Questions over funding for major Birmingham cycle route plans

The city council is planning to extend the current route on the A38 from Selly Oak to Longbridge through a £22.5m project, in a bid to create a ‘connected corridor’ for cyclists from the city centre.

The Labour-run council previously suggested the new stretch of cycle route would provide a safer environment for both pedestrians and cyclists, and help cut reliance on cars.

The project’s outline business case was approved last November by members of the council’s cabinet.

The scheme moved further forwards this week after cabinet members approved a strategy to appoint a contractor to deliver the necessary infrastructure works.

This means under the council’s preferred option, project works could commence on site in October this year.

But during a meeting on Tuesday, Conservative councillor Ewan Mackey questioned whether the project actually had the funding.

The council previously said the scheme will be funded by local match funding (£8m) and a Department for Transport external grant (£14.5m).

This grant is managed by Transport for West Midlands, part of the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) – led by Mayor Richard Parker.

However, more than 150 transport projects across the West Midlands are being looked at under the Rosewell Review, with a recent document proposing funding of around £5m for the A38 cycle route extension project – rather than £14.5m.

“Looking at the Rosewell Review from WMCA, it’s allocating £5m,” Coun Mackey said on Tuesday. “My maths means there’s a fair gap there.

“Where’s the rest of it coming from?”

“Can we get a specific answer on that point about [how WMCA papers] say the project is only getting £5m?” Coun Robert Alden, leader of the opposition, later added.

“Have we actually got £14m in the bank from the combined authority for this?”

The council’s managing director Joanne Roney then intervened, telling the meeting: “Just to clarify, the Rosewell [Review] has made a recommendation which hasn’t been agreed yet.

“We are still in discussion with the combined authority, our business case clearly pre-dated the Rosewell Review.

“If there is a change of funding agreed by the combined authority, we would have to come back to the overall funding that would be required to complete the scheme.”

“But I think we can approve the scheme on the outline business case now.”

“The changes that may or may not come through the combined authority have yet to be agreed and would be part of the negotiation,” she added.

Interim chief executive Ed Cox at the WMCA recently said the Rosewell Review was “helping us to look much more systematically at the way” they 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,” he said.

“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.”

He continued: “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.”

Martin Price, co-chair of campaign group Better Streets for Birmingham, backed the A38 project last year and said that he was “incredibly pleased” to see the proposals being brought forward.

“This scheme, along with cross-city bus proposals, will enable many more reliable and safe journeys along the A38,” he said.

“This is in stark contrast to today’s provision where people walking have to share the pavement with cyclists, where cyclists are sometimes crammed into a corner of the lane, and where buses lack journey time reliability.”