Wiltshire Local Transport Plan

The government's 1998 White Paper on Transport, 'A New Deal for Transport: Better for Everyone', introduced the concept of Local Transport Plans (LTP) to steer the development of national transport policies at the local level. The Transport Act 2000 then made it a statutory requirement for local transport authorities to produce LTPs.

The Wiltshire LTP sets out the council's objectives, plans and indicators for transport in Wiltshire. Furthermore, as a document developed through partnership working and extensive consultation, the LTP also provides the framework for all other organisations with a direct or in-direct involvement in transport in Wiltshire.

Local Transport Plan 4 (LTP4)

We are currently developing the draft LTP4, which will cover the period 2025-2039. Work is under way on development of the LTP4 strategy and associated sub-strategies.

The draft LTP4 documents will aim to:

Set the policy direction for transport in Wiltshire for the coming years.
Set out how our transport policy relates to other key areas, such as decarbonisation, health, safety and wellbeing, sustainability, network resilience, and the economy.

We are planning to hold a consultation on the draft LTP4 in autumn 2024. More information about the consultation will be available on this page in the coming months.

LTP4 is progressing in five stages:

Stage 1: research and scope - review the previous LTP and review background policy and geographical context.
Stage 2: issues and options - develop the challenges, vision and objectives for LTP4.
Stage 3: develop LTP4 - confirm approaches and develop strategies to achieve our vision; and produce draft LTP4 documents. We are currently at this stage of the process.
Stage 4: LTP4 consultation - hold a public consultation on LTP4 and report on its findings.
Stage 5: finalisation and adoption - update final LTP4 with consultation feedback and adopt LTP4.

Local Transport Plan 3 (LTP3)

The third Wiltshire Local Transport Plan (LTP3) covers the period from April 2011 to March 2026.

The Department for Transport's 'Guidance on Local Transport' (July 2009) sets of five overarching national transport goals:

support economic growth;
reduce carbon emissions;
promote equality of opportunity;
contribute to better safety, security and health; and
improve quality of life and a healthy natural environment.

In addition, the transport White Paper 'Creating Growth, Cutting Carbon: Making Sustainable Local Transport Happen (January 2011) has two main themes:

offering people sustainable transport choices, particular for shorter journeys, that will stimulate behavioural change; and
demonstrating how localism and the big society can work for transport.

LTP3's overall long-term strategy seeks to address and support these goals and themes by providing a sustainable transport system.

There are a number of supporting strategies that also make up LTP3:

Having been approved by the council's cabinet, the following LTP3 strategies were published in March 2014:

Following an extensive public consultation exercise, a reviewed LTP3 Car Parking Strategy was approved by the council's cabinet as its meeting in March 2015.

Wiltshire Local Transport Plan 2011- 2026 Car Parking Strategy (PDF) [10MB] (opens new window)

A further public consultation exercise was undertaken in late 2017 on a number of charging and operational parking options. These were considered by the council's cabinet at its meeting on 30 January 2018. Following a statutory Traffic Regulation Order process in April/May 2018, a number of the options were approved by the Cabinet Member for Highways, Transport and Waste in October 2018.

You can also download the town cycle network maps individually.

Consultation issues paper

As part of the early development of LTP3 a consultation issues paper was published in the spring of 2009. The paper covered a range of topics, including the importance of the national transport goals, transport issues in Wiltshire and the proposed strategic transport objectives.

Consultation workshops

During November 2010, Wiltshire Council invited various stakeholders and other interested parties to attend one of four consultation workshops to discuss the development of the LTP3.

Wiltshire Local Transport Plan 2011 – 2026 Consultation Workshops (PDF) [663KB] (opens new window)

Other supporting documents

Equalities Impact Assessment

An Equalities Impact Assessment (EIA) is a process for evaluating the equality and diversity impacts and consequences for policies, services or functions, in this case LTP3.

Wiltshire Local Transport Plan 2011 – 2026 Equality Impact Assessment (PDF) [313KB] (opens new window)

Strategic environmental assessment

To comply with the requirements of EU Directive 2001/42/EC and the Environmental Assessment of Plans and Programmes Regulations 2004, a Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) was undertaken alongside the production of LTP3.

There are several stages in the SEA process, the first stage being the scoping stage where baseline data is collected and collated, including all relevant plans, programmes and environmental protection objectives. This information is used to develop the SEA objectives. This stage also consists of a compulsory consultation period where the scoping report is open to comment and feedback.

The second stage consists developing and refining alternatives and assessing the potential effects of the transport options and the draft plan. Where significant adverse effects are identified, potential mitigation measures are considered.

A comprehensive SEA environmental report follows which also consists of a compulsory consultation period. An important element of the SEA process is the monitoring of both positive and negative effects and is an effective way of tracking the environmental effects of the plan and to show appropriate responses where adverse effects are identified.

The final stage of the SEA process is the SEA statement. This importantly shows how the SEA process was taken into consideration during the development of LTP3.

Strategic Environmental Assessment for LTP3 overall strategy, implementation plan and car parking, freight, public transport, road safety strategies

Strategic Environmental Assessment for LTP3 accessibility, cycling , powered two-wheeler smarter choices strategies

Habitats Regulation Assessment

A Habitat Regulations Assessment (HRA) is the statutory assessment of the impacts of implementing a plan or policy on a Natura 2000 site. It is required by requirement of regulation 85 of the Habitats Regulations 2007 (as amended). Its purpose is to consider the impacts of a land use plan against conservation objectives of the site and to ascertain whether it would adversely affect the integrity of the site. Where significant negative effects are identified, alternative options should be examined to avoid any potential damaging effects.

Carrying out a HRA is not only a statutory duty but is also immensely beneficial to the policy process as it is a means of identifying and addressing early on in the process any adverse effects that draft policies and proposals may have.