“They are wrong”: Mayor denounces council cycle lane plan as a return to “chaos”; Councillor baffled that cyclocross used “the green areas” of park; Olympic champion Kenny backs new velodrome proposal in West Midlands + more on the live blog
SUMMARY
Soudal Quick-Step reveal lime flecks for 2026 jersey
I’ll admit I’m not a fan of Soudal Quick-Step’s 2026 jersey. It wasn’t helped that a few leaked, low-quality photos are never going to show a kit in its best light. But, with their lycra now officially launched, I’m willing to cut them a little more slack.
Soudal say the kit “represents an evolution of the team’s iconic blue identity” that “incorporates a vivid electric-lime element, a deliberate move inspired by the Shine for Safety visibility campaign launched during this year’s Ardennes Classics.”
“Safety sits at the core of the team’s philosophy, influencing everything from rider education to equipment choice, and the introduction of electric lime reflects that commitment. By boosting on-road visibility during races, training rides, and everyday use, the kit enhances how quickly riders can be seen by other road users and is a simple but meaningful step toward improving safety.”
And the team even managed to get a quote from their sprint supremo Tim Merlier who unsurprisingly is a fan of the whole thing. “We all spend a huge amount of time training on open roads, so anything that helps us be more visible is a big positive.
“I love that this kit keeps the team’s classic look but gives us that extra visibility. I will be very proud to wear this kit in some of the biggest races and hope it brings us lots of success.”
Soudal Quick-Step have even put together a snappy video set to rap music, which is the style of the time.
Sadly though, there’ll be no smiling Remco Evenepoel carrying the team’s media operation going forward, after the Belgian star rocked up at the Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe team camp last week. The three-time Time Trial World Champion confirmed he’d target the Tour de France alongside Florian Lipowitz and avoid both the Giro d’Italia and the spring classics before the Ardennes.
Council demands “urgent action” from bike hire operators to “fix persistent problems”
Cycling must be a little too popular in Islington at the moment, and no-one, Lime Bikes included, seems ready for it.
West Midlands velodrome campaign supported by Olympic Champion Laura Kenny
When Birmingham agreed to host the 2026 Commonwealth Games, one early question was where would host the track cycling events, given the West Midlands lacks a velodrome of its own. Since then, the Games were brought forward to 2022 and went ahead with Lee Valley Velodrome in the Olympic Park hosting track events. But that hasn’t deterred the campaign for a velodrome to be built in the West Midlands.
Last year, Dudley Council commissioned a business case review looking into constructing a facility with the cooperation of the West Midlands Combined Authority. However, since the then Mayor of the West Midlands Andy Street lost re-election last year, no action has been taken on commissioning a feasibility study.
That hasn’t deterred campaigner David Viner, who has kept the original petition open and amassed more than 10,000 signatures including from Olympic medallists and World Champions Laura Kenny, Matthew Richardson and Lizzie Deignan.
Fellow campaigner Charlie Dickens said “We are incredibly grateful to these great cycling champions for giving their backing. If we are successful in getting the velodrome, it is possible it might be located within the Black Country.”
DUP councillor bemoans "terrible state" of park from cyclocross event
To Northern Ireland now where cycling fervour seems to have given one man a fever, after one Mid-Ulster councillor decided to provoke the internet with his thoughts on the state of a park in his Dungannon ward.
“Our parks are for everyone to use including cyclists,” the DUP’s Clement Cuthbertson wrote. “However if the ground conditions are not suitable, I would question the logic of permitting events to happen on the green areas. Windmill Wood has been left in a terrible state for those who walk the area daily.”
The Wood, for what it’s worth, was used for the Ulster Cyclocross Championships on the 7th December, an event for which the organisers would have needed to obtain relevant permission. Not that this detail seemed to bother Cuthbertson, who recently served a suspension from Mid-Ulster District Council after erroneously posting on social media that a children’s Gaelic football tournament “continues to idolise convicted terrorists”.
