Cycle lanes ‘can’t come at catastrophic cost to traffic flow’ says MP; Reduction in policing behind increase in road deaths; Manchester council accused of ‘flushing filtered neighbourhood plans down toilet’; Mail froths about speed cameras + more
SUMMARY
Jeremy Vine has a dig at Lancashire Road Police
The Lancashire Road Policing Twitter account came in for a barrage of criticism earlier this week after it used a photo of the aftermath of a collision to advocate the use of cycle helmets.
They have since said that the driver involved wasn’t to blame, adding: “We don’t always imply that a cyclist collided with a car but in this case, that’s what happened.”
Doesn’t look to be a tweet that people are going to forget about any time soon though.
“If ever there was a scene to promote the wearing of a pedestrian helmet, this is it.”pic.twitter.com/IB4gBgQsrr https://t.co/Ep8sm7d7mb
— Jeremy Vine (@theJeremyVine) July 15, 2020
Daily Mail froths about speed cameras
No, @DailyMailUK, speed cameras are used to catch and punish speeding drivers. If you stay within the speed limit of that segment of road, they are not an issue to any driver. pic.twitter.com/Q1IOgeaTBj
— Duffy The Gampire Slayer (@GampireSlayer) July 16, 2020
The Mail Online tends to favour longer headlines. It’s gone with: “Speed cameras ARE being used to fleece drivers: Watchdog reveals how locations are chosen in ‘good hunting grounds’ for making money rather than preventing accidents – so is YOUR yellow box among those raking in the most cash?”
So basically the story’s about how they put speed cameras in areas where people are speeding quite a lot.
Reaction to Daily Mail speed camera headline
Re the Daily Fail headline- we now know that (almost all) the British public will accept constraints on the freedom to travel at all in order to save lives but DM readers will not accept constraints on speeding in order to save lives.
— Martin Porter QC (@MartinPorter6) July 16, 2020
Trafford cyclists take to the A56 and ask for cycle lane to be made permanent
Last month Trafford Council removed a stretch of pop-up cycle lane installed on the A56 following complaints from drivers about congestion.
Trafford council’s executive member for the environment, Stephen Adshead, said the plan had ‘always been’ for the pop-up lanes, brought in under lockdown, to be temporary.
He said a major review of what remains of the cycle lane will be carried out, “at the end of the summer when more people will be returning to work following the easing of lockdown and all children are scheduled to be back in school.”
Because the last thing you’d want is to have your measures to reduce motor traffic still around when motor traffic increases.
The MEN reports that at the weekend, about 100 cyclists took to the pop-up lane to show support.
Fantastic to cycle along the a56 today showing support for the bike lane. Lots of people using it for the first time saying they will use it regularly from now on. Hope it stays. @OneTrafford @TraffordCouncil @SteveAdshead @OfficialTfGM pic.twitter.com/eUlWeVbTyZ
— Nicola Sales (@nicolasales) July 11, 2020
More are expected when they repeat the exercise on Saturday July 25.
Organiser Ruth Hannan wrote to the council afterwards to say: “I appreciate that there will be push back from this – people don’t like change – but this is something that I hope our new Labour council will do differently to their predecessors. Be brave, be bold. Even those who complain will benefit from the reduction in cars.”
In response to her message, Adshead repeated his comments about complaints from drivers, residents, local businesses and bus companies and confirmed there would be a review next month.
Got time for a cycling-themed Chris Grayling diss?
Cyclist-dooring former Transport Secretary Chris “Failing” Grayling – who once said that those on bikes aren’t road users – is getting a bit of stick this morning after failing to become intelligence chair, despite being Boris Johnson’s pick.
Chris Grayling heading home, wondering why he didn’t make the intelligence committee pic.twitter.com/vjIJORuNYZ
— James Felton (@JimMFelton) July 15, 2020
Evans Cycles moves its Birmingham store to the House of Fraser building
Evans Cycles has opened a new 12,000 square foot store in the House of Fraser building in Birmingham. (Evans and House of Fraser are both owned by Sports Direct Group.)
