JohnW wrote:I don't think that anyone is more upset than I am at what has happened and what is happening to CTC, and all under conditions of secrecy. But I think that we've got to the stage where we are, I don't think that we can alter it, but for the sake of preserving campaigning we now have to run with it and support those parts that we believe in.
Other campaigning organisations are available. I would say that one of the problems with CTC campaigning has been that it hasn't taking its members on the journey with it, involved them in developing policy, which I suspect is because there would probably be a strong "they'll have to prise any A roads out of our cold dead hands" undercurrent to it at least at first as a knee-jerk overreaction to Sustrans's sins. One of the problems with the CTC rebranding is that it hasn't taking its members on the journey with it, either.
I wonder how many of the erstwhile CTC's critics on these "About Cycling UK" threads are actually members?????????????
I'm not, for reasons I've outlined before, including
viewtopic.php?p=709002#p709002 - I'm not forced to join by the 5-rides-as-a-guest (or is it 3?) rule and there's insufficient incentive to join otherwise.
I've been asked by many people to join over the years but I know I wouldn't stand idly by as CTC eats itself, I don't feel I've enough energy left to lobby CTC as well as government and CN, and I don't really feel much personal investment in CTC. Also, I'm a democrat, so if CTC is going to smash headlong into BC's sports-funded peloton, then surely it's up to its current members to turn the handlebars or not as they wish? I've tried to join and reform a couple of other organisations in the past and it's not been fun. Also, Cyclenation might even win a bit no matter which of CUK and BC comes off worse, although the whole collision is all a bit of a waste of pro-cycling resources
I'm on these forums mainly because Cyclenation had a (rather lopsided in reality IMO) collaboration agreement with CTC, and partly because there are some really really helpful participants on here who know a lot about the sorts of bikes and sorts of riding that I do.
Vorpal wrote:The forum can't function as a 'members only' zone. Some of the volunteers who moderate / spambust are not CTC / Cycling UK members.
It would function but it would probably be mainly a spam-infested cesspool and echo chamber like many other restricted-to-verified-members forums of other organisations. There are plenty of other cycling forums out there, including some who have a history of accepting refugees from other forums where unpopular management changes occurred.
Graham wrote:What is the long-term objective of those who are opposed to the new branding ?
Get your tanks off our lawn - I want to see CTC adopt a more modest and honest name and behave as one part of a cycling sector, rather than its new megalomaniac name that purports to be all things to all people and its recent behaviour of rarely crediting other groups who work with it.
As we can all see the re-branding has proceeded anyway.
Has it? My usual cycling group has some members who are also CTC local activists and I happened to ask some of them what they thought of the rebranding. The general response was that they weren't involved so they're going to ignore it, with one member going so far as to stick two fingers up and say that they're all volunteers and national office can't force them to use the "Cycling UK" name. I think this could get very messy if national office moves against the local volunteers... or even if it stops answering to the CTC name in any way. After those responses, I wonder if national announcements that refer to the organisation as CUK will even be republished in local CTC newsletters!