What are cycling conditions like in Milton Keynes and Welwyn Garden City?

[Nearholmer]

We’ll have to start a Redway fan club!

Back to discussion of signposts.

Here is an example of what has recently been installed widely across the city, which is very good, except that like a very high percentage it has been rotated either by mischief-makers or the wind, so is now literally misleading.

I’ve begun to badger the council staff about this problem, because it is making waste of all of the money spent on new signs, and would actually be quite easy to fix using a drill and some big self-tapping screws.

[robing]

Although Redways not perfect and obviously shared use - I do find once you are on them you just relax knowing that there's no traffic and no close passes etc.

[drossall]

I don't know why they don't just paint signs on the path surfaces. Harder to vandalise. Except I suppose with paint. Or use coloured surfaces or something.

[Nearholmer]

There are a few coloured arrows on the ground, which if you know the colour code take you to somewhere, but I don’t think anyone does know the colour code, or where they head. They matched some previous generation signage, I think. Maybe I’ll follow them one day, just out of curiosity, to see where they go.

[mjr]

I don't know why they don't just paint signs on the path surfaces. Harder to vandalise. Except I suppose with paint. Or use coloured surfaces or something.

Bristol tried some. Path paint directions get covered by leaves, snow etc and wear away, cracking in frost unless very carefully-made or simple. Not insurmountable but requires ongoing budget. Signs are better in most places.

[mjr]

Here is an example of what has recently been installed widely across the city, which is very good,

Still not as good as the 1980s signs which showed route numbers clearly and put further-away major destinations in capitals. The 2016 regs allow local route numbers in light green boxes near the point of the arrow, so I wonder why that's not done with V11 and similar.

would actually be quite easy to fix using a drill and some big self-tapping screws.

Let me save you time and money arguing for that: it doesn't work because vandals either rotate the whole post in the base or bend the sign and/or bracket. Square posts can make rotation harder but they still fell whole posts. Screwing them to lampposts is as good as it gets but sign-bending is even more difficult to stop. The best solution remains patrols checking the signs and repairing damaged ones, same as on any road.

[Nearholmer]

The rotated signs mischief is a bit vexing, because we don’t (touch wood) have a noticeable problem with vandalism in any other sense.

Here is what cycling conditions locally are like today: lovely!

[plancashire]

...
Would also happily show people around!

Thanks!

[plancashire]

...
Here is what cycling conditions locally are like today: lovely!

That's scenically nicer than the Rhein, comparable with my wife's favourite river route along the Niers, although we do have proper bike paths along both rivers; hereabouts they run along the tops of the dykes, which gives good views.

[plancashire]

We’ll have to start a Redway fan club!

Back to discussion of signposts.

Here is an example of what has recently been installed widely across the city, which is very good, except that like a very high percentage it has been rotated either by mischief-makers or the wind, so is now literally misleading.

I’ve begun to badger the council staff about this problem, because it is making waste of all of the money spent on new signs, and would actually be quite easy to fix using a drill and some big self-tapping screws.

Looking at the zoomed photo it looks to me as if the fixing bands are loose. One is visibly drooping. The fixing is too flimsy to carry such long panels and was installed incorrectly, or possibly has been used later as a swing. The thing is designed to fail. I'll take more notice of a local sign here and photograph it.

[Nearholmer]

I'll take more notice of a local sign here and photograph it.

If it is a sound design, I will pass it to my “friends” at the council.

[mjr]

Looking at the zoomed photo it looks to me as if the fixing bands are loose. One is visibly drooping. The fixing is too flimsy to carry such long panels and was installed incorrectly, or possibly has been used later as a swing. The thing is designed to fail. I'll take more notice of a local sign here and photograph it.

The vandals swing on them, hit them, whatever, until they loosen.

[Bmblbzzz]

I don't know why they don't just paint signs on the path surfaces. Harder to vandalise. Except I suppose with paint. Or use coloured surfaces or something.

Bristol tried some. Path paint directions get covered by leaves, snow etc and wear away, cracking in frost unless very carefully-made or simple. Not insurmountable but requires ongoing budget. Signs are better in most places.

And they have not been reinstated after resurfacing.

[willp01908]

There are a few coloured arrows on the ground, which if you know the colour code take you to somewhere, but I don’t think anyone does know the colour code, or where they head. They matched some previous generation signage, I think. Maybe I’ll follow them one day, just out of curiosity, to see where they go.

I`m pretty certain the arrows represent the most direct routes to the city center from various outlying endpoints - maybe on the "super routes". One colour goes out and the other back.
https://getaroundmk.org.uk/cycling/wher ... er-redways

[Nearholmer]

I’m not totally sure - from what I can discern they might be solely CMK<> Bletchley (yellow one way, green the other) by one particular route, maybe the start of a wider scheme that was then abandoned.