9.4.4.1 Developing a Case by Case Approach

A case by case approach must be tailored specifically to the transport option under consideration and to the appropriate area or spatial level. This forms a partial analysis, which involves a detailed segmentation of the economic actors in the spatial areas relevant to the appraisal of the option. The following sets out a feasible approach which involves completing two analysis forms (shown here in Tables 9.2 and 9.4). The information used in completing these tables can be transferred directly to the Part 2 AST.

The approach outlined here can be tailored to particular studies and local circumstances, with the degree of quantification appropriate to the size of the study, the scale of the option under consideration and the expected relative significance of EALIs (both positive and negative) in the overall appraisal.

The case specific approach suggested here involves analysis of the potential behavioural responses of different "sectors" of economic activity. Here, the term "sector" has been used to describe different types or areas of economic activity, such as the manufacturing sector. Within each sector are "economic actors" whose decisions affect the economic performance of an area or region. Economic actors include businesses both in an area and outside it, land and property developers, and individuals in their roles as residents, workers, shoppers, visitors and tourists.

The following is a possible segmentation, adopted in Table 9.2, which could be used:

• Existing manufacturing and process industries, which produce physical products: this may usefully be segmented by sector/industry, and/or by size;
• Service businesses, which may be sub-segmented into those serving the local area and those which export services outwith that area; and/or by whether a physical product is produced;
• Mobile/inward/foreign direct investment, which may be capable of being attracted to the area;
• Tourists, who may be considered as a specific market served primarily by local service industries;
• Day visitors including shoppers, also a specific service sector market; and
• Working residents, who may migrate from or to the area and who may have jobs in or outwith the area.

The above is suggested as a general starting point for segmentation of economic activity into sectors; however, not all will be relevant or important in some areas, while in other areas it might be necessary to sub-segment sectors, for example where there are many different types of manufacturing industries where different industry responses to a transport option might be expected.

Once a usable segmentation has been selected, this approach involves investigating how the economic actors relevant to each sector might be affected by, and respond to, the changes in costs or accessibility brought about by the transport option under analysis. As outlined below, in most instances much of the required analysis will be based on survey evidence and accessibility analysis.

For example, in considering the business sectors, including the tourism industry and retailing, a combination of data gathering and structured interviews could be used in order to establish:

• Current performance, including size, recent growth, profitability/margins;
• Future objectives and aspirations - products, size, markets, production locations;
• Current and future/expected constraints, to include physical resources, human resources, management and capital;
• Output/product market conditions/competitiveness; location and size of main competitors;
• The significance of transport and accessibility to the business; and
• The role of changes in transport costs and journey time reliability in overcoming constraints and achieving future objectives and aspirations.

This process could also be advised by other data gathering, analysis and interviews, including suppliers and professional advisers, and in particular the property and recruitment sectors. The latter are important with regard to gathering information and opinion on impacts relating to land-use and labour market factors respectively.

The EALI assessment table includes these, albeit in a simpler form, but a fuller treatment of these can be found in SACTRA (paragraph 10.158 et seq.).  Here the basis of the analysis is to assess how a transport option will impact upon each sector of the spatial economy under consideration. Such impacts will arise through factors such as:

• Market and competitiveness changes, such as costs of delivery or increased reliability of logistics systems and lower costs of access to supplies;
• Labour market impacts through access to a larger pool of labour, which might have efficiency benefits;
• Land and property impacts arising through access to land for business development and expansion or the attraction of mobile investment; and
• The distribution of the Agglomeration impacts from WB1.

In order to adopt a systematic approach to the identification and quantification of impacts, each case should be segmented to identify the principal sectors which act as the sources or drivers of economic performance at the appropriate spatial level. Then for each sector, the potential role of the option in enhancing its economic performance needs to be considered. Generally, this will require an understanding of the potential responses of the economic actors within each sector to the transport option. This could usefully be informed by the methodology set out in Section 11 for Accessibility and Social Inclusion impacts. Change in accessibility for each people group and employment sectors indicates the positive and negative pressures and assists in developing understanding of the links between causes and effects.

The suggested way of bringing together information is to use the Summary Assessment Table, shown as Table 9.2. For most options, this should be derived from completion of individual sector tables. It should be noted that the activity sectors shown in Table 9.2 are indicative and may be changed depending on the option and its likely impacts. In some instances, sectors might be omitted while some sectors might require further segmentation to permit the necessary level of analysis. An example of a completed summary table is shown in Table 9.3.

Table 9.2: Potential EALIs - Summary Assessment Table

Table 9.3: Completed Example of Potential EALIs - Summary Assessment Table

Table 9.4 should be completed to set out those impacts which have been examined in detail and quantified. An example of a completed sector table is shown in Table 9.5.

This two step approach is suggested because a review of the qualitative version should help practitioners in identifying which impacts are most important (in gross terms) and hence to determine where to focus efforts to derive quantitative estimates of impacts.

Taking the individual sectors first, for each sector of activity, the assessment (shown in Table 9.4 and completed as an example in Table 9.5) should:

• First, provide an analysis of current market conditions and constraints relating to each individual sector: these can be analysed under the headings of land/physical resources, labour/human resources and product market impacts, which can be analysed at local and national levels. In certain cases it might also be necessary to include access to natural and /or manufactured resources and supplies;
• Second, provide (and justify) an assessment of how the transport intervention is expected to contribute towards enhanced performance in each sector: this must address inter and intra regional/area impacts;
• Third, consider how sectors might interact: for example, where there are links between sectors or where growth of one activity might feed through to impacts in other sectors, the assessment should at least describe potential interactions; and
• Fourth, set out an overview of the gross output (GDP or GVA) and/or employment impacts at the appropriate local and national spatial levels.

Once this analysis has been completed for each identified sector or driver, the results should be summarised using Table 9.1; the completed example shown as Table 9.2 suggests how these findings might be summarised and presented.

Table 9.4: Sector Table: Qualitative/Quantitative Analysis of First Round Impacts (Manufacturing and Processing)

Table 9.5: Completed Example of Qualitative/Quantitative Analysis of First Round Impacts (Manufacturing and Processing)