Highways Agency

Background to the HABAP

The aim of the Highways Agency Biodiversity Action Plan (HABAP)

The Highways Agency is responsible for the maintenance, improvement and operation of the trunk road and motorway network in England (excluding London, where, since July 2000, this has been the responsibility of Transport for London). It provides advice to the Secretary of State on all aspects of development and operation of the network.

As an executive agency of the Department of Transport, Local Government and the Regions (DTLR), the Agency works within the Government's strategic objective to encourage sustainable development. The Agency is committed to minimising the impact of the trunk road network on both the natural and built environment and to play a full role in implementing the Government's Biodiversity Action Plans.

This document, the Highways Agency Biodiversity Action Plan, or HABAP, is part of a long-term strategy for the conservation of habitats and species on the motorway and trunk road verges of England.

The overarching aim of the HABAP is to help the Agency achieve its objectives for conserving and, where possible, enhancing biodiversity. This will be achieved by fulfilling the following objectives:

• To provide habitat and species action plans which are relevant and appropriate to the network and to the work of the Agency, including some requested by national and regional conservation organisations.
• To set practical and realistic actions and targets so that the Agency's contribution to biodiversity can be maximised.
• To raise awareness and understanding of the importance of the Agency's biodiversity work among the Agency's staff and contractors, its environmental partners, and the general public.

The HABAP prescribes the Highways Agency's role in the conservation and enhancement of biodiversity in England within the context of its other objectives and responsibilities. In order to reflect to the national scope but localised management structure of the Agency, the Action Plans in the HABAP refer to relevant national, regional and local HAPs and SAPs.

'the soft estate is a considerable resource for biodiversity'

Development and scope of the HABAP

The soft estate (the land owned by the Highways Agency between the highway fences, but not occupied by road carriageway) is now seen as a considerable resource for biodiversity, stretching as it does across the whole of England and forming a network linking an enormous variety of habitats and landscapes. The HABAP defines actions and sets targets for the beneficial management of the soft estate for biodiversity, and covers the period 2002 — 2012. The HABAP has been produced broadly in line with guidance published by the UK Local Issues Advisory Group on the development of local Biodiversity Action Plans.

• Agreeing broad objectives within the Agency
• Reviewing the ecological resources of the area
• Establishing a data-base of relevant information
• Establishing a Partnership to take the plan forward
• Identifying priorities within both the national and local context
• Setting specific targets and proposals for action
• Identifying delivery mechanisms and sources of finance and advice
• Publishing the plan and implementing the agreed programme of action
• Establishing a long term monitoring programme to measure the effectiveness of the Plan in achieving national and local targets

'the partnership approach is essential to the biodiversity Action Plan process'

The Highways Agency Biodiversity Partnership

The partnership approach is essential to the BAP process, due to the multidisciplinary nature of the task. In particular, it emphasises that the protection of species and habitats is not simply the remit of nature conservation organisations, but should also be the responsibility of business, the private utilities, local communities and a range of other interested parties. The HABAP process involved setting up such a partnership, which includes representatives from relevant divisions of the Highways Agency, and from various conservation and countryside organisations.

• The Partnership's aim was to assist the Highways Agency in the preparation of the HABAP. It had the following specific objectives.
• To ensure that the HABAP contributes to the Government's objective of conserving and, where possible, enhancing biodiversity.
• To ensure that the HABAP reflects best practice in preparation, application and monitoring / reporting of biodiversity plans.
• To ensure that the HABAP sets practical and realistic targets so that the Agency's contribution to biodiversity can be maximised.

To facilitate the implementation of the actions identified in the HABAP, the individual species and habitat action plans also identify partners who will play a key role in certain actions. These include not only the statutory bodies, such as English Nature and the Environment Agency, but also other organisations which may have a specific involvement with the particular habitats or species.

Audit and Assessment

An assessment of all relevant existing Biodiversity Action Plans and an audit of the existing ecological records for the network were carried out. These enable selection and preparation of action plans appropriate to the Highways Agency soft estate.

The BAP Review

All available UK, regional and local BAPs were reviewed for references to roads in order to help clarify the role of the HA both locally and nationally and to inform the preparation of the individual HABAP species and habitat action plans. These included the UK Biodiversity Action Plan (comprising 45 habitat action plans and almost 400 species action plans), a number of regional/strategic level BAPs (such as the Environment Agency BAP, and the British Waterways BAP), and more than 60 local biodiversity action plans (mostly based at county or unitary authority level). English Nature's 'Sustainable Development and Regional Biodiversity Indicators' documents were reviewed for each region and the emerging Regional Planning Policies were also assessed for relevance to the HABAP.

Although not all the BAPs reviewed during this process directly mentioned roads or the Highways Agency, many included species and habitats that could occur within the Agency's soft estate (or that may be encouraged to do so through restoration/enhancement measures), or they included species and habitats that are most likely to be threatened by the construction or operation of roads. All information from the LBAPs which relates directly or indirectly to the trunk road network in England is now stored on a database (the LBAP Database), while the UKBAP information is summarised in the Stage 1 Report.