Thankfully grass and soil can repair itself, unlike tarmac or even concrete. And Cllr Clement Cuthbertson was quick to be informed of this fact…
“It’s grass, it’ll grow back in no time” wrote Iggy Smith.
“The long term benefits both physically and mentally of these events for attendees and the inspiration to the youth of today to get out there, get fit, be dedicated and active.. far outweighs the short term loss of grass seen by some busy bodies,” David Murray wrote in the most liked comment.
“It will grow back not like the cars [that] wrecked the paths which was far worse.” Doris Finlay wrote, before adding “I like to see the bikes. We don’t have a lot in Dungannon so nice to see a crowd of people coming to the woods and enjoying their day out ?”
Maybe we can all be a bit more Doris…
UPDATE: Cllr Cuthbertson has deleted his original Facebook post and uploaded a new update defending his position, saying “there was no need for this [green] space to be cut up,” adding that Council Officers say that “that lessons have been learned from this event and that better management will be in place going forward.”
Given Windmill Wood has been used for cyclocross events in the past, one can only presume that the council did not know what cyclocross was and what it entails…
Cuthbertson also had a message for “cycling enthusiasts” who he said had “felt it appropriate to hurl abuse at me both privately and publicly on this platform: you clearly do not know me. I will never be intimidated from representing the people of the Dungannon area.”
Last minute Xmas gift for under £6000!
*Adopts Lord Kitchener pose…*
Do YOU like crushing stones? Do YOU like riding a turbo trainer? Do YOU live in or around Droitwich and have a spare few thousand pounds? I think we’ve found you a perfect Xmas present…
Behold, the pedal powered stone crusher, yours for only £5336. Plus postage which might be… steep.
Why don’t cyclists use the bike path? Because it fell in the river...
This is a sad, unfortunate story. What makes it all the more surreal is the presence of Timmy Mallett in this article. If that’s not sufficient bait to make you click then I don’t know what is…
When rivals are teammates...
We’ve got a few intra-team rivalries brewing up for 2026, Evenepoel-Lipowitz, Ayuso-Skjelmose, Bernal-Rodriguez-Arensman-Vauquelin-Onley. And thankfully, the ever-informative Inner Ring blog has posted a lovely little throwback to soothing past quarrels…
“We need a show of unity from our two leaders at the Tour” “Put them in the same jersey” “They already wear the same team jersey” “Put them in the same jersey”
— the Inner Ring blog (@inrng.com) 16 December 2025 at 12:14
‘Brothers’ Hinault and LeMond bound together by the same cloth. Just tremendous…
FDJ-Suez release 2026 kit
Devoted readers may remember on Friday when I did a deep dive on several of the kit releases made already. Kudos went to the courageous, black marks went to the boring.
Well, the drip-feed of new looks is still coming, and Ineos Grenadiers are due to release their 2026 look later this week. In the meantime, let’s have a look at FDJ Suez, aiming to once again become the first French team to win the Tour de France Femmes, albeit likely with the Dutch rider Demi Vollering.
Honestly I’m not sure about this, the sponsors seem too compressed around the chest leaving swathes of empty space over the stomach and back. Meanwhile black is still dull, compared with the blue and white pattern that gave the team a more explicitly French feel. This kit, despite being modelled by Évita Muzic – former French champion and 4th at the TdFF in 2024, just doesn’t show the same sense of identity that its predecessor had. Ah well, you can’t have them all…
"He's gonna need bigger overshoes..."
Uno-X fast man Erlend Blikra has had a good year, starting to step into the shoes of retiring teammate Alexander Kristoff, all whilst racking up all important UCI points that secured the Norwegian team WorldTour status for the first time.
But it seems like his winter training isn’t quite as smooth as he’d like it.
Turn on the sound for the full experience…
Active travel progress "slows" in Wales, as campaigners warn "less effective" cycling infrastructure possible under new funding changes
It’s never a good sign when a respected report finds that none of its recommendations have been implemented…
"They are wrong": Mayor denounces council cycle lane plan as a return to "chaos"
Remember when we covered the “outrage” of the proposals made by Peterborough council to restore a cycle lane on Crescent Bridge?
