‘Electric bus’ towns among ideas in new transport plan for Lincolnshire

The County Council has started consulting on its vision for travelling around the county for the next 10 years.

Lincolnshire’s current Local Transport Plan covers the period up to 2022/23, and included the Lincoln Eastern Bypass and the East West Link Road, Grantham Southern Relief Road, and Spalding Western Relief Road among its ambitions.

The new plan addresses six themes:

· Supporting economic growth – connecting people to employment, and businesses to customers

· Future-ready green transport – reducing emissions

· Promoting thriving environments – making sure transport enhances, not spoils, local areas

· Ensuring health and safety – making sure transport is safe and responsibly managed

· Promoting high aspirations – providing access to education, training and support services

· Improving quality of life

Some key potential projects are outlined too, to demonstrate how the authority might achieve its aims. They include developing mobility hubs at larger towns and at the coast, making Grantham and Boston ‘electric bus towns’, developing an electric vehicle charging network, and supporting improvements on the A1 and the Lincoln to Nottingham railway line.

The council is now asking residents for opinions on the themes and the potential projects outlined.

Coun Richard Davies, executive member for highways at Lincolnshire County Council, said: “We’ve asked residents a lot recently for their views around transport – through our bus improvement strategy, and transport strategies for Grantham, Sleaford, Skegness and Mablethorpe – and I want to reassure residents that everything you’ve told us in those surveys is still taken into account here, as those plans all help feed in to this one.

“A Local Transport Plan is something we have to produce as a council, and it lays out what our transport is like now, where we want to be in 10 years, and how we’re going to get there. It’s big picture stuff, and once we have it, it allows us to apply for government funding pots that help us achieve the goals set out in the plan.

“Our last Local Transport Plan was published in 2013, and there are new challenges that we need to rise to in this new one. Never has the issue of climate change been so prominent in our thinking, so we need to address issues around sustainable and active travel, and increasing our capacity for electric vehicle charging.

“The plan also looks at freight and how our infrastructure can support business growth, as well as rail improvements, the public transport offer, and road schemes.

“Before we publish such a huge, overarching document, we need to make sure that the people of Lincolnshire, its businesses, and our partners, buy into the vision, agree with the challenges, and support the solutions that we’ve laid out.”

You can find the Local Transport Plan draft document, and complete the consultation online at www.lincolnshire.gov.uk/engagement. The survey will close at midnight on Wednesday December 1, 2021.

Residents in Sleaford, Skegness and Mablethorpe can also have their say on specific transport issues local to them, in their respective transport strategies.