E-Rail was commissioned to establish what Land Value Capture could be raised on the planned route. A comprehensive report was compiled which showed the sites where there was potential. These were mainly in city centre locations and the relatively new Edinburgh Business Park at the Gyle
E-Rail calculated that it could raise in the order of £70 m from adjoining landowners including an innovative agreement to reduce car usage by business Park occupiers sharing their vehicle and running cost savings. The report was delivered on the same day as the Scottish government agreed to finance the Whole project which ended E-Rails involvement.
In 2017 E-Rail was commissioned to explore Land Value Capture (LVC) on a Northumberland County Council priority transport project. In the last three years work has continued and the project is sufficiently advanced that an announcement is expected soon. This will be the first example of E-Rail delivering the full LVC process and will be a milestone in the development of transport funding.
City of Edinburgh Council invited E-Rail to explore how it might finance the re-opening of the route. All 12 miles of track existed except some 400 yards at Kinnaird Park and all the suburban stations required to be replaced.
Our survey revealed over 90 parcels of ground that were undeveloped all within 1 km of the planned stations. A 30 minute service was envisaged going to 20 minute at peak times. The cost analysis revealed that LVC could finance over 50% of the actual cost. By agreement with CEC, 12 of the larger sites were selected and agreement reached with 4 of the owners to contribute when Edinburgh Transport decided to concentrate on their ambition to have a tram service from the city centre to the airport. The South Sub project was abandoned. Some practical issues had arisen on access to the route for additional services and also platform congestion at Waverley station. These issues are now less critical and the project may soon be reconsidered. Several of the sites previously included have since been developed.
The 10 mile line extension of the Jubilee Line opened in December 1999 and provided a new underground rail connection from Green Park to Stratford that cost £3.5 bn. Two independent property valuations after the opening of the line extension agreed that the property close to each new station experienced a combined £13.5 bn increase in value.
The developer of Canary Wharf contributed towards the cost of the new Jubilee Line station however noother money was raised from Land Value Capture. Mr Don Riley, an engineer from New Zealand, bought land and buildings around Southwark when the project had been announced but prior to the extended route entering operations and his company enjoyed phenomenal growth. Mr Riley felt that his wealth was not deserved as he had not contributed to the cost of the Jubilee Line extension project and wrote a book called ‘Taken for a Ride’ (ISBN 10:190120202X) which describes his experiences. He invited Hazeland McGregor of E-Rail ltd to contribute with a chapter on our methodology which he fullysupported.
If the government had been alert to the method of capturing a share of the value, should they have secured only 25% from landowners who benefitted would have been sufficient to meet the construction cost of the line extension. This would have provided participants with a 75% bonus due to their land value increase after contributing to the project. The merits of this methodology certainly gives little excuse for landowners to decline participation.
Of the new stations long the Jubilee Line extension, some linked with existing routes and attracted little new value but at Southwark, Bermondsey, Canada Water and Canary Wharf the increases were substantial.
SLC Rail provided wide ranging specialist advice to Worcestershire County Council comprising of early business case development work and culminating in the management of delivery of the new Worcestershire Parkway Station that entered into service in February 2020.
SLC Rail were instrumental in developing an innovative funding and finance structure that used a mixture of public grants and commercial revenues generated by the project to meet the £22m project capital cost.
It is a new strategic parkway station and regional interchange for Worcestershire, providing improved access to Great Western Railway services to London and the Thames Valley and Cross-Country services to the South West, South Wales, and North-West and North East England.
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