Well-adapted transport system
Risk to the system from climate change: flooding, subsidence, extreme heat, and high winds impact the transport system.
Objective
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Transport is safe and reliable, with disruption to critical parts of the network kept as low as, or lower than, today’s level.
- Proposed target: from now through to 2050, trunk road accident rates should continue to decline on current trends, despite climate change.
- Proposed target: from now through to 2050, high risk rail accidents associated with extreme weather should be as low as is reasonably practicable.
- Proposed target: from now through to 2050, disruption to high priority road and rail routes from climate hazards should be as low as, or lower than, today’s level.
Actions
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Physical adaptations of assets: engineered and sustainable drainage systems; coastal and fluvial flood defences; reinforced earthworks and structures; heat-resistant materials for road and runway surfaces; and airflow and cooling for new buildings, interchanges, and vehicles.
- Drainage: drainage, including engineered drains and Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDs), is a key adaptation to reduce risks from flooding and landslides across all modes. New infrastructure and developments adjacent to transport infrastructure should ensure drains are specified for expected rainfall volumes out to 2050.
- Flood protections: coastal and fluvial flood defences such as sea walls and rock armour can resist damage to roads, bridges, railways, and ports. Raising or moving existing assets can also be effective across all modes. Larger engineered interventions are high cost, so their use is likely to be targeted to only the most exposed assets, where alternatives are limited.
- Stabilising earthworks: reinforcing earthwork stability can ensure the safety of roads, inland waterways, and in particular railways, as rainfall saturation and erosion can cause landslides and derailments. In addition to drainage, this involves strengthening earthworks by renewing and reinforcing embankments, soil and rock cuttings, including regrading or installing retaining structures.
- Heat resistance: road and runway surfaces and rail renewals can make use of more durable materials. New buildings, interchanges, and vehicles can integrate airflow, shading, and air conditioning.
- Reinforcing structures to withstand high-winds: supports for tall structures can be strengthened. Examples include communication masts, overhead lines, or signage.
These adaptation actions are connected with adaptation in the built environment and communities system, and in the land system.
Operational adaptations: preventative maintenance, adjusting operations to keep services running safely, and contingency measures to absorb impacts and recover quickly.
- Preventative maintenance: maintenance is vital for resilience of transport systems. Examples include clearing drains and vegetation, maintaining pumps, dredging harbours and waterways, dressing and patching tarmac, painting rails, and tensioning cables.
- Adjusting operations: it is sometimes necessary for transport operations to alter service schedules, routes, or reduce speed limits. In the most extreme conditions this also includes cancelling services or closing routes altogether. These options are relatively low cost to implement as they are largely behavioural, but lead to lost revenue, costs to passengers, and reduced productivity.
- Contingency measures: these involve dedicating resources to protect and restore critical parts of the system in the event of a severe disruption. They include training and equipping response teams and ensuring redundancy of key enabling systems, such as power supply, as well as having clear plans to manage impacts.
These adaptation actions are connected with adaptation in the built environment and communities system, the energy system, and in the digital and telecoms system.
Enablers
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Resources: funding for resilience measures in new and existing infrastructure and operational adaptation actions.
As roads and rail are public infrastructure, adaptation spending is primarily funded by general and local taxation, with some funding from passenger fares and fees charged to freight companies. Aviation and maritime infrastructure and services are generally privately operated and funded, although inland waterways are publicly funded.
Clear roles, responsibilities, and plans: for delivering resilience planning, determining priorities, and assigning responsibilities across different parts of the system.
Adaptation and resilience planning is a key step in determining and prioritising action. This practice is relatively mature in rail but there is room for improvement, while evidence is more limited for other modes.
- The 2014 Transport Resilience Review recommended that infrastructure owners and government collaborate to define a critical network of railways, highways, ports, and airports to prioritise for resilience improvements. By 2025, the majority of local authorities in England have published a ‘resilient network’ plan. However, implementation across other modes is less clear.
- Network Rail are developing ‘resilience categories’ which could guide this work in rail. In addition, Network Rail has published regional Weather Resilience and Climate Change Adaptation (WRCCA) plans for the current and previous control periods which has been recognised as an example of international good practice. Several other national and local transport agencies, including National Highways, Transport Scotland, Translink and TfL, have also published adaptation plans, whereas dedicated plans in aviation and maritime are more limited.
- DfT’s Climate Adaptation Strategy for Transport sets out a range of actions to achieve a responsive, reliable, and safe transport system in the face of growing climate risks. While many of the actions are a work in progress, this dedicated strategy for improving adaptation sets a good example among risk owning government departments.
Data and monitoring processes: for identifying climate risk exposure and asset condition, to target and optimise adaptation delivery, including for local roads.
Information on climate risk exposure and asset condition is essential for targeting and optimising adaptation actions. There is evidence of good practice across several transport modes, but local authority efforts are more limited. More evidence on the cost-effectiveness of adaptation interventions is needed to enable effective decision making on adaptation spending.
- Several fourth round Adaptation Reporting Power (ARP4) reports from transport operators include reporting on changing climate risk ratings. Transport Scotland and Translink are identifying climate vulnerability on their network, while National Highways are tracking vulnerability of flood hotspots. Network Rail’s understanding of drainage vulnerability is limited. A lack of information on the condition of local roads has been identified as a barrier to improving their resilience, but mandated ‘local highway maintenance transparency reports’ should help address this.
- Across transport modes, innovative technologies are being used to monitor and communicate relevant risk information. For example, Network Rail have fitted sensors to remotely monitor track temperature and used laser imaging technology to monitor earthwork movements. These technologies can be highly cost-effective.
Policies
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Planning policies and design codes: to determine the climate resilience of new infrastructure and ensure it can maintain safe and reliable service.
National Highways is responsible for updating the Design Manual for Roads and Bridges (DMRB), which informs design specifications in other national trunk road agencies and local authorities. National Highways have made some progress in incorporating climate risks into the DMRB, but this work continues. Network Rail is in the early stages of incorporating climate risk into design standards. The UK Government shapes planning decisions for major infrastructure projects, including transport, via the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) and National Policy Statements (NPS) for nationally significant infrastructure. While both the NPPF and NPS include relatively strong requirements on flood risk, consideration of other climate hazards could be clearer.
Resilience standards: to determine reliability expectations for customers and inform funding decisions.
The UK Government’s 10-year Infrastructure Strategy committed the Cabinet Office to map existing resilience standards for critical infrastructure sectors, including transport, by the end of 2026. This exercise will inform efforts to refine or supplement existing standards, alongside an assessment of the costs of achieving them, with a view to informing public spending decisions from 2030 onwards. More broadly, resilience oversight is embedded into legislation and local government duties, supporting preparedness for climate-related risks to the transport system.
The DfT’s Climate Adaptation Strategy for Transport re-iterated the UK Government’s commitment to establish resilience standards across all modes, and committed Network Rail to agree expected levels of service during adverse and extreme weather by the end of 2027.
Guidance and reporting: on climate risks and adaptation to strengthen adaptation and management of interdependencies between transport modes.
Access to the information needed to identify and respond to climate risks in the transport system has improved. However, there are several opportunities to further strengthen this, including:
- Strengthening reporting of climate risk preparedness and research to explore climate risks to interdependencies between transport modes.
- Improving guidance for infrastructure planners and operators on integrating climate adaptation within investment decisions and improving evidence on the cost-effectiveness of adaptation in transport.
- Relevant design codes and planning policies embedding appropriate consideration of climate risk. This includes updating relevant design manuals and codes, and ensuring key planning requirements properly consider exposure to climate hazards.