The new shop replaces the one at Birmingham New Street Station.
Strict safety measures have been introduced, including limiting how many customers can enter at any given time, marking out ‘two metre zones’ throughout the shop floor and eradicating touch points within the payment process.
Matthew Atkinson, Head of Retail at Evans Cycles, said: “We are hugely excited to announce the opening of our new Birmingham store within the heart of the City. Working closely with the team at House of Fraser we now provide a vital facility for the Midland’s growing number of cyclists, which is easily accessible and helps customers combine their shopping trips.
“We have also invested in a substantial refurbishment, giving shoppers an excellent in-store experience as well as access to a wide range of the quality products. Our large workshop, along with our 24 hour service guarantee, will keep our customers riding throughout the year and help more cyclists within the region to Enjoy the Ride.”
Government urged to make NHS more bike-friendly
Improve the NHS cycling facilities. Get the NHS bicycle friendly. Agree? Do sign! https://t.co/z3XvYyIVe3
— Joseph Mackay-Christie (@JosephMackayCh1) July 14, 2020
This letter to the Secretary of State says the NHS should consider:
- Significantly increasing the quantity and quality of secure cycle storage across the NHS as a matter of urgency
- Offering a payment for cycling to work to cover servicing and maintenance
- Embedding a walking and cycling culture throughout the NHS
It reasons: “Action should be taken now to enable active travel to, from, and around the NHS. This will mitigate the pressure on NHS car parking and on the transport system more generally – as well as having significant environmental, health and social benefits.”
Levenshulme filtered neighbourhood project ‘paused’ by Manchester City Council
In 2019, we reported how Levenshulme was bidding for £3.5m of funding to turn a one-mile area into the most cycle-friendly part of Greater Manchester.
Earlier this week, Manchester City Council withdrew its involvement with the Levenshulme Bee Network, which was running the project.
“We do not know what that means for the future of the Active Neighbourhood or the project areas that sit within it, including school streets, play streets, cycle parking, parklets and of course the filtered neighbourhood,” Levenshulme Bee Network said in a statement.
The MEN reports that there have been local concerns about communication and updates ahead of a six-month trial that was due to begin this month.
Executive Member for the Environment, Planning and Transport, Councillor Angeliki Stogia, said: “We remain fully committed to the Active Neighbourhood project for Levenshulme and Burnage.
“We are taking a fresh look at this scheme, which has the potential to provide road safety, health and air quality benefits by encouraging active travel in the area.
“We know that many residents are excited by the scheme, while others have concerns or need more information so they can let us know what they think. More than a thousand people have already given their views online and face to face.
“However, others still have comments and questions, so we are pausing the project to continue getting the views of the community, so that the proposals have the widest possible engagement before we move to a trial in the coming months.
“We will be working with the design team to build on the engagement and all the work that has taken place to date, to ensure that this is accessible by the whole community.
“The comments received in the coming months will influence the proposals and no permanent changes to road layouts will be made until after the final design has been agreed.
“We’re excited to move to the next phase of this project and we want to work with all members of the community to deliver the best possible outcome for Levenshulme and Burnage.”
Levenshulme residents accuse Manchester council of ‘flushing plans down the toilet’
Regarding the ‘pausing’ of the Levenshulme filtered neighbourhood project (see below), some local residents seem to be very unhappy with the way the council’s run the project.
Manchester City Coucil effectively outsourced community engagement to hundreds of local volunteers, before flushing two years of hard work down the toilet.
— Levy Bee Network – Get it Moving (@levy_get) July 16, 2020
We’ve had no explanation or apology for these events. We are determined not only to hold the council to account, but to build an unstoppable movement of local people for safer walking and cycling in our neighbourhood.
— Levy Bee Network – Get it Moving (@levy_get) July 16, 2020
Want a bike, but struggling to find a retailer with stock?
Cyclescheme have got some advice.
Try your local bike shop and smaller retailers etc.
