big bike revival

[Philip Benstead]

Dear All

What do we think of this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9mlBcs18G8&sns=em
http://www.bigbikerevival.org.uk/about/

[Ron]

Not a lot.
Despite getting £453,000 from the Scottish government to run this event, the cost of travel with a broken bike to our nearest centre, which is at at Harrogate rather outweighs any possible benefit.
Similarly, apparently we must go to Carlisle or Newcastle to visit our nearest Bike Recycling Centre.
http://www.cyclinguk.org/press-release/ ... l-scotland

[PH]

Looks great to me, plenty there to get people out in bikes, it's success depends on how well it's delivered, but from what I've heard of last years it made a good start.

[PH]

Not a lot.
Despite getting £453,000 from the Scottish government to run this event, the cost of travel with a broken bike to our nearest centre, which is at at Harrogate rather outweighs any possible benefit.

Would that be the money they were awarded three weeks go? The money to fund 50 repair centers across Scotland?
Maybe the situation will look different in a week or two.

[Paulatic]

Not a lot.
Despite getting £453,000 from the Scottish government to run this event, the cost of travel with a broken bike to our nearest centre, which is at at Harrogate rather outweighs any possible benefit.

Would that be the money they were awarded three weeks go? The money to fund 50 repair centers across Scotland?
Maybe the situation will look different in a week or two.

It was 4 weeks ago.

Where did you get the impression the money was going to repair centres?

There were jobs advertised with very short application dates so they should have bodies for it now.

The interesting thing, I find, is that it still hasn't appeared in Scottish Government or Transport Scotland news pages.

[PH]

Not a lot.
Despite getting £453,000 from the Scottish government to run this event, the cost of travel with a broken bike to our nearest centre, which is at at Harrogate rather outweighs any possible benefit.

Would that be the money they were awarded three weeks go? The money to fund 50 repair centers across Scotland?
Maybe the situation will look different in a week or two.

It was 4 weeks ago.

Yes, sorry. I must have been allowing a week for the cheque to clear

Where did you get the impression the money was going to repair centres?

The first google hit, I couldn't imagine the Scottish Government giving money away for nothing.

The funding covers maintenance and repair efforts at 50 centres across Scotland over four weeks in summer, as well as efforts to teach people the basics of fixing a bicycle.

https://cyclingindustry.news/scotlands- ... ent-grant/

[Paulatic]

Interesting PH your link does say

The funding covers maintenance and repair efforts at 50 centres across Scotland over four weeks in summer

Yet http://www.cyclinguk.org/press-release/2016-06-14/funding-boost-big-bike-revival-scotland CyclingUK say

The Big Bike Revival aims to get more people across the country cycling by getting their unused bikes out of the shed and back in working order. Over 50 centres across Scotland will host Big Bike Revival events over four weeks this summer, offering the public a chance to:

Fix a cycle so it can start to be used and learn how to maintain it.
Trade a cycle for one better suited to individual needs and donate surplus cycles.
Experience cycling in their local area, utilising the National Cycle Network, and discover local cycling networks.
Take part in a variety of cycle training activities to become confident and competent cycling on the road.

See the difference there?
Seems to be confusion.

[Paulatic]

TV advert coming to your screens next week
https://youtu.be/M9mlBcs18G8

I feel they've left it late in the year to promote summer.

[mjr]

How do you find where people near you would have to go? If I click the "Bike Re-cycle centres" link under "How do we fix this?" on http://www.cyclinguk.org/project/big-bike-revival then I'm told I need to pay to join CUK before I'm allowed to know. Are all the centres running events?

[Paulatic]

Not sure entirely what you are asking but is this what you are looking for?
http://www.bigbikerevival.org.uk/find-an-event/
Put your post code in

[Tangled Metal]

Read something about it being started in.Scotland following great success in the English scheme in 2015.

Sorry but did anyone know about the English scheme last year? Sounds like it's going to be ineffectual, just a piece of PR that's trying to sound practical but doesn't result in much change. Waste of money but I guess cycling is as good a area to waste money on as anything else.

[Paulatic]

I'm finding this whole business of bike-revival a little strange.
I can still find no announcement, on the relevant web-sites, about the current initiative from Transport Scotland or Department of Transport.
CUK appear to think you should join before they release to you where the "recycle centres" are. Will this sit well with the funders? Do they not think we are capable of a Google search to get the information?

[mjr]

Not sure entirely what you are asking but is this what you are looking for?
http://www.bigbikerevival.org.uk/find-an-event/
Put your post code in

Thanks for that. Now why didn't they link that from high up on the page on the CUK website?!?

Anyway, nearest events seem to be Essex or Nottinghamshire, both over 60 miles away. Even if they're ignoring places that they think are already bike-revived (Cambridge?), I'd expect something nearer than that if it was "big".

[Paulatic]

Read something about it being started in.Scotland following great success in the English scheme in 2015.

Sorry but did anyone know about the English scheme last year? Sounds like it's going to be ineffectual, just a piece of PR that's trying to sound practical but doesn't result in much change. Waste of money but I guess cycling is as good a area to waste money on as anything else.

50,000 people turned up and I quote

For every pound invested in the project, we generated up to six pounds in economic benefits.

Can you believe that?
There'll be figures, surely, to back up the claim.

[Psamathe]

...
50,000 people turned up and I quote

For every pound invested in the project, we generated up to six pounds in economic benefits.

Can you believe that?
There'll be figures, surely, to back up the claim.

Turned-up to what and who is concocting this "for every pound spent we generated £6 economic benefits" - which sounds like the sort of claim that should be subject to some external scrutiny. Any source/links as I'd like to check (too easy for organisations to make spurious claims on the assumption that people will not question them).

Ian