Council spends £55k turning cycle lane into car parking

You really can't fault a Council when it comes to paying through the nose for nonsense.

This reminds me of a ride I did recently that took in Godalming, Surrey.  Into which on the main road for part of the way there is, pleasingly, a cycle lane (only one way mind) in the form of a painted white line at the side of the road.

However, as you near town, the Council in their brilliance have placed new pedestrian "refuge islands" in the middle of the road in several places, which force the traffic right to the kerb.  How have they dealt with the cyclists?  Simple, the white line stops a few metres before the island pinch point, and carries on after. About as dangerous a solution as you could imagine.  Shortly after in any event, it turns into the usual fiasco with cars parked across the cycle lane anyway.

  With ficktards like that in charge, what hope is there?

Only in Britain! All off-carriageway cycle lanes like this are doomed from the outset because cyclists lose the priority that is automatically theirs when using the road running alongside. The precedent was set over 70 years ago when the first dual-carriageways were built with cycle lanes constructed to run parallel, none of them with priority over side roads. The irony is that many of these cycle lanes are of decent width and properly surfaced, unlike the shared use footpaths dodging lamposts and bus stops, which are horrible to ride on because they receive no engineering whatsoever.

The best form of cycle lane is that provided by a white line on the road itself.  Drivers tend to follow white lines. The problem, as always, comes when vehicles park on them.

Well shoot me down but I sympathise with the resisdents on this street. I lived on a similar but busier road to this and it's not about parking near home but finding anywhere to park that wasn't on a cycle path or caused traffic disruption.  We have to remember that roads aren't just there to get from A to B but people like us actually live on them.

We've got a shared pavement/cycle path along the seafront in Brighton.

It's a fucking liability, especially in the summer, with stupid parents letting their kids run around in it, people nonchantly walking down it hand in hand admiring the view and not paying attention to anything around them and those who see nothing in front of them but their phone screen.

Awful idea.

Just to be clear on road cc's 2 main stories today:

Cyclists in Manchester are charged £50 for riding on pavement due to endangering pedestrians

Cars in Stoke are blocking cycle lanes so being rewarded with £55k car park and putting cycles on pavements.

Genius!

Presumably the council will charge each householder the £2300 cost for their parking space as undoubtedly it'll add to to value of their property.

Sad state. £55,000 of taxpayers money used to help people store their private property slightly closer to their homes rather than sort out the problems with some old and, not particularly well designed, actual cycle infrastructure.

When segregated lanes get raised at planning meetings the cry is always that changes to drainage will be prohibitively expensive. This will not be the case here as it was built for the purpose. It just needs basic changes to junctions to bring it up to modern design standards and enforcement to stop people parking on it and you'll have the basis of some good infrastructure that kids and more vulnerable users may actually use. Of course it still needs to connect to places people want to go but removing it shrinks any network opportunities and makes cycling even less likely to be taken as the convenient option it should often be.

Just use the road after the cycle lane is removed, but remember to take primary position and it's not your fault that you can only cycle at 8mph.

@ Frog:   Yes, I'd noticed how all those cities with inadequate cycling facilities were all recording incredible growth in cycling; especially amongst the young and women...

No surprise that no one uses the cycle lane if you have to give way to side roads. Pointess having segregated cycle paths if they are done this poorly.

I'm just not sure how it costs 55 grand to take down a couple of cycle path signs!

In some ways a sad loss to a very forward thinking scheme from sometime in the 50's I believe. This was a properly segregated cycle lane. I've rarely ever used it in my 54 years as even before the scourge of it being used as a car park it had problems. Being segregated, even in the days when the roads and gutters were regularly swept, it was often full of "rubbish" that you worried would lead to punctures. This is still true as well as having dodge the parked car at certain points.

Once again car is king.

"The scheme is also designed to help improve residential parking and will allow residents to park much closer to their properties." 

Yeah, because walking is just meh 

in my opinion, dedicated cycle lanes are a failure; we are road users and only need a 1 meter lane at each side of the road. Everyone is happy: pedestrians have a dedicated pavement , drivers are not hampered by riders and riders keep the road user status. 

But then, this lane should be clear of any parking car ... It's the road after all, not a cycle lane.

Why aren't yhe parking on their drives? These house have enough space between the house and the pavement.

Quotes that cyclists have had near misses with people parking on the lane suggest the drivers are at fault not the infrastructure.

Too be honest, having no cycle lane is preferable to a poorly designed one. No way would I use this designated lane shared with pedestrians and which yields to every minor side road. It's simply not safe unless you slow to walking pace which then makes the whole cycling thing rather pointless.

Brilliant, so a rubbish cycle lane doesn't get used, partly because inconsiderate motorists use it to park and then get reward by the council giving in and handing them free public land to park their cars, and it's to going to cost council tax payers for the work to be done too.