Construction traffic management plan for a town centre site

A construction traffic management plan outline for a town centre site has to answer a different set of questions from one for a greenfield plot. There is no space for a compound, the access is shared with pedestrians, the streets around it are one way or pedestrianised for part of the day, and the highway authority will condition the plan before any work starts. Write it as an operational document a site manager can follow, with drawings, rather than as a statement of intent.

The section order below follows the sequence a highway engineer reads, and each heading notes what has to be shown rather than described.

Site context and constraints

Open with the constraints, because they justify everything that follows. A single plan does most of the work here, marked up with:

• The site boundary, the hoarding line and any land outside the site needed for the works.
• Adjoining uses with sensitive receptors named: schools, care homes, hospitals, residential frontages, retail entrances.
• The surrounding street hierarchy, one way sections, bus routes and stops, taxi ranks and loading bays.
• Pedestrianised streets with their timed restrictions stated.
• Existing footway widths at the pinch points, measured.
• Cycle routes, including any on-carriageway lanes that will be affected.
• Statutory undertakers' apparatus known to be in the footway.

Then state the programme in outline, with the phases that generate different traffic. Demolition, excavation, substructure, superstructure, envelope and fit out have distinct vehicle profiles, and a plan that assumes one profile throughout will be queried.

Routing and agreed access

Name the route. From the strategic road network to the site, street by street, with a drawing showing it and any prohibited movements marked.

Agree the route with the highway authority before submission rather than proposing one and waiting for comment. Where the route passes a school, set out the timing restrictions that apply. Where it involves a turn a rigid vehicle cannot make, show the swept path analysis for the largest vehicle proposed, and state that vehicle's dimensions.

Include the exit route separately, because it is often not the reverse of the arrival route on a one way network.

Two further items belong here. Signage for drivers, including the wording of the instructions issued to hauliers, and the mechanism for enforcing the route with subcontractors, which is usually a contractual condition backed by a log of breaches.

Vehicle numbers and phasing

Quantify. A table by phase, listing the vehicle type, the number of movements per day and the expected peak hour, is what allows the highway authority to judge the effect.

Derive the figures from the contractor's programme and quantities rather than from a rule of thumb, and say where they came from. Then state the measures that keep movements out of the network's peak hours, and out of the retail peak on a Saturday if the site fronts a high street.

Where deliveries cannot avoid a peak, say so and explain the management response instead of hiding it.

Wheel washing and highway cleanliness

Depositing mud on the highway is an offence, and on a town centre site the risk is concentrated at a single gate.

Specify the provision: the type of wheel wash or wheel cleaning arrangement, its position on a plan, how the run off is contained and disposed of, and the arrangement where the site is too constrained for a drive through unit. Jetting bays, brush systems and a nominated operative with a hose all appear in approved plans, and the authority mainly wants to know that somebody is responsible.

Add the sweeping regime. A road sweeper on call, a stated inspection frequency of the carriageway and footway near the gate, and a named person who checks it at the end of each shift. State what happens after a spillage.

Pedestrian and cycle management

This is the section that distinguishes a town centre plan, and the one highway authorities read most carefully.

Show the pedestrian route past the site at every phase, with widths dimensioned. Where the footway is narrowed or closed, show the diversion, the crossing points used and the signage, and confirm the temporary traffic regulation order or licence needed for it. A diversion that requires pedestrians to cross a road twice needs justification.

Deal with accessibility properly. A route with a temporary ramp gradient nobody could use in a wheelchair is not a route. Tactile paving at new crossing points, barrier types with tapping rails, and lighting levels within the covered way all belong in this section.

Cyclists need the same treatment. Where a cycle lane is suspended, state the alternative and whether cyclists are expected to share a bus lane, because that decision should be made deliberately rather than by default.

Deliveries, hours and booking systems

Set out the working hours for construction and, separately, the hours for deliveries, which are often tighter. Then explain how arrivals are controlled.

A booking system with defined slots is now standard on constrained sites. Say who operates it, how far in advance slots are allocated, what happens to a vehicle arriving early, and where that vehicle waits. A holding area off the public highway is the answer the authority wants. Where none exists, name the location used and confirm it is lawful to wait there.

Noise sits alongside this. Construction noise is controlled separately, and prior consent for the works can be obtained under the Control of Pollution Act 1974, which gives certainty about hours and methods. Where a noise assessment supports the plan, the structure our note on the sections an officer checks in a noise report describes applies to the plant assessment.

Emergency access arrangements

Short section, and it must be specific. Confirm that emergency access to the site and to every neighbouring property is maintained at all times, show the access route on a plan, and state the minimum carriageway width kept clear.

Name the arrangements for a crane lift or a delivery that temporarily blocks the street, including the duration, the day, the notification given to the fire and ambulance services and to affected occupiers, and the marshalling arrangements. Where a street is closed under an order, confirm the consultation carried out with the emergency services.

Keep the site's own emergency procedures brief here. The highway authority is interested in the effect on the street.

Monitoring and review during works

The final section is what turns the document into something enforceable.

1. Name the individual responsible for the plan, with a role title and a contact number, and state the arrangement when they are absent.
2. Set out the complaints procedure, including a published number, a response time and a log open to the council.
3. State the inspection regime for the route, the crossing points and the cleanliness of the highway.
4. Commit to reporting to the council at a stated frequency, and to reviewing the plan at each phase change.
5. Explain how subcontractors are inducted into the plan and what happens when one breaches it.
6. Record the version history, since the plan approved by condition is the one that has to be followed until a revision is approved.

Point six matters more than it sounds. A site running to an unapproved revision is in breach of condition, whatever the practical merits of the change.

Submit the plan as a Construction Traffic Management Plan where the condition asks for one, and keep it separate from the broader Construction Management Plan covering hoardings, waste, dust and working practices, because the highway authority discharges one and the planning officer the other. Where parking stress on surrounding streets is part of the picture, the method in our note on writing a parking survey method statement applies to the baseline. The report index lists the related documents a constrained site usually needs.

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