Cycling UK Forum

This has probably been brought up before but I would like to know members / leaders views on this before I write to my MP and local councillor. Apparently Highways England have £100 million to spend on trunk road cycling improvements - and judging by my local area they are going to spend it pretty quick on useless cycle paths whilst much needed improvements are missed. To summarise: Near where I live there have been £1 million schemes which put cycle /multiuse paths next to our main trunk road in urban areas. Ok - so what ? This urban trunk road is a fairly recent addition to our environment, and bypassed all the existing road network - nobody needs to use the bypass for cycling as there's plenty of the old roads to link anywhere and everywhere. The only part of the trunk road which needed a cycle path next to it is the rural bit and that has been ignored, presumably cos it was harder to build a path on that part. Meanwhile there's a derelict railway line which links three towns rotting away doing nothing - it's ideal for a cycle route and even ends up in a park. So my point is - this money spent building wide tarmac paths next to trunk roads could be much better spent converting old rail lines, and creating a few joined up links to our generally good existing local off-road network. Who advises those with the dosh ? Does Cycling UK or Sustrans have any say ? - I would say not judging by what I 've seen. Is it up to me to draw some maps for my MP and Local Councillor or am I just wasting my time ? I'm not motivated by any personal gain - after 50 odd years round here I can quite happily cycle round my local area all day and every day on lovely routes - I just want everybody else to have that opportunity. All responses welcome - thanks, Colin

+1 Colin

There seems for a need for common sense cycle planning depts. There are existing routes just sitting there waiting to be used.

On the other hand completely useless cycle paths are built going from nowhere to nowhere and benefiting no cyclist, AS LONG AS it gets rid of car parking spaces or is in front of a new housing development. Naturally this all needs tactile paving and traffic light crossings.

Contact your local cycle campaigner http://www.cyclinguk.org/local-campaigners/map

They probably have a good idea who is involved in such things in your area.

Good point, but I think adding a track alongside a trunk route is a good idea anyway. Marginal cost, and even if it's not particularly useful now, in the future there might be housing developments built, or other cycle routes that could link to it. Seems to me that a lot of the problems with cycling infrastructure come from trying to shoehorn it onto existing roads, it should be standard practice to incorporate it into new schemes where the typical daft/dangerous compromises can be avoided. And £100 million? Peanuts isn't it, in the roads budget.

Tell them to slap a few more painted lines on existing roads then pocket the rest for other things. That's the current style of cycle planning that goes on up here.

Basically, why bother trying to get the money spent well. You're wasting your time! Planning departments don't understand cycling and never will in the UK now. If you want well planned cycle provision now the time to organize and campaign was in the 60s before the car use truly took off I reckon. Like the Dutch did I believe. It's too late now.

PS I live near Lancaster, one of the first 5 funded cycling demonstration towns(it's been a city since the 60s so CDT was not technically correct). It still had the wonderful Lancashire county council mis-spend the central government sourced, ring fenced money for a city centre to university separate cycle route along the A6. Subject to.numerous FOI requests to find out where the money went plus the information commissioner getting fobbed off when he ruled that the requests were valid and the information should be supplied. Nothing was provided and the council effectively stuck two fingers up to the information commissioner as well.

Rant over.

PS back from Holland and IMHO it's a lot better than the UK but isn't perfect. There's a negative attitude I thought coming from the cyclists. Anyone on a bike acted like they owned the road/cycle routes. It felt highly arrogant at times plus dangerous I thought. Not the cycling paradise some make out. I guess we're a selfish species no matter what transport mode we use.

Sustrans did get the (then) Highways Agency to accept a few years back that a parallel corridor could, in some circumstances, be a more appropriate place for a cycle route than alongside the carriageway itself. I know of one route that was funded by the HA along those lines, although there are some other issues with that particular route that mean it doesn't currently fulfil its potential.

The new Highways England guidelines for cycle infrastructure actually do look better than the average. But it's difficult to comment without knowing the location in question. I'd suggest that, as a starter, you could lobby your local county councillor, with the intention that their highways department could contact Highways England and investigate whether they could work together on an alternative.

