An itemised cost breakdown of transport interventions identified in Places for Everyone

Matthew Broadbent made this Freedom of Information request to Transport for Greater Manchester Automatic anti-spam measures are in place for this older request. Please let us know if a further response is expected or if you are having trouble responding.

The request was successful.

Matthew Broadbent

Dear Transport for Greater Manchester,

Appendix C of document “03.01.04 PfE Strategic Viability Assessment Stage 2 Allocated Sites Amendments” in Places for Everyone (formerly the Greater Manchester Spatial Framework) identifies a list of transport interventions for the allocations in the plan. Although the viability assessments provide an overall figure for the strategic transport costs for each allocation, they do not provide a cost breakdown of the individual measures themselves.

Paragraph 2.8.2 states “costs for strategic transport measures have been provided by Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) using Locality Assessments for each site”. Please provide a full, itemised, cost breakdown of the transport interventions identified in Appendix C for all of the allocations in the plan.

Should the request exceed cost/time limits, then please focus your efforts on JPA 12 (Beal Valley) and JPA 14 (Broadbent Moss).

Yours faithfully,

Matthew Broadbent

FOI, Transport for Greater Manchester

Good afternoon,

REQUEST FOR INFORMATION UNDER THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT 2000

We acknowledge with thanks your request for information held by TfGM which was received at this office on 04/10/2023.

Information requested as set out below:

"Appendix C of document "03.01.04 PfE Strategic Viability Assessment Stage 2 Allocated Sites Amendments" in Places for Everyone (formerly the Greater Manchester Spatial Framework) identifies a list of transport interventions for the allocations in the plan. Although the viability assessments provide an overall figure for the strategic transport costs for each allocation, they do not provide a cost breakdown of the individual measures themselves.

Paragraph 2.8.2 states "costs for strategic transport measures have been provided by Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) using Locality Assessments for each site". Please provide a full, itemised, cost breakdown of the transport interventions identified in Appendix C for all of the allocations in the plan.

Should the request exceed cost/time limits, then please focus your efforts on JPA 12 (Beal Valley) and JPA 14 (Broadbent Moss)."

We write to advise you that your request is being dealt with and considered under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 ("FOIA"). We will endeavour to respond to you within 20 working days from our receipt of the request by us direct from yourself or on the date is has been transferred from another public sector body to us (counting the first working day after the request is received as the first day).

Please note that the FOIA covers all recorded information held by a public authority and does not require that authority to create new information for the purposes of responding to your request. In some circumstances there may be a charge applicable, if this is the case, we will advise you on this in due course.

Please quote the reference number above in any future communications.

Regards,

TfGM Information Governance Team

https://tfgm.com/

This email and any files transmitted with it are intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom they are addressed and may contain confidential and/or privileged information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of, or taking of any action in reliance upon this information by individuals or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient please notify the sender immediately and delete the email and any attachments. As a public body, Transport for Greater Manchester may be required to disclose this email or any response to it under the Freedom of Information Act 2000, unless the information in it is covered by one of the exemptions in the Act. This email has been scanned by anti-malware and anti-spam controls using Defender for Office 365.

FOI, Transport for Greater Manchester

Good afternoon,

Further to your below request for information, I am writing to advise you that we require more time to respond to your request as we are considering a public interest test under Section 43 of the Freedom of Information Act. Section 43 (2) exempts from disclosure information which would prejudice, or would be likely to prejudice, someone's commercial interests.

We will now endeavour to respond to your request by 29/11/2023.

Sincerely,
TfGM FoI Team

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Dear Transport for Greater Manchester,

The information you are withholding while considering the applicability of section 43 has already been released in part:
https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/1...

I submitted a similar request to Oldham Council for the Oldham allocations, and they did not identify Section 43 as a potential reason for lawfully withholding the information. Having reviewed the cost breakdown for the Oldham allocations, it is difficult to see how Section 43 would apply to what basically amounts to a few rough estimates.