Well, sharing the outrage is Paul Bristow, Conservative Mayor of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough and a former MP for the city. In a Facebook post he says the temporary cycle lane “caused chaos” during COVID, adding that “I work with Peterborough City Council on all sorts of things. We are developing a good relationship?
“But on this they are wrong. It’s important they change their mind.” Bristow then urges readers to sign the petition on his website, denouncing the infrastructure. He’s also attached a video of himself chatting with the former council leader describing the plan as “utter bonkers”
Bristow claims “we all want active travel but what we don’t want is to see a war on motorists”. Where have we heard that before…
As we previously reported, the cycle lane proposal is still only in the planning stage, and council infrastructure planning isn’t exactly the speediest. The cycle lane, if it actually materialises, might not be here for a while.
Depressingly, the Facebook comments are largely supportive of the petition, including from other elected officials.
“Thank you Paul Bristow, for your solidarity with motorists. […] Reducing lanes and closing roads only creates bottlenecks and congestion, and the push for congestion charges is a clear sign of an anti-motorist agenda. Your support makes a real difference” wrote Cambridge Councillor Delowar Hossain.
“I recall chaos during [Covid-19] for all emergency vehicles when the cycle lane over the bridge was introduced… Maybe the police & fire & ambulance services should add their voices to the protest to reintroduce another cycle lane” mused Rowena Sampson.
Our voice of reason came from Steve Baxter who wrote “As a cyclist, what do you do? It’s dangerous to ride on the road both ways, and there isn’t enough space on the path to ride. Maybe one side of the path needs removing, and a crossing added on both sides of the bridge.
“But then that causes even more of a nightmare for everyone. The solution should have been sorted 20 years ago, another bridge for pedestrians and cyclists. This bridge was never built for what it’s used for.”
Now more pedestrian and cycling infrastructure is an idea we can definitely get behind…
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Latest Comments
@Dodonline Look up "Induced Demand" adding capacity does not work.
@chrisonabike ...have impersonated Dutch bike shop owners, people with disabilities, and possibly different genders / sexualities. And have gone from broken English to perfect fluency in a week or so Only a few of us remember those hilariously inept impersonations!
@belugabob Unfortunately going down this route is likely to be a missed opportunity. "Safer streets" can be done in a way that allows access to a virtuous circle with whole suite of benefits. But ... that would mean following something like in NL. So "sustainable safety" - a different philosophy of transport, plus gradual infra and organisational changes over decades. Generally opportunities for concentrations of money beat that. So it looks like we'll get "probably safer on average" but with who knows what side effects, while concentrating insane amounts of power (money) in the hands of a very few. And those will be effectively unaccountable, being almost all overseas, and not having to live in the same streets as their products (they may be flying)...
@Fursty Ferret "...regulator" That should be little comfort, because during previous scandals it became clear that in many cases the regulators were easily hoodwinked, or (especially US) they rely on the companies themselves to mark their own homework. (And in the case of SUVs/light trucks, I heard the US government has been hard a-lobbying the likes of Europe and the UK for "reciprocal recognition" e.g. to accept their product as is without further checks). Needing the makers to help / do the checks is even more likely given the complexity of self-driving vehicles. I suspect self-driving vehicles will likely soon be safer on average than human drivers (a low bar). Of course I think other potential consequences are also a matter of concern (not least - in *theory* humans can be held accountable, but holding humans in large companies accountable for their tech is a *lot* harder)...
@mdavidford Celebrity traitors with Lance? Worse - some of these slippery lycrist quislings deceive people that they're a) pedestrians - by getting off their bike and b) drivers - by getting into their cars! It's all on display in this forum, where IIRC such cyclists have appeared under multiple names, have impersonated Dutch bike shop owners, people with disabilities, and possibly different genders / sexualities. And have gone from broken English to perfect fluency in a week or so...
