SCOTS searches for the value of priceless

摘要

The Society of Chief Officers of Transportation in Scotland (SCOTS) has been working on plans to take asset management to the next level, or two, for some time. It started last year with a report considering the value of the local road network. This gave the rough figure of the network providing around £6bn of ‘utility value’ per year, based mainly on highways, transport and business cost data. The authors stressed the absolute value was immeasurable as it’s a key piece of national infrastructure. However, while the network is priceless – imagine a world without roads, streets, squares, or bike lanes-the policies attached to that network might soon be more measurable. ‘Utility value’ is only the first level in a proposed three-tier value pyramid. SCOTS has now secured public funding to develop phase two of this measurement framework. This next phase – again funded by the Scottish Roads Research Board – will look at ‘social value’ data for the second level of the pyramid, and at the top level, provide a predictive model to map ‘future value’ in response to different policies or foreseen changes in context.