Here is our latest update regarding bike stock – https://t.co/OCPdERnk7z pic.twitter.com/dARcWAxhmO
— Cyclescheme (@cycleschemeltd) July 15, 2020
Reduction in policing behind increase in road deaths
Spending cuts combined with a lack of recognition of the importance of roads policing has resulted in a rise in road deaths, according to a report by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC).
The Guardian reports that a steady decline in deaths in road traffic collisions up until 2013 has since been rising. Deaths were up from 1,541 deaths in 2013 to 1,624 in 2018.
The inspector of constabulary, Matt Parr, said: “Our inspection suggests that roads policing, despite the number of road deaths plateauing and likely to increase, is seen as less of a priority than it should be.
“We found that almost half of local crime plans didn’t include reference to roads policing. This, along with an unclear national strategy, is doing little to help reduce the number of deaths and life-changing accidents which occur on our roads.
“Spending on roads policing has been cut by 34% resulting in fewer officers dealing with offences that cause road deaths. However, there is a clear, and pressing, need for government, police and crime commissioners, chief officers, and the College of Policing to recognise the importance of roads policing in reducing death on the roads.
“We have made recommendations to help the police improve the effectiveness of roads policing in England and Wales. In doing so, we are clear, roads policing is not optional.”
The Department for Transport launched a consultation on roads policing earlier this week.
Police went to arrest thief for stealing a bike… and found over 100 more at his house
Police are urging Bedfordshire bike theft victims to get in touch after they went to arrest someone and found 100 bikes at his property.
The force says it has been dealing with “an overwhelming number of calls” since posting about this.
See anything you recognise?
Sky News reports that a 41-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of handling stolen goods. He has been released pending an ongoing investigation.
PC Jade Kilbey, investigating, said: “This was a proactive arrest carried out off the back of intelligence provided by a member of the public who had been a victim of bike theft. The number of bicycles we have recovered is significant and it would be great to be able to reunite some of them with their rightful owners.
“We would urge anyone who has had their pedal cycle stolen within the Bedford area in recent weeks to get in contact with the make, model, colour and serial number of their bike, along with any other distinguishing features.”
If you want to submit a report, you need to email jade.kilbey@bedfordshire.pnn.police.uk with the subject ‘Bedford Bike Theft 40/35795/20’.
Cycle lanes “can’t come at a catastrophic cost to traffic flow” says Crispin Blunt MP
They were talking pop-up cycle lanes on the World at One this lunchtime.
Crispin Blunt MP – who helped force the removal of a pop-up lane in Reigate after just three days – paid lip service to the importance of new cycle lanes, before confidently asserting that they ,“can’t come at a catastrophic cost to existing traffic flow; nor should they come at a catastrophic cost to the business of a town centre.”
Chris Boardman was on too, talking about the one on the A56 in Manchester. (There’s a bit more about that one further down the page.)
There’s been talk about the A56 lane being binned, but it’s actually just a short stretch south of Sale that’s been abandoned.
Boardman pointed out that most of it is still up and in use.
“This isn’t actually a cycle lane at the moment,” he said. “It’s an alternative to public transport.”
He highlighted the fact that one third of households in Greater Manchester don’t have access to a car.
“On a normal day, there’s 320,000 people who travel around three miles to get to work, to shops etc,” he said. “200,000 of them – if we are to obey all the social distancing measures – either have to find another way to get to work or they don’t get to travel.
“So right now this is actually about social justice and giving people an alternative – a safe alternative – to public transport for the moment by reallocating road space for them.”
Pop-up bike lanes a necessary form of social justice says Chris Boardman
🚶♂️🚲🐝➡️🛴👨🦽@Chris_Boardman putting the record straight on @TraffordCouncil @OneTrafford A56 pop up cycle route- one of the most significant schemes in the country – at approx 1.30pm https://t.co/f6Iovfb7G6
— Martin Key 🐝 (@martinkeyBC) July 16, 2020
Harrogate swaps land with Duchy of Lancaster to allow bike path on the Stray
Harrogate park, the Stray, has had a mixed relationship with cycling.
