BRIEF PARTNER PROFILE
Greater Manchester (GM; UK) is the fastest growing UK region with population of 2.7m residents. 1.3b trips (out of 2.2b) per year are conducted by private vehicles. GM is the business centre of the North England, and there are more than 300,000 inward trips per day by commuters who live in close-by cities (such as Liverpool, Leeds and Glasgow) who also prefer the convenience of car, instead of an intermodal trip including rail. GM is also a famous British destinations with 1m tourists visiting per year.
Transport for Greater Manchester is the delivery arm for the democratically elected Greater Manchester Combined Authority and its Transport for Greater Manchester Committee. We are funding improvements to transport services and facilities, supporting the largest regional economy outside London.
PROJECT INVOLVEMENT
TFGM leads and acts as the MaaS operator in the GM pilot (T8.2) in WP8. GM provides a testbed for door-to-door urban and intercity (national), multimodal and intermodal trips and offers the opportunity to identify and test the B2C&B2B models. Our focus will be on piloting the gaps in the current transport provision that would be needed to enable an uplift in the market for MaaS lifestyles in a region such as Greater Manchester; and how they interact with current transport supply. More specifically, this involves the piloting of the use of shared access minibuses in combination with ‘market making’ activity linked to integrating existing transport demand into travel groups that, together, make efficient bookings of the shared access minibuses. We deliver a partnership between a range of ‘transport brokers’ – which includes Car Clubs and TfGM, in its role of providing ‘Ring & Ride’ and ‘Local Link’ Demand Responsive Transport solutions for the disabled, elderly and those with inadequate access to fixed-route public transport. The idea of the pilot is to apply the same principles as those found in poorer countries, who do not benefit from local government led subsidised public transport, where the use minibuses run by quasi-municipal entities exist to satisfy the needs of local populations and the vulnerable have existed for a long time. The idea is to avoid imposing a technical solution platform on a community, by setting up the supporting frameworks for community empowerment, which can then inform the development of a suitable, open-source platform (via TravelSpirit) that will assist those communities to run their community transport more effectively, and support the services with a sustainable finance model. TfGM role in this is to facilitate the pilot, with supporting operational staff, who are experts in delivering complex multi-stakeholder transport solutions in Greater Manchester. TfGM will also provide significant contributions to WP3, MaaS prototype business models as well as WP9 (dissemination) and WP10 (exploitation).
KEY PERSONNEL
Mr. Simon Ho (Male): Senior Innovation Officer: Strategist, Market Researcher and Technology Innovator. 15 years in project and team leadership roles, with a strong emphasis on data and technology, covering the areas of urban regeneration, commercial property & retail, transport planning & operations and digital. He is transport thematic lead for the £10m Internet of Things City Demonstrator and TfGM lead on for the InnovateUK funded project into application of revealed travel behaviour in creating bespoke incentives for changing travel behaviour.
Mr. Rafael Cuesta (Male): Head of Innovation & Development: Rafael has a wide range of experience in the transport and intelligent mobility field and significant expertise in the development of mobility as a service. He has worked with big commissioning budgets and advices cities and European networks on sustainable mobility. He leads TfGM’s international co-operation programme in the areas of sustainable transport and urban development. He regularly moderates round tables at conferences and other high-level policy events.
Ms. Nicola Kane (Female): Head of Strategic Planning and Research: Nicola is a chartered town planner (MRTPI) and qualified transport planning professional (TPP) and joined TfGM in 2014 after 15 years of working in consultancy. She has wide-ranging experience in transport strategy and policy development and travel behaviour change. She’s now enjoying the opportunity to help shape the future of transport in Greater Manchester and spends most of her time thinking about what the future might hold, as her team works to develop and deliver a new long-term transport strategy for Greater Manchester, covering the period to 2040 (www.tfgm.com/2040). The draft 2040 transport strategy sets out Greater Manchester’s ambition for delivering “world class connections that support long term economic growth and access to opportunities for all”. It considers the complex factors that might drive or disrupt our future travel needs, taking into account factors such as a growing and ageing population; climate change; the opportunities and risks presented by new technology and innovation; and how transport investment can support the need to build at least 200,000 new homes in Greater Manchester over the next 20 years.
Mr. Nick Roberts (Male): Head of Services and Commercial Development – Bus :Nick has worked in public transport for over 20 years at County, Unitary and PTE level. He has been responsible for delivering and contract managing a range of areas including local bus, social services, mainstream and special needs school transport, as well as community transport and demand responsive services. Roles have involved stakeholder engagement, introducing change and innovation to provide better value for money and enhancing the customer experience.
Mr. Jonathan Hughes (Male):Total Transport Research Officer – Demand Responsive Transport: Jonny leads on the TfGM’s Total Transport project. Total Transport is a central government funded programme looking at innovative new ways of delivering transport in rural areas. Jonny is looking at how joint commissioning, demand responsive transport and shared services can be used to improve transport in the poorly connected areas. Jonny has previously worked in local government, where he led on a range of sustainable transport projects, in the third sector and in politics.
Mr. Peter Cushing (Male): Metrolink Director: Peter spent many years in road and air freight operations at Board level prior to bringing his experience and expertise to the rail industry in 2000. Peter then gained experience in the rail industry and has operated in two heavy rail TOC’s as a Director between 2000 and 2005.He was part of the team involved in the DfT’s remapping of the heavy rail network and has also worked on several rail franchise bids, winning three. Peter worked with TfGM’s Metrolink team on a long-term interim basis from 2007 to 2012, overseeing existing day-to-day operations during the current £1.8 billion expansion programme. Early in 2013 Peter became the Metrolink Director at TfGM, responsible for the expansion programme delivery and the on-going operation of the Metrolink network. Peter is also a Director of UK Tram and Chair of the Promoter Group within UK Tram.
Mr. Market Salter (Male): Rail Operations Manager: An experienced Rail Professional and Management Consultant with over 20 years proven delivery experience at all levels across Major Projects (Construction, new Rolling Stock, Signalling and Systems Integration, and TOC franchise bids), Business Change Programmes, Asset Management, Operations and HSQE, built up across London Underground, Network Rail, UK TOCs and also Consultancy work at government level in both Europe and Africa. An experienced Programme Manager with a thorough understanding of contractual and commercial issues, Mark is often brought in to advise on how best to deliver works in complex live environments, and in recovering programmes to clients timescales and requirements.