243.Section 141 gives the Mayor a general duty to develop and implement policies to promote and encourage safe, integrated, efficient and economic transport facilities and services to, from and within London.
244.Section 142 requires the Mayor to prepare a transport strategy for London setting out his proposals for fulfilling the duty under section 141, including his proposals for providing transport for people with mobility problems and a timetable for implementing those proposals. The duty and the strategy will not be confined to those forms of transport for which the Mayor or TfL will be directly responsible. The duty encompasses all forms of transport, including walking, and does not apply only to users of transport who are resident in London. It covers the movement of goods as well as people.
245.Section 143 gives the Secretary of State a limited power to direct the Mayor to change the transport strategy. The Secretary of State will only be able to use this power where the strategy would be inconsistent with national policy and have an adverse effect outside Greater London. In accordance with section 144, London borough councils, the Common Council and any other statutory body exercising transport functions will be required to have regard to the strategy. The Mayor can issue guidance about the implementation of the strategy to other bodies that must also have regard to it.
246.The transport strategy will be subject to sections 41 to 44 of the Act, which make general provision for the preparation and publication of strategies. These include provisions on timing, the need to have regard to available resources and the persons to be consulted by the Mayor.
247.Section 145 requires the London borough councils and the Common Council to prepare local implementation plans ("LIPs") setting out their own proposals on how they intend to put the transport strategy into effect in their respective areas. The councils are required to consult various bodies and must include a timetable for when they intend to implement the proposals in their plan.
248.Section 146 provides for the Mayor to approve each local plan, ensuring that they adequately implement the transport strategy. He must not approve a plan unless he is satisfied that it is consistent with the strategy, and that the proposals in it are adequate to implement the strategy and that the timetable for implementation is adequate for those purposes.
249.Section 147 gives the Mayor various means by which he can ensure that a plan is prepared to his satisfaction if a council fails to do so and can recover the cost of preparing a plan himself in default.
250.Sections 148 to 150 provide for the revision of LIPs when the transport strategy is revised and enable councils to propose revisions of their own to their LIPs, after their LIPs have been approved by the Mayor. They also enable the Mayor to recover any reasonable expenses from Boroughs when he has had to prepare or implement a revised LIP on their behalf.
251.Section 151 provides that once a plan has been approved the council must implement it according to the timetable in the plan. A plan prepared by the Mayor for a council will be treated as if the council itself had written it.
252.Section 152 provides that if the Mayor considers that a council has not carried out any proposal in its LIP satisfactorily and according to the timetable in the plan, he will be able to exercise the appropriate powers of the council, at their expense, in order to fulfil the strategy.
253.Section 153 provides that the Mayor may give legally binding directions to councils on the manner in which they perform any of their duties set out in sections 145 to 151, i.e. provisions on the preparation, submission, re-submission, revision and implementation of local implementation plans.