None of this stuff is hand-wavy. There is just no mandate to do structural change because voters vote for things that are directly opposed to each other, and there is no political leadership to actually push this through without voters. For example, healthcare...Javid did an interview the other day where he said explicitly...it is not possible to reform this, the public don't want it but the system is collapsing (and, ofc, this plays into Labour's hands...this is the only area they are strong on despite Streeting seeming to advocate for every position simultaneously).
You have quoted transport and local govt. Both relatively complex areas.
The main structural change in transport is linked to the planning system. All environmental assessments need to be removed, appeals processes need to be time-limited, lawyers removed totally, and (very likely) you need to remove all planning authority from local govt. This is probably the toughest area because central govt will fuck it up, but you could un-delegate it and then re-delegate to a new local body (but not like education pre-academies, it would be something like local infrastructure bodies that raised money from local taxes).
Local govt...where to begin. Social care needs to be moved out, likely some degree of tax devolution, planning needs to be moved out, massive levels of waste...I have not actually seen how this gets solved because unions and nepotism is so embedded (the Tories introduced new disclosure requirements, the media just don't seem to report this stuff...you can see massive levels of not only waste but what looks like graft...nothing), more powers for councils to create economic growth locally (the lobby group against this goes to the heart of govt, some councils like Warrington have created massive growth locally with so few powers...the Civil Service is violently opposed to this)...big picture is: remove powers that have externalities (healthcare, planning) and hand over economic powers (one idea would be local corporation tax).
Reform and SDP are specific. But what people don't understand is that "reduce wasteful spending" is specific...everyone knows the area in which money is wasted. But what they don't say is quite simple: you try to reduce spending, the civil service unions will stop all work across all departments immediately, they are militant. If you look at what is happening at Home Office or Justice, no-one is explicit about that because, frankly, voters don't want to hear it. That is what "structural change" means...the Home Office needs to be burned to the ground (and btw, the Tories have been trying this, the Border Force is still failing...the public doesn't realise that their senior management has been put on measures multiple times, they have brought people in from the MoD, the army...nothing works, they literally restructured the whole thing to get it away from the Home Office MULTIPLE times...it still doesn't work).
But there is masses of very specific policies in every area that can change things. The problem isn't politicians but that there is no mandate (largely due to Labour successfully selling the public repeatedly on bags of magic beans).