Politician in "fixing things for my mates / companies I have an interest in" shocker!
@mdavidford Could make that shorter - "we’re letting too many people drive" * I would bet to a first approximation the "damage" could be predicted by number of humans times time driven. Most effective way to fix that - without the UK's "just get rid of the vulnerable road users" - is to remove the motorists, to padded individual lanes, far away from vulnerable road users. Though they'll still crash (and into each other). * Should be "we have incentivised people so that most of them see 'driving' as the solution to most of their transport needs, as well as being part of their status as adults, and we could usefully change that *and* it would also improve health, the economy, the environment..."
@This Wreckage The other point is the observation that efforts to fix the transport systems which reduce motoring convenience almost always meet with very noisy opposition. But when a lot of motor (through) traffic has been removed it turns out that people don't want to go back. They don't all necessarily say how much nicer it is or connect that to the lack of motor traffic. But this experiment has been run in many different localities in different countries and the results seem to hold. Caveats as usual - it's always possible for authorities to bungle things terribly - or even deliberately mess things up with ulterior motives. And people have to have enough time to adapt to the new situation, which is probably nearer a year or two.
@This Wreckage And yet - in the poorest parts of where I stay (Edinburgh) it's not uncommon to see bikes with flat tyres rusting in the closes of flats, or on balconies, and they aren't all kids' bikes... I do agree that storage is an issue. IIRC some places (Edinburgh now) are starting to bring in guidance on having some cycle storage for new flats. Nothing like NL though where for decades it's been a part of the building regulations. I think most people who don't own a bike have simply never considered owning a bike as adults, because they're not "cyclists" (e.g. not practicing a sport) and transport cycling isn't "a thing" for most people in the UK currently.
It's really not smart to alienate so many potential buyers by putting hookless rims on a road bike. I personally don't think it's safe, but everyone can agree it greatly limits tire choices and inflation pressures. Both very important things on a road bike.
45 thoughts on ““They are wrong”: Mayor denounces council cycle lane plan as a return to “chaos”; Councillor baffled that cyclocross used “the green areas” of park; Olympic champion Kenny backs new velodrome proposal in West Midlands + more on the live blog”
Can we have some sort of
Can we have some sort of public service announcement / awareness programme to what the actual definition of ‘chaos’ is? I swear that 95% use it to describe a couple of cars waiting in a queue.
Empty wrote:
When I used to drive a van for my local hospice, I had to leave it in a back lane while I went in to the shop. Three minutes later, a rather vertically challenged man stormed into the shop, demanding that the van was moved as it was “causing chaos”: two cars, him and one other.
In Peterborough, “chaos”
In Peterborough, “chaos” applies to a 5 minute longer SUV journey made to a fast food drive through (the anticipated fat, sugar and salt hit makes time drag).
Yeah. I’ve been to the city a
Yeah. I’ve been to the city a few times for the now defunct Cambridgeshire closed road ride and it seemed to be a strange place with lots of dual carriageway type roads everywhere (and i did see quite a few fast food places).
What usually happens when
What usually happens when there’s a slow down on the road is that everybody waits their turn and allows traffic to join from side roads, in accordance with the rules.
Chaos would be drivers shunting each other out of the way, driving on the wrong side of the road, taking short-cuts though back gardens, ramming through walls etc. I’ve never seen it happen, although it’s fairly common to mount the pavement to save half a second on a journey.
“Maybe the police & fire &
“Maybe the police & fire & ambulance services should add their voices to the protest to reintroduce another cycle lane”
I can’t remember the source, presumably somewhere here on RCC, of polling of emergency services on whether segregated cycle lanes cause them issues.
From what I remember very few, if any, responses indicated that was the case…
And in that clip they should have counted how many cars behind them only had one occupant (the driver), moving in a slow queue (the aforementioned chaos?).
