The guidance document published by TRICS today (22/01/2021) addresses the need for practical guidance on using the Decide-and-Provide (D&P) approach in transport and development planning. TRICS is the system of trip generation analysis for the UK and Ireland. It is part of the Transport Assessment process and it contains a comprehensive database of traffic and multi-modal transport surveys, covering a wide range of development types. TRICS allows its users to establish potential levels of trip generation for their development scenarios using a series of database filtering processes, and it is widely used by both transport planning consultants and local authorities. 

The new guidance from TRICS is primarily aimed at transport planning professionals, including TRICS users, in the public and private sectors. It is intended that it will assist, in particular, those who prepare or review transport appraisals, including Transport Assessments (TAs) and Transport Statements (TSs). It is split into two parts, the first one explaining what the D&P approach is and the second one contains the practical guidance and examples of it being used. 

This Guidance is intended to have the following learning outcomes:

• Understanding what the D&P approach is and why it is needed.
• Informing the preparation, and review of, transport appraisals, including TAs / TSs.
• Supporting TRICS users in making best use of TRICS’s bank of survey data, including historic data sets.
• Understanding of how the D&P approach relates to the wider plan-making and development management/ development control processes.

The report is available here.

In 2016 CIHT released a report about D&P called CIHT Futures which you can find here.