Last year huge crowds, heavy flooding and heavy goods vehicles used for the UCI Road World Championships resulted in significant damage.
However, it looks like it’s now going to be a key part of Harrogate’s cycling network plans.
Yorkshire Live reports that North Yorkshire County Council secured more than £3m of funding to build the two-way Otley Road Cycle Route in 2017, only to suffer a setback after it failed to reach an agreement about a strip of the Stray that formed part of the plans.
The Duchy of Lancaster, which manages the Stray, has now agreed to exchange land with Harrogate so that the project can get underway.
There are three options where land could become part of the Stray: near St James Drive, Arthurs Avenue and Wetherby Road.
“The cycle path will be on both sides of Otley Road but the issue is on the northern side,” explained Councillor Don Mackenzie. “The verges are Stray land. We need to replace it with land that is acceptable to the Duchy.
“The land near the hospital is our preferred option. It is continuous with the cycle route and if the other two options were to become Stray land, residents living there would have a fair bit of restrictions if perhaps they wanted to make a little entrance to their driveway.”
Mackenzie said designs for the majority of the cycle route had been completed and that he was hopeful a large part of it would be completed by the end of the year.
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Latest Comments
@chrisonabike Will you two please stop panda-ing to one another?
@kingleo They're only imposing the 18+ age limit, raised from 16, on escooters, not legal ebikes. There is no minimum age for riding an EPAC in Ireland.
I thought it was all about the gear ratios?
@chrisonabike These are polarising issues - anyone attending would have known there was trouble bruin.
@VIPcyclist Yes, the live coverage on S4C was a few stages at the beginning and a few at the end. Shame it wasn’t the whole lot. Stage 19 was particularly good live. Setting the record for the fastest time up the Alpe. He went a bit faster than I did a few years ago 😮. Amazing watching Pogačar hit the bottom of the hill with the breakaway over 3min ahead of him. S4C is available to watch again on the BBC iPlayer if you want to rewatch. The adverts seem to be stripped out too 👍🏻. S4C are looking forward to next year when some stages are here at home in Cymru 🙂. Non-welsh speakers can just watch the video I guess. I like it in my own language, but the iOS app ‘Tour Tracker’ is very very good too, especially for time trials. It’s also more ‘live’ than the live video. So, if it announces some sort of incident you can focus on the live feed to wait for it! (Cymraeg is one of the British Isles oldest living languages BTW.)
I paid for my month, first week off work so I wanted proper full day coverage. Enjoyed it, nice to be able to pause live coverage, but then they make you watch the adverts when trying to catch up. Channel 5 for when I was working, alright, less chat. Seemed to use the tnt virtual studio. Already cancelled, of course, but will be catching the TdF femmes until I'm booted off. Even though I could watch the commenwealth games I haven't, I hope the games have done well securing the rights because their viewing figures will be right down, such coverage benefits being on the BBC.
A goat has a carbon fibre fuselage, Pratt and Witney jet engines, hydraulic retractable undercarriage and in flight movie screens, but that doesn't make it a Boeing Dreamliner.
Didn't we do this earlier in the week?
If you come to road.cc only to read road bike articles, why do you keep clicking through to the other ones? Seems a bit daft
It's not the riders, it's not the equipment, it's not the clothing, it's not the nutrition, it's not the training. All those factors together probably allow for no more than 10% of the total improvement. Hmm, I wonder what the rest could be? It must be the tires ;-)
46 thoughts on “Cycle lanes ‘can’t come at catastrophic cost to traffic flow’ says MP; Reduction in policing behind increase in road deaths; Manchester council accused of ‘flushing filtered neighbourhood plans down toilet’; Mail froths about speed cameras + more”
Omg the lorry driver should
Omg the lorry driver should be in prison for that one. That pedestrian would have been dead.
They should have been wearing
They should have been wearing hi-viz with lights and a helmet. They’d have been fine then. Certainly nothing to do with a lorry driver breaking the law or just driving badly.
The pedestrian also needed to
The pedestrian also needed to be registered, with their registration plate visible, how else would they have been identifiable otherwise?