Imagine how much less motor traffic there would have been if each (or most) of those drivers was cycling…
I believe that the emergency
I believe that the emergency services have to be consulted if there is significant roadworks or hard engineering changes. So if people put in bollards, segregated lanes, they will already have expressed their view via some statutory process.
mitsky wrote:
If they made the cycle lanes wide enough then emergency services could use them to by pass the queues of traffic that really are holding them up.
Like me if you’re abso-f*#
Like me if you’re abso-f*#$ing-lutely sick of hearing the phrase “War on motorist”.
Clearly the phrase is still a
Clearly the phrase is still a lodestar of Conservative policy at all levels.
Peterborough is in the process of spending £65m on rebuilding the approach to the rail station and walking and cycling links from the station to the city centre. That photo shown is contained within the scheme, so it is only right and proper that cycling provision should be included.
Peterborough is a fat city and people need to be encouraged to get out of their cars.
Bristow and Fitzgerald really need to develop some vision and look beyond money and tipping their caps to disastrous Tory policy.
A few years ago, these two were photographed with Liz Truss, when Fitzgerald was PCC leader and Bristow was the MP for Peterborough. What a collectors item that would be (not for reasons any of them think, but more for appreciation of comedy genius).
Peterborough is interesting
Peterborough is interesting in that it’s car- infested (with a long axis -Lincoln road) and in a rural area (also associated with high motor use).
BUT it is kind of possible for traffic to bypass (though no ring road exactly there is the A15 / A1159). And it’s very poor in parts so cheaper transport should be a concern.
AND it actually has a historic cycle/active travel network! Fragmented, certainly. Narrow, grubby, inconvenient and lacking in social safety in places, true. But a genuine effort was made including grade-separated crossings of the Lincoln Road, and that could potentially be made much more useful. Oh, and it’s flat, and East coast so “but we have weather” is less of a thing (except wind).
I really hope Peterborough
I really hope Peterborough Council stick two fingers up at that odious man and actually speed up the introduction of the cycle lane.
Peterborough does have a good
Peterborough does have a good parkway and ringroad system. It is very easy and quick to get around the city by car. In recent decades, the council has allowed the construction of several satellite retail parks, which have added to the volume of cars travelling to and around the area.
The problem with the parkway system is that rising volumes of car traffic have resulted in bottlenecks near the city centre. This is caused by the volume of motor vehicles, not cycles.
There is a decentish network of cycle paths, but they discontinue at the edge of the city centre. There is no safe cycle route into or through the centre, unless you are prepared to dismount and walk for around 800metres or more. And you are right, parts of the existing cycle path system could be improved.
(Incidently, the current cycle network and parkway system was created decades ago by councillors with vision, not people like Fitzgerald. The system was excellent for the volume of vehicle traffic at the time).
Peterborough has trialled park and ride systems, but they were not popular enough with residents.
The current focus is to give cars priority, to try and encourage footfall in the city centre (much footfall has been lost because of a proliferation of low paying warehouse development and the creation of our of town retail parks).
I’ve started using the phrase
I’ve started using the phrase ‘war on active travel’.
I’ve started using the phrase
I’ve started using the phrase ‘war on active travel’
The war has been joined with enthusiasm by Lancashire County Council (guess who is in control!) which has barred one of the newest long distance walk websites from its library WiFi
http://www.roofofenglandwalk.org.uk/
It’ll be road.cc next!
If its new, its likely its
If its new, its likely its been blocked by some random IT/McAfee protocol which someone needs to report to them to get it unblocked. It happens all the time, with the huge amounts of scammers etc computer are too cautious. My old boss was telling me that when emails were first invented for a while his council received no correespondence from Middlsex until they realised that all their stuff was being blocked because of the last 3 letters 😉
I was aware of that- I
I was aware of that- I remember an NHS Trust blocking access on staff WiFi to a pathology website description of ‘water melon stomach’ because of ‘melons’- I was just making festive fun of Reform, to make up for the shame of living in an area that would vote The Horror in
HLaB wrote:
Also known as the Scunthorpe problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scunthorpe_problem
It’s categorised by Palo Alto
It’s categorised by Palo Alto as low risk/travel. But you’re right, a domain that’s under 30 days old could be blocked by default. Obviously I don’t know what firewalls they use or how they have them configured, although it’s unlikely to be McAfee who don’t make hardware.
bensynnock wrote:
That doesn’t count: because it’s real.
