Making active travel work: the role of integrated, multi-modal network planning

Active travel investment is growing across the UK. But too often, individual schemes still fail to add up to coherent, usable networks.

Through our partnership with AECOM, we're calling for network planning to shape decisions from the outset – bringing together strategic planning, local knowledge and lived experience to support more connected, integrated journeys.

At the core of network planning is a persistent gap between strategic intent and lived experience. While plans increasingly describe integrated, multi-modal networks, delivery still happens scheme by scheme, shaped by local constraints, competing demands and immediate pressures. In many cases, active travel priorities are poorly aligned with public transport, particularly bus networks.

As a result, networks that appear coherent in strategy can become fragmented in practice.

Why this conversation matters now

In recent years, authorities across the UK have set out ambitious plans to promote and make active travel easier, often with constrained budgets and challenging political contexts.

National policy advocates for walking, wheeling and cycling to be part of multi-modal networks. The Department for Transport’s Better Connected: A Strategy for Integrated Transport, the new Cycling and Walking Investment Strategy (CWIS3) and Active Travel England’s ‘Worth Every Step’ delivery plan all reinforce the need for more integrated planning across modes.

The Bus Services Act and the growing role of franchising – which can give authorities greater control over routes, frequencies, fares and service standards – add further impetus for authorities to plan bus services as part of a connected multi-modal transport system.

Yet delivering on national and regional ambitions is becoming more complex.

The limitations of a scheme-led approach

Against this backdrop, the limitations of a scheme-led approach to delivery are becoming more apparent. Without a clear, integrated network plan:

• Schemes are delivered opportunistically rather than strategically

• Difficult decisions about road-space allocation are deferred, revisited or avoided

• Connectivity is weakened by scheme-by-scheme, corridor-level decision-making

• Public confidence is undermined by inconsistency and lack of continuity

Mode-by-mode planning remains the default in many cases, while operational pressures and fragmented delivery processes can mean connectivity is not considered early enough in development.

What is often missing is a clear framework for understanding how routes connect, how different modes interact and how investment contributes to a coherent network over time.

What is network planning?

At its simplest, a network connects people to the places they need, and want, to reach. Those journeys are varied: getting to work or education, accessing healthcare, shopping, caring responsibilities, leisure and social activity. Crucially, many of these journeys are linked together, not undertaken as isolated trips.

Effective network planning recognises this complexity.

For walking, wheeling and cycling, this means moving beyond corridor-based thinking and creating networks that are coherent, legible and continuous.

But network planning must be multi-modal, recognising that streets and roads serve different functions and the needs of different users must be considered together. This maximises the value of good public transport.

How network planning improves outcomes

Network planning has the potential to improve active travel outcomes in four key ways.

1. It enables realistic travel choices

For as long as the car remains the most direct, comfortable and convenient option for most journeys, it will dominate. Network planning creates the conditions in which walking, wheeling and cycling become realistic alternatives.

Integration with buses, rail and other forms of mass transit is central to this. High-quality public transport depends on people being able to access stations and stops easily and safely. The aim is not to replace public transport, but to make it easier to use by improving connections before and after the main leg of the trip. Network planning helps maximise catchments and unlock the full potential of existing assets.

2. It provides a basis for space allocation decisions

Urban areas can’t accommodate all modes everywhere. Network planning allows authorities to make explicit decisions about where different modes should be prioritised, taking account of street function, movement needs, place character and the need for connected, continuous networks, rather than revisiting those debates scheme by scheme.

Circulation plans – which overlay modal priorities across an area – provide a particularly powerful mechanism for this.

3. It supports phased delivery and long-term investment

Few networks are delivered in a single funding cycle. Network planning allows authorities to:

• Prioritise interventions strategically

• Build credible investment pipelines

• Align short-term funding opportunities with long-term outcomes

• Coordinate transport investment with future housing and economic growth

Without this, funding availability risks dictating outcomes, rather than plans guiding investment.

4. It supports equity and consistency

Road networks are generally well understood and consistently planned. Walking, wheeling and cycling networks are not – particularly when it comes to different user needs, including disabled people, older and younger users, or those who do not feel safe travelling at night, in isolated locations or mixing with traffic.

Network planning helps establish consistency of provision and experience, supporting modal equity and improving public trust in the system.

A new partnership designed to support better network planning

Network planning sits at the intersection of technical transport planning, operational understanding, local knowledge and legitimacy, plus public engagement and trust. Yet, no single organisation can bring all these perspectives alone.

A new partnership between AECOM and Walk Wheel Cycle Trust has been formed in direct response to this challenge, combining complementary strengths from the private and not-for-profit sectors to help local authorities plan, prioritise and deliver active travel networks more effectively.

Walk Wheel Cycle Trust brings a deep understanding of how walking, wheeling and cycling networks are experienced and used day to day, informed by their role as custodians of the National Cycle Network, behavioural evidence, inclusive and accessible engagement and long-standing work with communities across the U.K.

AECOM brings active travel planning and design, strategic transport planning, multi-modal network planning, circulation planning, public transport planning and design, and delivery expertise across the full project lifecycle, including involvement in the development of national guidance and investment-ready strategies.

Combined, we can provide the technical and strategic rigour required to move from vision to implementable networks as well as grounded local insight, public credibility and long-term custodianship - essential ingredients for networks that work in practice, not just on paper.

Together, this partnership bridges the gap between strategic intent and lived experience, as can be seen in our ongoing work in Northern Ireland (see below case study).

What needs to change – and what we are calling for

Walking, wheeling and cycling networks are now fundamental infrastructure for healthy, inclusive and economically resilient places. But delivering them requires more than strong policy and well-designed individual schemes.

If the UK is serious about delivering active travel at scale, several shifts are now required:

• Network planning for all modes must precede scheme design, not follow it

• Multi-modal integration must be the norm, not an aspiration

• Circulation-level thinking should underpin difficult space-allocation decisions

• Local knowledge and engagement must inform strategic planning, not sit alongside it

• Funding should follow plans, not dictate them

The AECOM–Walk Wheel Cycle Trust partnership exists to help authorities make these shifts – providing the technical capability, strategic clarity and community connection needed to move from fragmented schemes to functioning networks.

Without integrated, multi-modal network planning, even good projects can fail to add up to a coherent system. The priority now is to plan connections from the outset, so that every intervention strengthens the wider network.