) which provide a complete record of the heritage assets ensuring that maintenance reflects statutory requirements.

8.3 Quality Management and Sector Schemes

The Council’s internal engineering services delivery group, known as the Engineering Design Group (EDG), is responsible for the design, project management, procurement, supervision and contract management associated with the delivery of infrastructure schemes across the authority. The EDG is certified to ISO 9000/1 and is responsible for the maintenance of highway structures and supports highway maintenance in other ways, for example through the preparation of contract documents and offering design assistance.

The Council requires its contractors and suppliers to hold National Highway Sector Scheme (NHSS) certification to ensure work is carried out to the highest standard using properly trained and competent staff. NHSSs are complementary to ISO 9001. The Council’s specifications require BBA HAPAS approved products to be used, ensuring that they comply with relevant regulations and standards.

The Devon County Council Materials Laboratory provides testing services on a variety of civil engineering materials to ensure they meet British and European standards including elements relating to safety and carries out site investigations to inform scheme and adoptable highway design. The Laboratory is accredited (Quality Assured), for a major part of its testing under the United Kingdom Accreditation Service (UKAS).

The Council has staff who are members of ADEPT, working with other authorities and local enterprise partnerships to deliver clean, sustainable growth through recovery and regeneration, and ensure that best practice is shared.

8.4 Environmental Management

An internal Environment Review system is used by the Council, which includes an Environmental Risk Assessment that is undertaken at the beginning of the concept stage for all projects. This identifies environmental constraints on the project, informs the allocation of resources, and identifies further work necessary to satisfy statutory requirements or mitigate the impacts of the project.

8.5 Materials Utilisation

The maintenance of the highway network requires the selection of optimum treatments and materials to provide the most beneficial whole life cost solution. The selection of treatments and materials is made in an evolving environment where price, availability and sustainability pressures are constantly changing.

The cost and availability of materials have been under pressure in recent years and the reduced availability of labour and materials has led to significant price rises. These pressures include but are not limited to:

Covid-19 has affected supply and disrupted workforces,
Removal of red diesel from construction works,
Increasing fuel costs,
Shortage of haulage drivers,
Construction demand fluctuations – sharp falls in the first half of 2020 followed by a steep recovery since,
Supply chain bottlenecks due to global demand shocks,
Increased administration at UK ports affecting imports and exports due to UK EU Trade and Cooperation Agreement, and
Sharp rises in shipping costs and temporary surcharges.

The environmental challenges facing the earth have led to the authority declaring a climate emergency meaning that the highway service and their supply chain need to work towards a carbon net zero position by 2030, for this to be achievable we will need to reduce the overall carbon footprint of highway maintenance. This goal will only be achieved by selecting treatments and materials that have a low carbon impact across their service life.

The specifications used by the Council to procure highway service work already include measures to reduce carbon, these include:

Warm mix asphalt included as default choice,
Inclusion of recycled material in the production of asphalt, and
Use of recycling for carriageway maintenance.

Furthermore, through relationships with its contractors and supply chain, the Council encourages the use of local materials where practicable.

8.6 Waste Management and Recycling

The Council’s Resurfacing, Recycling and HFS Contract includes rates for in-situ and ex-situ recycling of materials.

Asphalt planings arising from highway maintenance activities are all re-used in the county and none are deposited into landfill.

The Term Maintenance Contract (TMC) includes three environmental Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), one of which measures the percentage of waste diverted from landfill.

8.7 Noise Reduction, Air Quality and Pollution Control

Statutory requirements with regard to noise, air or water pollution from maintenance operations are complied with through risk management and by employing precautionary methods. Where practical, good practice methods are adopted to mitigate inconvenience to the community.

The Council supports district and unitary authorities who are responsible for air quality monitoring. An example is in Ivybridge where on-street parking was causing traffic to queue which was contributing to poor air quality in the Air Quality Management Area. The parking was removed in 2021 through a Council led scheme, which has resulted in improved traffic flow leading to improved air quality.

8.8 Nature Conservation and Biodiversity

The Council has produced a ‘Life on the Verge in Devon’ document which provides practical guidance on the steps required to manage a road verge for wildlife. Communities are encouraged to manage verges for wildlife where it is safe to do so and not in conflict with the health and safety management of verges. A free step-by-step guidance document is available on the Council’s Environment webpages.

A number of important verges within the county have been designated by the Council as Special Verges due to their exceptional wildlife value or their value to communities. Currently, there are 112 Special Verges located throughout the county, each one with its own specific survey and management card. The location of Special Verges can be found at Devon County Council’s environmental viewer, under the Ecology/Geology tab.

Customers who are interested in helping manage a Special Verge are invited to email nature@devon.gov.uk for more information.

8.9 Environmental Intrusion

The Council has adopted a protocol and accompanying guidance for highway design and management in Devon’s nationally and internationally protected landscapes. The principles of the guidance may be applied in all rural areas of Devon. Both documents were produced in 2011 in association with the Council’s two National Parks, five Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONBs) and two Unesco World Heritage Sites.

9. Procurement

The procurement of maintenance activities and programme and service delivery is competitively, as well as publicly advertised, on either Contracts Finder or, for larger tenders, via Find a Tender Service (FTS).

Works are procured through a number of different contracts, namely Term or Framework. This includes a main Term Service Contract, and smaller framework contracts that procure activities such as Surface Dressing, Resurfacing, Recycling, High Friction Surfacing and Road Restraint Systems.

By ensuring maintenance activities can be split among different delivery partners, this maximises resource availability as well as recognises the more specialist requirements of certain maintenance delivery.

Each Contract is designed to ensure value for money, adherence to policies, specifications and alignment to the Council’s Strategic priorities.

10. Improvement Actions

This Plan and the supplementary Annexes are live documents. They will be subject to continuous improvement and ongoing development with input from Council Officers and Stakeholder feedback. The Plan and Annexes identify areas for improvement which are summarised as Improvement Actions at the end of each document. These Actions are managed following a process that aligns them to Strategic Goals and prioritises their implementation taking account of the framework of funding and resource availability.

The actions that have been identified as being required to ensure the asset management objectives are achieved are:

Review of Network Hierarchy so that maintenance categories are relevant to the network and easily understood, and to allow for more targeted investment strategies to be developed.
Continued development of the Communication Strategy to enable improved engagement with citizens and key stakeholders, and improve joint working with District, Towns and Parish Councils.
Continued development of the Asset Data Strategy to prioritise and progress key actions.
Review the Resilient Network so that it is relevant to the network and easily understood, and the Critical Infrastructure, to allow for more targeted investment strategies to be developed.
Continued development of the Lifecycle Planning Module using accurate inventory and condition data to better understand future costs of managing the condition of the network to achieve levels of service.
Improve coordination with other areas of the authority that are involved in strategic developments such as development control. Developments often may create new assets, which is adding to the asset inventory and maintenance liability.

11. Conclusions

The Council is facing many challenges. In relation to the management of the highway asset, these include:

Contributing towards the Corporate Strategic Plan, ‘Best Place’,
Meeting targets for the reduction in carbon, and
Delivering levels of service under significant financial pressures.

In response, the Council needs to be agile and continually review its processes, looking for improvements and efficiencies through innovation and adopting new ways of working, such as engaging with communities to drive effectiveness and self-help solutions.

This Plan is underpinned by twelve annexes for the main Highway Assets that are each maintained by a lead expert allowing the annexes to evolve with time and be updated as live documents.

Version Control

Version	Date:	Summary of Changes
1.0	12 April 2023

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