Tangled Metal wrote: If you want well planned cycle provision now the time to organize and campaign was in the 60s before the car use truly took off I reckon. Like the Dutch did I believe. It's too late now.

Nope, the Dutch did it in the 1970s in reaction to car use taking off. Other places have started to do it since, including some surprising ones.

Tangled Metal wrote: PS back from Holland and IMHO it's a lot better than the UK but isn't perfect. There's a negative attitude I thought coming from the cyclists. Anyone on a bike acted like they owned the road/cycle routes. It felt highly arrogant at times plus dangerous I thought. Not the cycling paradise some make out. I guess we're a selfish species no matter what transport mode we use.

It's been pretty good on my two trips there. I think "arrogant" maybe depends on how you feel about bike bells being rung if you're about to step/ride out in front of a bike without looking. It's not utopia (cycletopia - anyone remember that?), but comparing the UK to it is like comparing dirt tracks to superhighways, often literally.

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Actually it's not the ringing of bells that makes me say there's a degree of arrogance. As one Dutch woman said to us the road laws applies to cyclists as well as motorists but many cyclists think of themselves as kings of the roads. That could quite reasonably be seen as a kind of arrogance. If you want to compare it to the UK it's like the arrogance of motorists that shout out "get off the road!" to a cyclist (or something similar). It's about one road user thinking they have more right to the carriageway.

As far as the decade goes, I assumed 60s because that's when I.understand car use in the UK started to grow. I knew the change in approach / attitudes in Holland happened when car use took off there. If that's the 70s I stand corrected.

Richard Fairhurst wrote:... I know of one route that was funded by the HA along those lines, although there are some other issues with that particular route that mean it doesn't currently fulfil its potential. ....(My emphasis)

Is the location secret? The bit I've highlighted sounds like a euphemism for "rubbish."

Sorry to say but I think I'm wasting my time on this forum. A couple of responses have been sympathetic but no real direction on how to pursue this.
I have written to a local cycle campaigner previously with no response - I will try again. The MP and County Councillor do respond but don't really know what I'm talking about. To the member in Lancaster - the paths from Caton / Morecambe / Glasson / Carnforth to Lancaster are just what we need in my locality (Feetwood / Thornton- Cleveleys / Poulton).
Thanks anyway, Colin

Oh yes a few good routes into the city but the uni options are not good considering the number travelling that way each day. It's the A6 which has had cyclist accidents at levels high enough to get central government funding to solve or a convoluted way to avoid the A6. The university is a big employer in Lancaster if you include the students and most live in town or that side of the uni.

Sorry if I'm being so.negative. My positive side could only suggest local cycling activists or groups. I used to cycle with such a group in Kendal once, the local cycle scene group. I think there's a few similar "scenes"going on around the north west. Perhaps contact local environmental groups? They might have a sustainable, local transport policy and bodies to become activists/lobbyists for your aims.

Probably not very good ideas but unfortunately I'm tending to base my views on what mostly happens when money is allocated for cycling without adequate thought to its use. That would take serious consultancy fees to achieve and swallow up most of the money I reckon. They like consultancies do governments and councils I reckon.

BTW, what are your ideas for cycling provision in your area? I'm not too far away and don't know the area but with the use of Google maps/street view I'd like to visualise your ideas. If that makes sense.

TBH a cycle forum might not be a good source of ideas for you. Too interested in kit and politics it feels at times. I do wish you success in your aims.

colindash wrote:Sorry to say but I think I'm wasting my time on this forum. A couple of responses have been sympathetic but no real direction on how to pursue this.
I have written to a local cycle campaigner previously with no response - I will try again. The MP and County Councillor do respond but don't really know what I'm talking about. To the member in Lancaster - the paths from Caton / Morecambe / Glasson / Carnforth to Lancaster are just what we need in my locality (Feetwood / Thornton- Cleveleys / Poulton).
Thanks anyway, Colin

I started campaigning because I saw some things that I felt needed to change. I did a few things:
-wrote to the highways agency involved
-found a local politican who was sympathetic and asked his advice
-met local cycle campaigners in nearby towns
-made a friend of the cycling officer on the county council

These are all folks who have some knowledge about how the system works, understanding of funding, approval, etc. I have to admit that it often feels like banging my head on a wall. The only thing that seems to vary is how hard the wall is.

