Petition on road taxes/fuels

[mjr]

If Cycling UK had a reference 'standards' to guide the assessment of particular sections of routes, they could list those up to standard and rate others.

The nice thing about standard assessment methods are there's already so many of them: Cycling Infrastructure Audit, Cycling Level of Service, Vulnerable Road User Audit, ...

All new routes would require building to standard. Prior to building, all routes should be evaluated and signed off saying they meet standards, local authority task.

That's the difficult bit and where successive governments have completely failed. The inclusion of IAN 195/16 (as seen at https://cycletraffic-elearning.com ) in the Design Manual for Roads and Bridges may improve things slightly, but real change will probably require central government withholding money from highway authorities until they meet basic standards of providing for cycling (and probably walking, too). At the moment, they hand the money over and say it's up to local voters to hold their council to account and the crap cycleways usually get lost in the mix of all other issues that people base their vote on.

[Steady rider]

You have in large part detailed the serious problem with the system. The government issues guidelines and leave it up to local authorities how they deal with issues. I complained about a roundabout design not being in keeping with standards, the Dft pointed out the responsibility rests with the local authority. The engineers who designed the roundabout claimed it was to standard but it was not to standard in terms of when several roundabouts are on the same stretch of road. The system fails in properly holding people to account. It would need something like an ombudsman for transport issues, endless paperwork.

[Bonefishblues]

You have in large part detailed the serious problem with the system. The government issues guidelines and leave it up to local authorities how they deal with issues. I complained about a roundabout design not being in keeping with standards, the Dft pointed out the responsibility rests with the local authority. The engineers who designed the roundabout claimed it was to standard but it was not to standard in terms of when several roundabouts are on the same stretch of road. The system fails in properly holding people to account. It would need something like an ombudsman for transport issues, endless paperwork.

Are they mandated or discretionary? You seem to indicate that guidelines are set as to how mandatory standards are enforced - have I got that right?

[Steady rider]

http://www.standardsforhighways.co.uk/h ... td1607.pdf

part 4.8

The standards state a number of things that should be followed. In the case I was referring to, roundabouts either side of the Holme Road roundabout on the A1079 are fairly centrally located, Standards say roundabouts should be similar on the same route for safety reasons. The Holme Road one is offset, some accidents have occurred.

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.86429 ... ,15z?hl=en

People get injured, vehicles damaged and it is not easy to inform the people their accident may have been contributed to by the sub standard design. Info was sent to the ERYC and DfT.
the road sign shows a central roundabout ahead
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@53.86274 ... 6656?hl=en

[Bonefishblues]

To answer my own question, there's perhaps 10% at maximum of the document at most which is mandatory. Most are guidelines.

What's the method of redress if, for instance the mandatory requirements regarding dropped kerbs aren't followed?

[gaz]

... but I feel they're frustratingly reluctant to pressure people to get the existing junk fixed or reroute their network to avoid it.

The times they may be a changing: https://www.sustrans.org.uk/node/15542

Having recently travelled along a stretch of NCN1 with local Sustrans staff they expressed that whilst the initial assessment will be whether a section is "Gold", "Silver" or "Bronze" the bit we were on would probably best be categorised as "Brown" (or at least something of a Brownish nature ).

[Steady rider]

What's the method of redress if, for instance the mandatory requirements regarding dropped kerbs aren't followed?

Just to give you a reply, I expect you would ask for the dropped kerb if it was a joint cycle path type situation, if not provided you could try to insist, if not provided I think you would be wasting your time with the ombudsman office, as you say they are guidelines mainly.
Assuming a situation does require proper attention and you get nowhere with it. The Highways Act somewhere I expect will say the authority should provide for the convenient and safe movement of traffic. So if a situation requires better provision than they have provided for, it could go to the local court, but the authority would probably use someone on £100 per hour to defend their position. Unless you have a highways engineer plus good legal representation probably not worth trying, plus costs ma be added to your expenses. The system is not designed to allow people to have too much influence, even if they are promoting standards or best practice.