Integrated Transport Planning: The 'Rehabilitation' of a contested concept in UK bus reforms

The paper is part of what we can call “post New Public Management (NPM) studies” which denounce that the policies of austerity and competition have made local public transport fragmented and less attractive for customers. These studies that indicate the need for greater coordination within this sector as a condition of social and environmental, and not only financial, sustainability are increasingly numerous. We show how the public transport legislative evolution in UK (more strictly Great Britain) has aimed towards the assurance of more coordination into a fragmented sector. However in its last stage, the Bus Services Act 2017, we find not only more incentives to increase coordination but the ‘rehabilitation’ of a contested concept such as the integrated transport planning. Specifically, we show that the ‘rehabilitation’ of the integrated transport planning did not happen immediately but gradually over the years through several reforms. During this transition, both negative and positive aspects, and the tensions between competitive mechanisms and coordination mechanisms have lived together. This tension demonstrates the challenge of finding an appropriate role for public and private actors to make public transport fully sustainable. The case of Great Britain shows that transport sustainability must be found in a mix of mechanisms: not only market and partnership but also hierarchical mechanisms, such as an integrated and coordinated planning. © 2019 Elsevier Ltd