You’re right. How did I
You’re right. How did I forget that!
suddenmoves wrote:
You are Lancashire police and ICMFP.
Can I pay in installments?
Can I pay in installments?
suddenmoves wrote:
Certainly; ten pounds a week until I decide otherwise. Fair?
Secret_squirrel wrote:
That pedestrian would have been jam, liberally spread along about sixty feet of road
Looks like a schoolboy as
Looks like a schoolboy as well!
it was more a van – the type
it was more a van – the type that does ‘gardening’ jobs cash in hand. Bet you a million bikes that the driver was not insured or taxed and likely banned. But as the other article points out – there are no Police policing the roads so who cares?
Fairly or not, Chris Grayling
Fairly or not, Chris Grayling has something of a reputation for being in charge when whatever it is he is in charge of explodes in a catastrophic apocalypse of fiery incompetence and usually at some significant cost to the British taxpayer.
Mungecrundle wrote:
It’s just a coincidence that Boris the Liar and Contemptible Cummings picked such an outstandingly successful, highly experienced in intelligence matters Jonah to head the committee in charge of releasing the report into Russian interference in the referendum and elections.
Total coincidence.
I’ve already emailed my MP about it, and that they’ve thrown Julian Lewis out of the party for daring to follow HoC rules and having a non-partisan vote for chair of the committee. Banana republics are looking on in amazement.
The Grauniad had an op-ed,
The Grauniad had an op-ed, said Grayling doesn’t so much leave a trail behind him as a line of scorched earth and ruins…
Failing Grayling has been the
Failing Grayling has been the flak jacket for the Cons Gov to hide bigger cases of ineptitude. Without his election to the intel position, other Ministers who thought that they could slither down in their chairs will now have to sit up and ensure that they don’t FU.
“Boris Johnson’s pick” neat
“Boris Johnson’s pick” neat wording from the Graun, well known for spelling errors
Re: the Daily Fail article
Re: the Daily Fail article
I remember the halcyon days of the seventies(!) and it occured to me it was all about ‘working to rule’. Well how about encouraging their readership to do a ‘drive to rule’? They’d soon get rid of those cameras if there was no income from them!
🙂
Another anti-cycling, anti
Another anti-cycling, anti-health decision by Angeliki Stogia. I hope someone finds some dirt on her soon. MCC can and should do better.
There’s already dirt. She’s
There’s already dirt. She’s on the board of NCP. It stinks of a conflict of interest.
Without having any particular
Without having any particular axe to grind in her favour, that’s a little misleading. For starters, it’s not NCP she’s on the board of, it’s NCP Manchester, which is a joint venture between NCP and the council. And she’s not on the board in a personal capacity, but as a representative of the council as part of her transport role. If she left that role, she’d be replaced on the board by whoever took it over.
You could argue that investing in a joint venture gives the council too much of an interest in promoting car travel, but it doesn’t really stack up as a personal conflict of interest.
It seems to me that the Mail
It seems to me that the Mail is complaining that speed cameras are placed to catch speeding drivers rather than at places where speeding drivers are having
accidentscollisions. What is the problem with that point of view? (Apart from it being the Mail and therefore automatically wrong in some people’s opinion.)That’s not what they’re
That’s not what they’re saying, though. They’re claiming that camera locations have been determined by the number of speeding drivers (rather than the number of collisions, and that that could only have been motivated by a desire to maximise revenue generation.