“war on motorist” – I’m
“war on motorist” – I’m pretty sure if we had a body count, most people would agree the mostorist was winning that war…
Like Bill Hicks joke about
Like Bill Hicks’ joke about the war on (some) drugs – it’s a “war” being won by those who (mostly) don’t know they’re fighting…
It’s a war on cyclists by the
It’s a war on cyclists by the Tory media.
kingleo wrote:
Ably assisted by the BBC.
What to think of the
What to think of the Transport Police that no longer investigate thefts?
There is no war on cycling. It’s jusy back to normal. The momentum that started during covid is slowing down, or even coming to an end. As a lifelong cyclist who doesn’t drive, I’m annoyed amd frustrated. Yet I better be aware of the reality because I ride almost every day.
Fellow campaigner Charlie
Fellow campaigner Charlie Dickens [should have] said, “If we get a velodrome in the West Midlands it will be the best of times, if we don’t get one it will be the worst of times, to build one will show wisdom, to fail to do so will show foolishness…”
I used to rent at the west
I used to rent at the west end of Thorpe Road which directly goes over the Pottyboro bridge for nearly 10 years. Making it more navigable by bike definiely would have been more ‘right’ for me. The bridge/ roundabout is chaos with or without a cycle lane and the absence of which is a barrier for all but the most confident of cyclists.
I actualy liked when it was most chaotic (no cycle lane present) but merely due to the stupid number of kids getting dropped off at the private school and some other random event. For West to East journey at least. When there’d be a mile long queue over the bridge which I could bypass down the middle and navigate a stationary roundabout (its lethal when traffic is moving). I’d often avoid it all together for east to west journeys as the roundabout is on a gradient that doesn’t do you any favours even though the alternatives were more than twice the length and not ideal security wise either.
Erlend Blikra – when a
Erlend Blikra – when a Norwegian needs a pair of Finns to complete his training session.
Paul Bristow, Conservative
Paul Bristow, Conservative Mayor of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough: a not very elegant demonstration of the Oxford word of the year “rage bait”.
“….the temporary cycle lane “caused chaos” during COVID….” I do hope he’s got evidence for that, and he isn’t just indulging in personal prejudice and massive exaggeration: I’d be surprised if he did have that evidence.
Bristow claims “we all want active travel but what we don’t want is to see a war on motorists”. Condemned from his own mouth. Anyone repeating the lie that there is a war on motorists is a fool and charlatan.
Reminds me of Thursday’s council meeting, extended by at least two hours by the Independents, who just love the sound of their own voices, while achieving rather less than nothing: on Saturday, they put up a large article on the web, explaining how wonderful they are and how much they are accomplishing.
EDIT: I’ve just watched the video, it’s hysterical. All you get to see is their feet. I kept waiting for it to pan up so that you could see the bridge, but no, just feet.
It’s always the cycle lanes
It’s always the cycle lanes that cause the traffic chaos, never too much motor vehicle traffic.
It’s amazing how dumb people
It’s amazing how dumb people are….
eburtthebike wrote:
That’s just road.cc’s dodgy embedding – you either get the top half or the bottom half of the picture, and if you start and stop it it toggles between the two. You need to play it as picture-in-picture to see the whole thing.
mdavidford wrote:
Thanks. Seeing the whole thing, I can see two lines of mostly stationary traffic behind them: chaos, even though there isn’t a cycle lane!
No complaints about cross
No complaints about cross-country running races – I have done a lot in parklands and on commons where the ground becomes a lot worse than shown in the photographs. After a heavy snow thaw, the mud was sometimes knee deep in places.
