Future of 150 West Midlands transport projects 'to become clear' as decisions over allocation of £2.4 billion funds to be made

Members of West Midlands Combined Authority’s (WMCA) Joint Overview and Scrutiny Committee were told 168 schemes are being looked at under the ongoing Rosewell Review, set up to look at how best to utilise £2.4 billion devolved transport funding.

Bosses said schemes are being assessed on where they are at in the developmental stage before deciding on how funding should be allocated.

Interim chief executive Ed Cox said 78 of the 168 schemes were still only at the conceptual stage.

But he added every project would be assessed on criteria including economic benefits before ‘transparent decisions’ would be made.

During a Q&A with Mayor Richard Parker, committee chair Tim Huxtable said: “As councillors, we’re always seeking a positive difference for our wards, cities and town and the West Midlands as a whole.

“When are we actually going to be told where new schemes will actually commence, building on that legacy of work which has either been delivered or is under construction and nearly complete?”

Mr Parker said a number of major schemes including the extension of the Metro to the £3 billion Sports Quarter and Birmingham City FC’s new ground and investment into Witton and Aston Railway stations to support Aston Villa have already been taken to WMCA Board.

He said: “We are working through the Rosewell Review on those list of major projects and currently we’re going through a process, clarifying the projects and their status.

“Importantly, what we will be really clear about is where the projects are in the timetable in going through the due process.

“Every part of this region is contributing to that process and those plans are being built up with and through our council partners.”

Mr Cox said: “The Rosewell Review is helping us to look much more systematically at the way in which we plan for major capital programmes.

“Historically, the way in which the Combined Authority worked was to take the entire budget and allocate that entire budget at the moment at which we were notified of the funding.

“That ties everybody’s hands for the whole period and makes it very difficult to unlock projects or find additional funding for when new projects come into the pipeline.

“What we’re changing now, with the advice of Rosewell, is the process by which that is going to happen.

“What we’ve been able to do independently is allow the Rosewell team to make an assessment of all the projects that exist at this current time and categorise them according to where they are in their development pathway. There are 168 different projects.

“Once you’ve categorised where they are, you can start to allocate development funding in the appropriate form at the appropriate moment depending on where that project is.

“What we are not doing is committing huge sums of money to a project that is still at a concept stage.

“What we can do is start to allocate small amounts of revenue funding in order to start to explore at each different stage where a project is up to.

“As it passes a gateway according to transparent criteria, we can then say we can move to the next stage until finally it receives the actual commitment of capital funding.

“That process is now going to start to kick in. A paper will go to Board in February which will start to outline what that process is.

“We hope by Autumn, there will be very clear process for every project to enter that pathway and start on that journey.”