But the policy could have been motivated by a number of ways of thinking, from the ostenibly reasonable (‘the more speeding drivers we catch, the more that will modify their behaviour and become less dangerous wherever they’re driving’) to the unthinking (‘well, it’s just obvious that more enforcement is better, isn’t it?’), without having to assume that it was venal.
the cameras at no2 in their
the cameras at no2 in their list,27,705 tickets issued, are on the A12 Suffolk/Essex border, it has been and probably always will be a notorious local spot for speeding traffic,and the accidents they do cause,the average speed cameras are there to try and curtail that speeding and to protect some very old style little chance of joining at an appropriately similar speed to the dual carriageway junctions there.
but the speed limit on that road is still 70mph, so each of those 27,705 vehicles was travelling faster than the maximum permitted speed on UK roads.
in fact the local police released figures only last month, an Audi (quelle surprise) was caught at 111mph on that stretch of road during lockdown, so thats 27,706 tickets.
and thats not even the highest speed I think theyve recorded on that section of road, but Ill let the Daily Mail tell the story of that one… https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5459793/Soldier-escapes-driving-ban-despite-caught-130mph.html
so why is there any complaint at all about those people being caught speeding ?
Shock report: police “go out
Shock report: police “go out and catch criminals”
“Dear Bedford police…I’ve. if any of them are here I’d like them back please” ?
“Dear Bedford police…I’ve had an s works venge nicked, a trek madone, a cervelo s5…
EddyBerckx wrote:
Don’t forget the Dogma F10! :o)
Did you see their Facebook
Did you see their Facebook post about this? They’ve got a yard full of bikes – looks like Oxford train Station.
Quote:
Some people probably see Mail Online headlines and think “Wow, all those words, some in uppercase, so it must be true.” It makes my head hurt just trying to imagine being that thick.
There’s nought so satisfying
There’s nought so satisfying as a prejudice confirmed. As ever, the Mail strikes a pernicious note, that the police and cycling Mikey should leave “innocent” motorists alone, focus on something that doesn’t kill 1,000 people a year (the Mail’s source is the HMIC annual report, the same as for the Road.cc story about less road policing = less people alive – “nought to satisfying…”)
When there’s a Dorset police “No Excuse” bust of a speeding/uninsured/ disqualified/ drug-driving Audi/Rover reported, there’s always a minority view of “your a disgrace dorset police” in the comments and then there’s Cycling Mikey’s current experience…
There are far too many
There are far too many motorists driving without insurnace, tax etc and until the Police and other authorities get that sorted there is no way anyone should be considering any form of registration etc for bikes. Priorities, get them sorted. It’s not that difficult to check a taxed car, so why are there loads on the roads? Same with insurance
Quote:
I’m pretty sure that bicycles are also traffic…
Bike path on the Stray – but
Bike path on the Stray – but not really. It’s not your fault, it’s misleading reporting by local papers. This is the Stray land where the bike path is going to go. It should never have been part of the Stray in the first place.
For what it’s worth, this is the full, lamentable story of a council (North Yorkshire) failing to build a bike path that was supposed to be completed in July 2018.
cycle lanes must not be put
cycle lanes must not be put in, they cost too much money and cyclists dont use them anyway! can i just leave this here please.
now if cycle lanes were any good, smooth, SAFE, and drivers actually gave way at give way lines, if they got you to where you wanted to go without ever having to switch back to a main road, or slammed you into a lamp post, maybe, just maybe, they would be used, and over half the current car journeys in the uk could be made by other means. Ive just watched my neighbour. He left in his car at 707. He came back in his car with a milk carton at 712…… yes im a creep. But its annoying! stop driving around when you can cycle or walk it! oh also, the blue bmw in the clip, i told the local council about it, they said” i see nothing wrong with the bmw driver, you stopped in good time’… Bollocks to them then. I wonder if i actually crash into a car bonnet, then will they take notice?
Well it’s a really stupid
Well it’s a really stupid layout.
Apart from the last one, the drivers were fine.
hirsute wrote:
But they did all break the law by not stopping at the stop line.
“Cycle lanes “can’t come at a
“Cycle lanes “can’t come at a catastrophic cost to traffic flow” says Crispin Blunt MP”
Well, in every case I’ve seen, cycle lanes improve traffic flow, and they increase the profits of local businesses, but hey, this is a tory, so let’s not let facts get in his way. Has nobody told Crispin that this is his party’s policy now? Still, with the example of the ICS committee and Julian Lewis, tomorrow’s headlines will be full of how he’s been thrown out.
