Activity Management Plan example tool

The Central Otago District Council (CODC) had done a comprehensive review of its AMP in 2015. For the 2018 NLTP, the council’s AMP development team looked at the lessons learned. Through consistent, ongoing community engagement, the council determined that their strategic drivers were largely unchanged. Since they had reliable data, the council was able to update the forecasts of their development needs without having to redo all aspects of the analysis. A strong foundation enabled the CODC to apply fit-for-purpose effort, which is a key principle of the Business Case Approach.

Review the CODC’s AMP(external link)

The Whāngārei District Council’s AMP is being used due to the detailed options analysis it presents, using the right level of detail and allowing decision makers to use evidence to inform their thinking. The AMP has succinct descriptions of problems, benefits and consequences. It demonstrates clear thinking related to option identification and provides detailed analysis to substantiate its selection of the preferred programme.

Review an extract from the WDC’s AMP [PDF, 19 MB]

In the Introduction section, this tool also provides links to documents produced by the Tasman District Council and Auckland Transport. These are being showcased as examples of good practice in specific areas, as you’ll see below.

To make the most of the AMP example tool, you may first need to familiarise yourself with AMPs. Here is a good place to get started:

• Road Efficiency Group (REG) guide to integrating the BCA in activity management planning [PDF, 7.3 MB]

An AMP should set out a three-year, 10-year and 30-year or longer view of planned expenditure and explain:

• the national, regional and local strategic drivers for services
• how your organisation will assess and manage transport demand
• the critical assets and how these are accounted for in the proposed plan
• what levels of service the investment provides
• the planned balance between maintenance, renewals and capital investment proposed for the maintenance of existing assets and for any future needs
• how these costs will be met.

Councils primarily use AMPs to demonstrate what they plan to invest in, so they can deliver to the levels of service expected by the community they serve. Most of your stakeholders are unlikely to read your full AMP. All of them however will appreciate a bird’s eye view of your detailed planning, and any insights and actions resulting from it. This is why many councils write an executive summary, either within their AMP or as a separate document. The executive summary can be used as the basis for subsequent advice to decision makers and to engage with different target audiences. An executive summary should be written in a way that is simple, concise and accessible to different audiences including non-technical readers, such as members of the community and other stakeholders. The idea is to help readers become quickly acquainted with your entire AMP, without having to read it all. If you’re writing an executive summary, write it to assure your readers that you are: working within a sound strategic context using evidence to support your identified problems, opportunities and constraints using evidence to inform your decisions around the selection of a preferred programme and its specific mix of activities delivering measurable benefits addressing any key risks and assumptions. The executive summary of the Tasman District Council’s Transportation Activity Management Plan for 2018 is a good example of what a good executive summary should do. Tasman District Council’s Transportation Activity Management Plan (see section 1)(external link) Also look at Auckland Transport’s Asset Management Plan summary. It’s a great example of how to communicate ideas of strategic importance to a wide audience. Auckland Transport’s Asset Management Plan summary(external link)

Overall, your AMP should be able to demonstrate:

• sound principles and processes for developing road maintenance and capital investment proposals, including identifying the best value-for-money options and timing of interventions
• smart procurement and management practices that optimise the delivery of customer-focused activities in the most cost-effective manner.

It all begins in the introduction of your AMP. The introduction should broadly cover the information listed below. Select each example to see some extracts from the introduction of the CODC’s AMP.

This part of your AMP provides you with an opportunity to demonstrate that your organisation has sufficiently considered ways to progress government priorities, regional priorities, and ONRC outcomes and measures.

In its review of AMPs Waka Kotahi looks for assurance that your organisation has incorporated the ONRC in the way you assess gaps in levels of service.

Use this part of your AMP to:

• define the levels of service for the transportation activities that your organisation delivers
• identify how the levels of service contribute to the Government Policy Statement on land transport (GPS)
• identify any local issues over and above national and regional priorities, that need to be addressed in managing your network.

Select each example below to see the kind of information your AMP should include.

Your AMP should include growth forecasts and other factors that influence demand, population forecasts, the impact of these changes in demand on the transportation network, and how you propose to deal with these. Factors that influence customer demand on the transportation network include:

• population growth and decline
• demographic change
• change in land use
• economic growth and decline
• modal change
• development of recreational areas
• future customer expectations.

This tool does not provide any examples under this heading, because each region needs to tell its own story of demand and growth. In telling this story, your organisation needs to:

• use robust data
• demonstrate that you have gleaned some analytical insights from that data
• demonstrate consistency with the projections in your region’s RLTP and any national level projections, such as, the Ministry of Transport Domain Plan or Arataki, the Waka Kotahi long-term strategic plan for the land transport system.