We did have some small successes, such as getting barriers made wider (unfortunately not removed). I did find the Cycling UK campaign network useful when it came to people to contact, information to use, etc. If you are a member, contact the National Office and they can offer advice, and sometimes support. There are also some campaigners' yahoo groups that have experienced campaigners on them who can help beginners.

For what it's worth, I agree with you. Your highways authority might not. If you submit suggestions to them, make sure they are entirely clear (include maps with routes marked, etc.). Probably they will say we canæt do that because... Prepare another response; contact Sustrans for help if you think it could be a good link to a Sustrans route. Also, they can give you examples of things like compulsory purchase made for cycle tracks (that is a frequent objection to schemes such as you are suggesting).

If you want help with anything, I am sure that if you ask about specific thing, you will find forum users helpful.

edited to add: I think people ahve responded to your question about 'who advises those with dosh' and didn't get any further.

p.p.s. it is certainly not a waste of time, though it may feel like it sometimes (or most of the time). It may not seem like they listen, but sometimes what Sustrans, Cycling UK, or local Cycling groups have recommended is implemented years later.

@ Colin. I can understand you being easily discouraged. I would advise inviting your MP / Councillor out on a bike ride. The below is what I did and a short report about these rides and the reasons why they need doing:


Before Christmas a small group gathered at Shepreth Station for a cycle ride to Cambridge station in support of vulnerable road users. We were so pleased to have the Labour MP Daniel Zeichner come and ride with us. We were also impressed the Lib Dem candidate for Cambridge Julian Huppert has agreed to come along on a future ride as did Mark Slade of the Cambridge Green party.

This ride took place along the brand new A10 cycle path and took about 40 minutes. Apart from the route through Harston, and the traversing of the park and ride site, this was all on cycle path. Almost as good as it gets in Cambridgeshire.

We need to get more MPs and local councillors out on bike rides because it is a good litmus test to see if they genuinely understand the risks and the improvements that need to be made. Sadly the tories Heidi Allen MP (my own MP) and Jason Ablewhite the Cambridgeshire Police and Crime commisioner both declined to support these cycle rides. Every year a small number of vulnerable road users are killed on Cambridge roads.
In 2013 my daughters friend crossed Milton Road with her cycle and this was the last thing she ever did. The fact is that an MP should have a passion for reducing death and injury on our roads, because this is about their constituents and families. The same thing applies to local councillors. All of the major parties have policies promoting cycling and walking not least for health reasons.

Cambridge has a good selection of beautiful paths but they are not joined up. To implement complete grade separation of motor vehicles would need underpasses and overpasses as can be seen on paths in Holland, Germany, and Austria. It is only fair that the motor vehicles causing such destruction and delay pay the cost of ensuring that they can not in future harm vulnerable road users.


Video taken by a cyclist on the ride
====================================
https://youtu.be/g57zXsgqtqs

Dedication
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yc8V8UD4CVM

To (try) and answer some of the OP's questions: HE is responsible for trunk roads. If HE budget includes money for cycle paths alongside trunk roads then that's what it should be spent on, by edict from central government (IIRC).
For (just about) any other road you need to identify your Highways Authority (usually county council or unitary authority). Due to government cuts they will have close to zero (or just zero) for cycle infrastructure in their annual budget, but usually can find money for new roads (see next sentence). There is (some) money available from external sources (eg Local Enterprise Partnerships - the modern well financed quangos, which usually have some money for 'sustainable transport'; not that much actually goes towards cycling infrastructure) but your Highways Authority will need to bid for that money.
IME you need to find a supportive councilor or three on the relevant HA and a supportive group of local cycling advocates, then convince them of your proposals eg for the railway route, then get a national organisation like Sustrans to back your proposal, then start stirring, frequently!
(Much as Vorpal suggested earlier )