LEP Oxfordshire Tipple England Economic Heartland BEN

The Department for International Trade (DIT) is pulling together its first portfolio of investment projects in the Oxford-Milton Keynes-Cambridge ARC Corridor, a senior official has revealed.

Simon Sweetinburgh, Regional Manager for Capital Projects at the department, told our Oxfordshire event that the DIT will focus on the east-west corridor in the latest of its prospectuses for inward investors: “We’re producing the first portfolio of investable projects in the corridor. If you’re engaged in any major projects and you think you would be interested in being introduced to major overseas investors, come and see us. Our inward investment team is busier than ever taking enquiries from potential investors in the UK.”

[emaillocker id=”71749″]

Sue Halliwell, Oxfordshire County Council’s Director for Planning and Place, said that the authority is pressing ahead on introducing a zero emissions zone in Oxford city centre: “That will send a strategic signal to the market that we are serious about this.”

The Council’s Strategic Infrastructure Plan for the county aims to deliver improved connectivity across the county, Halliwell said: “It’s not necessarily about building roads, it could be about taking road space away and travelling around the county in a different way. It’s about prioritising road space for mass transit and cycling. People are willing and ready to make that shift when the infrastructure is there.”

The county’s transport plans must be future proofed to allow for technological advances, such as the potential roll out of driverless vehicles, like the autonomous pods which have been already piloted between Didcot Parkway and Milton Park, according to Halliwell.

The collaboration between the county’s different tier authorities on the infrastructure strategy provided an ‘amazing springboard’ for future co-operation: “Across the county, politicians are signed up to a mechanism where we can prioritise infrastructure and look at priorities for the county as a whole.”

Nigel Tipple, Chief Executive Officer of the Oxfordshire LEP, said that the business-led body has been lobbying the Government to extend and improve the North Cotswold line in order to relieve pressure on the county’s rail network: “We’ve been making the case to London that if you improve the Paddington to Hereford line you get improved rail services along the Cotswolds.”

Pointing to commitments in the past two Budgets to support the new east-west rail link between Oxford and Cambridge, he said: “We’ve been successful at building the case to look at new rail infrastructure.”

Tipple warned that the growth plans for the ARC are on a bigger scale than the area has seen before and face competition for resources from the other projects, like HS2. The Expressway arterial road planned between Oxford and Cambridge is unlikely to be built in ‘one hit’ but phased instead with work starting at either end before joining up in the middle.

Oxfordshire has already seen ‘quite a significant increase in terms of capability’ with housing completions across the county having already increased from 1,700 per annum a few years ago to 4,500 last year: “Infrastructure is enabling us to accelerate the delivery of housing, not delivery more on top. It’s not perfect but we’re getting there.”

The LEP boss also predicted that businesses in Oxfordshire will cope with the UK’s withdrawal from the EU, even if this takes the form of a Hard Brexit: “The reality is that business will continue to trade in the days and weeks after. Businesses are already creating their own resilience plans.”
[/emaillocker]