Reflections from our audits: investment and asset management, a report by the Controller and Auditor-General, published in July 2017, states: ‘As the stewards of public assets, it is important that public entities have the right information, systems and people to manage assets responsibly and to the best of their ability. Having the right information, systems and people provides a good foundation for effectively managing assets to meet the needs of current and future generations.’

The report also mentions that, ‘…public entities need to be realistic about the gaps in their information and systems. They need to understand the gaps and work hard to fill them to enable good asset management.

Good information about assets is needed for public entities to monitor the performance of assets and manage them. If done well, public entities will make decisions that optimise services to people and they will realise the most value from their investment in the assets.’

Full report by the Controller and Auditor-General(external link)

Your AMP should provide details on significant assumptions and uncertainties. It should cover negative effects associated with operating the transport system (for example, noise, light spill, dust suppression issues and crashes) and risks, taking care to highlight any risks related to critical assets.

Some AMP authors may include assumptions related to investment and financial forecasting along with information on funding options, as seen under the programme expenditure section. However, in this tool, all information and examples on risk and assumptions are provided below.

Select each example below to see more information.

An AMP should provide an overview of asset information regarding the individual transport asset groups. Your organisation should have used the asset management software, Roading Assessment and Maintenance Management (RAMM), to record information regarding their roading assets.

Reflections from our Audits: Investment and asset management, a report by the Controller and Auditor-General, published in July 2017, states: 'Having robust information about physical assets and their condition helps public entities make effective and sustainable decisions about how their assets are managed. Public entities might not have detailed information about all of their assets, but they should have a good understanding of critical assets. Critical assets are those assets that, if they failed, would have a significant adverse effect on essential services.'

Read the full report by the Controller and Auditor-General(external link)

Select each example below to see more information.

Your AMP should be able to answer the following questions:

• What is the evidence for identified problems and opportunities?
• What is their relative importance and urgency?
• Is there sufficient evidence to show that the programme and its elements have been optimised for the mix and timing of activities?
• Is there an appropriate procurement approach to deliver value for money in the short, medium and long term?

The WDC AMP builds on strategic context to evaluate alternatives and options, systematically considering each problem statement set out in the strategic case. For the assessment of the data, peer group analysis and option assessment, the AMP uses a five-point traffic light rating system. This rating system is based on a qualitative assessment of the levels of service (LOS) and cost comparison data: For the analysis of options, the WDC has made a qualitative assessment of the effectiveness and impact on LOS. They have also considered the cost impact of the options and assessed the 30-year net present value (NPV) costs to determine the relative whole of life costs of each option. For options that represent the status quo, the WDC has shown the current work category budgets which have been averaged over the 2015–18 period. For all other options, they have shown the relative change in the annual average budget (2015–18 period) required to fund the option.

Select each example below to see extracts from the WDC’s AMP.

An AMP must provide detailed information on the investment and funding required for transportation activities. This includes, but is not limited to:

• your revenue and financing policy
• your funding sources
• the value of your assets
• development contributions
• the apportionment of cost of capital works
• historic and proposed maintenance costs
• historic and proposed renewal costs
• planned improvement costs.

Developing robust expenditure forecasts requires a comprehensive understanding of past and current costs. Your AMP should include both high-level summaries of programme expenditure and detailed costings for different services. The summaries and information must in turn align with your funding application in Transport Investment Online (TIO).

Under this heading, you may also include information on procurement. In this tool, all procurement-related examples are included under the previous heading, The programme of works.

Select each example below to see more information related to programme expenditure.

It’s critical to plan for the regular review of an AMP. This ensures that it remains relevant to the issues being addressed and adapts to new technologies and changes in industry practice.

Each AMP should include an improvement plan to address gaps in knowledge and understanding. The improvement plan should set out key tasks for the next three years to improve the next review of the AMP. Tasks typically cover reviewing:

• assumptions regarding forecast growth and demand
• asset data (across all inventory and condition elements)
• deterioration modelling
• planning
• optimisation
• performance in delivering against the short-term plan (including timeliness, cost and quality)
• level of service performance against target key performance indicators (KPIs)
• delivery arrangements.

Here are some questions to think about when you write and review your organisation’s improvement plan: Does the improvement plan identify deficiencies? Does it set out how these deficiencies will be addressed before the next review? Does it identify ways to provide a better line of sight from the GPS through to service delivery? Does it identify ways how to better link the ONRC to your business systems – including collection of data and reporting on customer satisfaction, asset performance and technical measures?

Select the example below to see more information.