Hopefully, biased, illogical, petrol head opposition to sensible measures will have a catastrophic cost to this MP’s future as a politician.
My guess is that Blunt has
My guess is that Blunt has done his political sums. We live in a land where bar-room grand talk becomes policy.
A few of us are battling thiis issue out in the Southampton Echo – every day a new letter appears “aren’t the cycle lanes terrible, my 2 mile journey takes twice as long”, ” you know what, I’m going to pollute even more if they remain by driving more slowly”, “will somebody please think of the disabled?”, “cars are the lifeblood of the city, the shops will all close without them, how will we get to the football”, “cyclists want us all to live In mud huts”, “Fluffy the kitten needs to go to the vet’s, but it’s 4 miles away – you do want him to go,don’t you?”
OK, the last two are a bit of a fabrication on my part, but there’s a real danger of these lanes being a fleeting memory, a lost opportunity – like April 2020.
David9694 wrote:
Yes, I know what you mean. You can win all the arguments with logic, facts and data, but it doesn’t make any difference. Trying to change peoples minds when they believe something is very, very difficult. There has been quite a lot of research on it, and even when you do change their minds, they revert to the original belief the day after.
I was reading something the
I was reading something the other day about how lazy our brains are. Basically we tend to believe the first thing we encounter. They tested it with buffet lines and invariably the first 3 or 4 dishes visited were the most popular even when they reversed the order of the dishes.
Didn’t Homer Simpson once
Didn’t Homer Simpson once complain that he didn’t want to learn anything new in case it pushed out stuff that he already had in his brain…?
Not sure we’re even changing
Not sure we’re even changing many minds, in the polarised world of the comment columns.
You don’t get an answer when you ask “where does it end?” Or “what’s the alternative?”
The ‘how will the emergency
The ‘how will the emergency services get through’ seems to be a popular one too,people have just become accustomed to driving out the way instantly,not pull over when it’s safe to do so or plan ahead, so popup lanes where you cant move the cones end up with cyclists as the target for peoples anger that because the ambulance cant get through as quickly might cause people to die.
And the implication is always
And the implication is always of some kind of mic-drop moment “ah-ha, you hadn’t thought of THAT, had you?”. The letter-writers have so much more sense than everyone else.
I work in The Netherlands and
I work in The Netherlands and I can tell you that cycle lanes that remove roads do not improve traffic flow, of course there are less cars due to more people cycling, but simply do the math, if you go from 2 lanes to 1, you reduce 50% of the available road, thus you need 50% reduction of cars just to be equal which does not happen, however the dutch (largely) embrace the value of the cycle lane and accept it, this is what we need to do as a country. Crispin is simply cycle hater, unfortunately way too many MP’s are selfish short sighted idiots
So in The Netherlands, where
So in The Netherlands, where I assume the cycle lane will be fully used, if you look at the total throughput of people before and after the cycle lane replaces a car lane (reducing car space by 50%), is the total result positive or negative?
Traffic ‘evaporates’ though.
Traffic ‘evaporates’ though. When filtering / cycle lanes / pedestrianised areas are built the traffic does not ‘catastrophically’ grind to a halt. The area becomes cleaner, quieter, more friendly and more wealthy. (Houses in quiet, traffic free neighbourhoods increase their value) However when you build a multi lane ‘by pass’ or ‘ring road’ – these do grind to a halt.
what’s important to note
what’s important to note however is that when the number of available lanes are reduced, less drivers pick that road to drive down because it is no longer an efficient way to get to their destination, so it’s not as if there are 2 lanes worth of drivers all still fighting to fit into the 1 lane.
those who still do and then rant and rave about how the loss of a lane has ruined everything, are those incapable of planning ahead their route or thinking in general.
Which road used matters though, because if it’s the only road to a location many people go to, there is no alternative option to travel by instead and so you face issues of almost all of the traffic remaining. the solution is to build a purposeful route for cyclists away from traffic, or improve the area’s level of accessibility. Crispin is so short-sighted he would make ridiculous statements without even trying to first come up with alternative suggestions.