Furthermore, by continuing to withhold this information you are obstructing my response to a statutory consultation. I need this information to be able to comment meaningfully on the viability of the allocations in Places for Everyone. By further delaying my request until 29th November (8 weeks after I filed the original FOI request) you are severely limiting the amount of time I have to review and comment on the information.

If you ultimately release this information to me after the consultation concludes, or leaving me so little time that it is not possible to review the information and make meaningful comment then you are potentially putting the plan at risk of a judicial review. I would greatly appreciate it if you would resolve this matter by the end of this working week (17th November).

Yours sincerely,

Matthew Broadbent

FOI, Transport for Greater Manchester

Good afternoon,

Please accept our apologies in the delay in responding to your request. The response is currently at approval stage once this is complete we can then send it out to you, this should be approved and ready to send soon.

Sincerely,
TfGM FoI Team

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Matthew Broadbent

Dear Transport for Greater Manchester,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of Transport for Greater Manchester's handling of my FOI request 'An itemised cost breakdown of transport interventions identified in Places for Everyone'.

The way TfGM has handled this request has been unprofessional and unlawful. I filed a simple FOI request which should have been relatively straightforward to process, and lawfully my request should have been fulfilled by 2nd November. TfGM delayed it until 29th November for spurious reasons (even though Oldham Council did not see an issue in fulfilling a similar request).

I received communication from TfGM saying my request was at approval stage and would be with me shortly, and yet two days later I am still waiting for the information. Since the my request has now been approved, every day that TfGM delays is in breach of the law. This information should have been ready to go and I should have received it as soon as it was processed. I expect this information by the end of the working day today, otherwise I will take the issue up with the ICO.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/a...

Yours faithfully,

Matthew Broadbent

FOI, Transport for Greater Manchester

Dear Matthew,

We are sorry to learn you are dissatisfied with TfGM's handling of your Freedom of Information Act request, therefore, we acknowledge your request for an internal review.

Please be advised this will be undertaken by a senior colleague, independent of the original decision made. They will contact the relevant internal officers who provided the information contained in the response and we will write to you again when that officer has had an opportunity to review the decisions previously made.

Please note there are no statutory time limits under FOIA for the internal review to be completed, but the Information Commissioner considers that a reasonable time for completing an internal review is 20 working days from our receipt of the request for an internal review (counting the first working day after the request is received as the first day). Therefore, we are working towards a deadline of 02/01/2024.

Yours sincerely,

Information Governance Team
Transport for Greater Manchester

NOTE: Please do not edit the subject line when replying to this email, to allow all your correspondence to be linked to your original request.

This email and any files transmitted with it are intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom they are addressed and may contain confidential and/or privileged information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of, or taking of any action in reliance upon this information by individuals or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient please notify the sender immediately and delete the email and any attachments. As a public body, Transport for Greater Manchester may be required to disclose this email or any response to it under the Freedom of Information Act 2000, unless the information in it is covered by one of the exemptions in the Act. This email has been scanned by anti-malware and anti-spam controls using Defender for Office 365.

FOI, Transport for Greater Manchester

2 Attachments

Good afternoon,

Please find attached TfGM's response to your request for information, received by this office on 05/10/2023. Please accept our sincere apologies for the delay in providing this information.

We have created a brief questionnaire to gather feedback on the FoI/EIR process. We would be grateful if you could take a minute to respond. Please note that this questionnaire is intended to be anonymous, if you would like us to address specific queries about your request, please do so via the internal review process referenced in our correspondence. The form is available via the following link: https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponseP...

Sincerely,
TfGM FoI Team

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FOI, Transport for Greater Manchester

1 Attachment

Dear Mr Broadbent,

Please find attached response to your request for an internal review.

We extend our sincere apologies for the delays faced in being able to respond to you.

Yours sincerely,

Information Governance Team
Transport for Greater Manchester
2 Piccadilly Place, Manchester M1 3BG
www.tfgm.com

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