Wandsworth Council handing
Wandsworth Council handing out speeding tickets to cyclists on Tooting Common (reported also in Times and Telegraph, sharing this link as they’re paywalled): https://www.londoncentric.media/p/speed-cameras-cyclists-london-park-tooting-common
Be interested to know more about the legality of this…
Rendel Harris wrote:
Presumably the charge will state they were scorching along, or flying, and “far too fast”?
But some local authorities
But some local authorities retain historic and often forgotten byelaws relating to bicycle speeds.
In the case of the capital these often date back to the days of the old Greater London Council. London Centric has discovered the same 12mph cycle speed limit also theoretically applies in Battersea Park and Wandsworth Common, as well as in north London’s Finsbury Park, with potentially many other public places affected if councils chose to enforce the law.
The law requiring dogs to be
The law requiring dogs to be on short leads on foot paths should be enforced as well. Twice recently, loose dogs have knocked me off my bike, I was doing about 5 mph. The second time I asked the dog owner for help to get up (I’m 83), he refused but kept shouting abuse at me as I lay injured on the ground, luckily 3 normal people came along and helped me.
kingleo wrote:
Sorry to hear that – hope you don’t let the buggers get you down. You can see this as at least a 3:1 ratio of helpful people to asshats!
Assuming this isn’t a
“Friends of Tooting Common. The volunteer group recently published an open letter saying there is a “particular problem with delivery riders” and urged the council to increase speed checks and build barriers to slow down cyclists, warning the status quo is a “serious accident or fatality waiting to happen”.” (My emphasis.)
Bicycles have been around for decades and cyclists have almost certainly been doing over 12mph for a long time.
How many KSIs have their been?
And assuming this isn’t a permanent thing, it might be worth asking the council to provide the KSI figures before, during and after this is done to show it was worth spending taxpayer money doing this to cyclists rather than drivers.
mitsky wrote:
I’m no fan of the business model of food delivery companies (workers’ rights, outsourcing risk in the public even if the risk from cyclists may be small – not “employees” so not their problem though etc.)
In fairness to the group complaining delivery riders are highly salient. Because livery, because of course they’re working shifts rather than just going a to b like most other riders so are out for hours, because they’re frequently crossing the footway, because they all tend to be on “ebikes”. (Anecdata but while other people do use these the delivery drivers seem more likely to have ones looking like motorbikes, for reasons of “robust” presumably).
And at least in Edinburgh on certain routes and at certain times (but not morning commute hours) you could definitely get the impression that the vast majority of cyclists are food delivery riders.
I wonder whether if another reason for their concerns – perhaps unconscious – is around an “immigrants who don’t understand the rules / can’t be trusted” narrative?
I should clarify, I wasn’t
I should clarify, I wasn’t including electric assist bikes or illegal e-motorbikes in my “over 12mph” comment.
I can average 12mph when commuting on my pedal bike.
That average is including stopping at red lights, being slowed down by queues of drivers etc.
So my cruising speed would be at least 15mph.
And thats me not being very fit and on a second hand £50 bike that isn’t designed for speed.
Re.: Crescent Bridge,
Re.: Crescent Bridge, Peterborough.
The three lane system does not confirm to the Design standards for road design. Each lane should be 3.65m wide, clearly they are not. The local campaigners should ensure the road design conforms to the standards, thereby only two traffic lanes with space for cycling.
Ah, but presumably a turning
Ah, but presumably a turning lane is needed because safety? (Also just happens to be “because capacity”).
I do know even the Dutch are keen on that at junctions.
The fact that such wide lanes are demanded is another thing, although on major routes we are where we are. I know there’s always pressure from bus companies also. Really my beef is we have too many “major routes”, particularly through urban areas…
But 3.65m wide is the
But 3.65m wide is the standard! A right turn lane is recommended to be 3.50m at a minimum, preferably 5.0m. the carriageway on this bridge is not wide enough. If I was local, I would be calling for an RSA to investigate the risk of collision between vehicles on the through lane, with vehicles in the right turn lane.