Surrey Infrastructure Report to Save LAs Money

Date: Friday 11/09/09

Surrey release their county-wide Infrastructure Capacity Report

A widespread issue in local government is re-inventing the wheel, each authority individually setting in motion programmes of change and development. The result of this is that time and money can be unnecessarily spent.

The Surrey Improvement Partnership have addressed this by undertaking a county-wide infrastructure capacity study and by developing costed infrastructure schedules in conjunction with all 12 Surrey Authorities (County Council and 11 Districts and Boroughs), key infrastructure providers (transport, utilities, education, health) and other interested stakeholders (the voluntary sector, community services, business).

The report programme itself has saved individual authorities from conducting their own research, but more importantly has developed a standardised approach to modernising local government infrastructure in order to maximise efficiencies in all area of public authority work.

The report is a crucial milestone in this project, designed to support sustainable development. It highlights existing deficits and reviews the future infrastructure levels required to manage the growth projected in the South East Plan. 

The report is now available on the SIP website and can be downloaded here:

Infrastructure Capacity Report Part A [352 KB]

Infrastructure Capacity Report Part B [4.55 MB]
 
The first part of the report includes a demographic analysis, an outline of governance arrangements, a funding outlook and a look at the costs associated with non delivery. The second part looks at the infrastructure baseline and a future needs analysis. The report is supplemented by a set of county level Strategic Infrastructure Schedules, costed and dated plans for future infrastructure provision in Surrey. These will ensure that the needs of Surrey are transparent and that efficiencies are maximised where possible through joined up working.

It is hoped that infrastructure and service providers will adjust their capital investment programmes to support the delivery of the schedules. They are intended to be live documents that will be updated and refreshed to ensure that they remain a valuable resource.  A training programme will be rolled out shortly to make sure that the schedules are properly understood and utilised.

The next year’s work programme will involve supporting the Surrey boroughs and districts to develop more local level Infrastructure Schedules. The Surrey Infrastructure Forum will meet on 22nd October at HG Wells, Woking, to share learning across the county.

For more information, please contact sicp@surreyimprovement.info