TRICS – what is it?
Simply put, a trip rate is the rate at which a land use generates movements, whether they be vehicular, pedestrian, or by public transport etc.
A trip ‘rate’ is usually provided per unit of development, i.e. per residential dwelling, or by 100sqm of office floor space as two common examples. The trip rate can then be factored up by the relevant size of development to give the overall trip generation of the proposal.
Trip rates allow the impact of a new development on local highway or public transport networks to be assessed. Trip rates are usually derived from the TRICS database which is overseen by the TRICS Consortium Limited. This is a large database of existing sites that have been independently surveyed across the United Kingdom and Ireland.