UKBAP

A total of 17 Priority Species Action Plans and seven Priority Habitat Action Plans from the UKBAP were found to refer directly to the activities of the Highways Agency, and these are listed in Table 1. In many cases, the loss of habitat to road building and/or the damage to habitats through road-related pollution, were identified in the UKBAP as particular threats. However, road verges are also identified as potential refuges for a number of these species and habitats, and could represent a valuable resource for them, particularly if managed sensitively.

A further 98 Priority Species and 11 Priority Habitats also have some relevance to the soft estate, including several bird and bat species (that use road verges as linear flyways for foraging), numerous invertebrates, a range of scarce plants, and a number of wetland habitat types. Although no direct reference was made to roads in their Action Plans, all of these species and habitats have at least the potential to occur on or adjacent to the soft estate, and could benefit from appropriate conservation management of the road verge.

The review demonstrated that a significant proportion of UKBAP Priority Species (42%) and Priority Habitats (53%) either are known, or are likely to occur within the soft estate.

'for some areas of the country the true biodiversity value of the network is likely to be significantly underestimated'

LBAPs

There was considerable variation between LBAPs in terms of their relevance to the Highways Agency. Some BAPs barely considered roads, either as a threat to, or as a potential resource for, biodiversity, while others were actively involving the Agency in their action plans for various habitats and species. However, a number of common themes were apparent from the LBAP analyses:

• Roads as factors in species and habitat declines
• The need for partnerships
• The need to carry out appropriate impact
• assessments and mitigation
• The need for appropriate management

The Network Information

The current knowledge of the biodiversity value of the Agency's land holding (referred to as 'network information') was then assessed and considered in relation to the information gained from the BAP reviews.

Network information was collected for 14 of the 20 Highways Agency areas; the remaining six areas did not have any information available at the time of the study, but the Environmental Database currently under development will result in better coverage. The detail and focus of the network information varied considerably from area to area and from contractor to contractor. In some cases, there were very detailed records of the fauna and flora present along a stretch of road, while others gave only rudimentary descriptions of habitat type. For some areas of the country the true biodiversity value of the network is likely to be significantly underestimated. Nevertheless, a rough indication of the total extent of different Priority Habitats recorded to date on the soft estate, and the prevalence of different Priority Species is presented in Tables 2 and 3.

The HABAP

The next stage of the process was selection of priority habitats and species for conservation action, to produce the HABAP. The following criteria were used for selection:

• Habitats or species that occur on the Agency's
• estate which are a priority habitat / species in the UKBAP; and/or
• are included in the UKBAP or any local BAP with a request for HA action.

The Highways Agency Habitat and Species Action Plans are presented separately in Part B of the HABAP.

The habitats and species are of particular relevance to the soft estate. Five broad habitat types (woodland, grassland, heathland, boundary features and water features) have been selected, so that the generic actions identified within the HAPs can be applied to bring benefits to as much of the soft estate as possible. Within each HAP, however, detailed actions are also provided for relevant UKBAP Priority Habitats, so that specific objectives may be set for the management of these target areas wherever they occur on the network.

Twenty species (or groups of species) have been selected for Species Action Plans at this stage of the HABAP. The SAPs have been grouped to relate them to thebroad habitat types with which they are most commonly associated: woodland features (dormouse, badger, bats, red squirrel and juniper); grassland features (red kite/kestrel/buzzard, barn owl, Adonis blue butterfly, Deptford Pink and Tower Mustard); boundary features (Western Ramping-fumitory); water features (otter, water vole, great crested newt, vendace, white-clawed crayfish, Agabus brunneus (a water beetle) and southern damsel fly); and heathland features (reptiles and narrow-headed ant). Each group of Species Plans also contains a brief introduction to other associated species of conservation importance. Further species may be added to the list in the future as the Plan develops. For this reason, the Habitat and Species Action Plans have been published in loose-leaf format, so that additional plans can be incorporated into the document as they are produced.

Implementation, Monitoring and Reporting

This document, the Highways Agency Biodiversity Action Plan, or HABAP, represents part of a long-term strategy for the conservation of habitats and species of conservation importance on the motorway and trunk road verges of England. The next step will be implementation, which will be the responsibility of Agency staff, agents and consultants, across the network working in partnership, where practical, with neighbouring landowners, conservation organisations and other interested parties.

The HABAP will be reviewed at least every five years in order to monitor progress towards the targets set in each of the individual species and habitat action plans. Although the emphasis initially will be on these habitats and species, the HABAP is intended to be an iterative process rather than simply a one-off report. As knowledge of the ecological resource of the soft estate develops, the focus may need to shift in order to accommodate new habitats and species. Similarly, all actions relating to a species may be completed and the species could then be removed to a 'monitoring only' list. Where possible, the review of the HABAP willbe integrated into the review of the UKBAPs.

The Highways Agency measures progress against its objectives by the use of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). The KPI for biodiversity from 2003-2007 will be the achievement of targets set in the Highway Agency's SAPs and HAPs. Progress against this KPIwill be reported in the Highway Agency's Annual Report. A more detailed report on progress against the individual SAP and HAP targets will be reported in a separate document in 2007. At that stage the entire HABAP will be reviewed in terms of its content, structure, species and habitats included, and the appropriateness of the targets set. It is envisaged that this review would also take advantage of the partnership approach.