Evaluation of The Northern Way Transport theme
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Colin Buchanan has recently completed a three-year continuous evaluation of the value added by The Northern Way’s Transport theme, in collaboration with SQW who carried out an evaluation of the wider initiative
The Northern Way was an initiative led by the three Northern Regional Development Agencies (RDAs) – North West Development Agency, Yorkshire Forward and One North East – against the backdrop of the productivity gap between the North and the rest of the UK. It promoted pan-northern collaboration on strategic opportunities to improve the economic prospects of the North. It brought together public, private and academic organisations to work on transport, innovation and private investment themes. It promoted strategy integration in City Regions and facilitated the development of a wide-ranging economic evidence base,
The Coalition Government’s decision to abolish the RDA network has resulted in the closure of The Northern Way and our evaluation report provides an assessment of its achievements over the 2008-11 period as well as lessons learnt.
The evaluation found that the Transport theme, driven by the Transport Compact – a group of local and regional politicians, supported by transport experts and led by Professor David Begg – coordinated across a range of partners in the North, providing a forum for discussion of northern transport interests and created the space for reaching consensus on tricky issues. We concluded that, within The Northern Way, the Transport Theme had produced a clear and consistent approach to influencing transport policy.