Road Danger Reduction isn't enough

The latest Lambeth Life has popped through my letterbox with a piece about the draft Lambeth Transport Plan saying "The overall goal is to adopt a new approach to transport called Road Danger Reduction"

The reality is that people choose to walk and cycle on our streets when they feel safe and comfortable, regardless of how dangerous the streets actually are.

Lambeth's approach must focus on 'Road Fear Reduction'.

A little bit of this is about providing training to road users in the fundamentals of road etiquette (which may not be the ones that first come to mind in our motor-centric country).

But the bulk of Road Fear Reduction is about ensuring that, whether intentionally or inadvertently, motor vehicle users don't deter those wishing to travel in an active manner. More than that, because active travel is the beneficial form to the health and wellbeing of both people and the planet, those planning the conditions in which motor vehicles can be used need to adopt an approach which positively encourages people to walk and cycle.

In other words we must ensure the conditions for walking and cycling make these choices feel absolutely delightful, as well as not actually being dangerous.

The same of course applies in terms of the relationship between cyclists and pedestrians as the recent issue on the Thames Path demonstrates.

And, to be clear, I'm not suggesting for a moment that motorised transport isn't useful, just that it musn't denigrate the experience for non-motorised users of that space.

Lambeth's Transport Strategy (aka LIP)

I haven't yet read the draft, but I hope it starts along these lines:

Within three years Lambeth will be a place where anyone, whether a primary school child or a granny, able or doddery, resident or visitor, can thoroughly enjoy walking and cycling on our streets in a convivial way, absolutely without fear of being harassed of knocked over by the driver of a motor vehicle.

Within these three years those needing to use a motor vehicle in Lambeth will realise and accept their total responsibility not to frighten or bully (let alone injure or kill) those who wish to walk and cycle.

Vroom, Vroom Peer Group

When you respond to a planning application that response is available for others to view, presumably so it can inform their response or allow inaccuracies to be challenged.
I'm indebted to the SE1 blog's Twitter feed section for sharing a letter of objection to a planning permission application to extend the Boris Bikes docking station outside Southwark's Hop Exchange from the Managing Director of property company Peer Group.

In the letter the MD, Howard J Dawson (who may or may not be the same person as the J. H. Dawson on the letterhead's listing of company directors) claims "the cycle docking stations are an unsightly addition to the streetscape" that "The council is irresponsible in encouraging cyclists...." and finds it "regrettable that TfL does not spend its resources more usefully repairing the roads and footpaths and making adequate provision for cars which already pay excessively for the privilege of using the borough's roads"

Each to their own view, although why anyone would favour stuffing up Southwark's roads with more noisy, polluting, space wasting, unsightly cars that have the capacity to be far more damaging when used carelessly by their users than bicycles do is beyond me.

It is perhaps not surprising that a quick Google throws up a very strong association between the Peer Group and Britain's most prolific manufacturer of racing cars.

Promising intent from TfL and Lambeth Council

Well done to Lambeth Council's Transport and Highways department for taking up my suggestion to minimise one way paint signage when they resurface Wincott Street / Reedworth Street shortly to avoid having to redo the paint when the streets are made two-way for cycling. And well done to them for planning to make the streets two-way for cycling!

Thanks also to Cllr. Steve Morgan in Prince's Ward for pursuing this.

 Thanks also to Lambeth Council's Transport Planning and Strategy department for eliciting fantastic news from TfL that they are looking to improve Lambeth Bridge's scarily narrow northbound cycle lane, making it 1.5m wide when they resurface this summer through removing the very dodgy narrow cycle lane southbound in favour of the shared cycle/bus lane.

Where should this child cycle?

I chatted to MP Kate Hoey and St Thomas' Hospital Chair Patricia Moberly as the Prince's Ward Coffee Morning today. They were clear that they viewed the ban as a solution to several constituents complaining about some reckless cyclists on the Thames Path and that it wasn't their view.

I also got the distinct impression that neither of them used a bike to get around and neither had considered what the alternatives to the South Bank felt like to people who did ride bikes.

I don't know the kid in the photo below. It was nudging 4pm this Saturday afternoon and he was cycling along the Thames Path with his mum walking along. I was coming the other way and had been contrasting the Thames Path with the alternative road route.

 Below is the on-road route (the Jubilee Greenway, National Cycle Route 4, A road, Red Route...) around 4pm this Saturday. A nice weekend recreational cycling space for families?

 What was it like on the Thames Path around 4pm on this Saturday?
Space outside the London Eye

 Rammed outside the Aquarium. I don't know the cyclist in the photo but it's obvious why he's got off his bike. Like every other cyclist I've seen on the Thames Path since I've been doing this blog he  was being considerate to pedestrians (not to say that there aren't some nutters as I'm sure there will be some - probably the same nutters who drive in cycle lanes on the road).

 Now it thins out

 and here's the bit by St Thomas' where the 'No Cycling' signs have gone up. The chap with the bike had remounted and ridden off.

In an age when we're aiming to encourage people to travel actively it is clear that the alternative cycling route is appalling in comparison to the Thames Path. If the authorities work to really improve the local roads to make them friendly for kids, grannies and everyone else wanting to ride bikes I'll bet fewer cyclists will use the Thames Path.

The Thames Path at 11am this Saturday morning

 A little busy outside the wheel but loads of space outside the Aquarium

 An empty tunnel

An almost empty Thames Path

Westminster, Brent and the City versus cycling

On Thursday I went to teach in a Primary School just north of Queen's Park Station in Brent, adjoining Westminster. I took the cycle route signed here in Westminster and turned right as marked. So far so good:

 Still in Westminster I came to the next junction which had no sign post so I assumed straight on would be the way although the sign says dead end.

Still just in Westminster I saw a sign confirming I was on the right track, though there was no dropped kerb.

 I obeyed the sign and went straight ahead crossing the three lane gyratory

 into the lane opposite, now in Brent, and through the car park

 to come out onto the same gyratory that I had just crossed and needed to cross again.

 The school was on the next road with a continuous stream of motor traffic

and car parking (or school run drop off) spaces slap bang outside. There were no cycle parking racks in the school.

Not all the kids were able to make it up a slight incline (not really a hill) without stopping, maybe due to not cycling frequently enough to know how to work the gears effectively or build up their stamina. That road ran alongside the local Queen's Park which would have been a great place for the kids to develop bike skills and stamina, except that the sign clearly says 'No Cycling'

 and the park is controlled by, you guessed, the City of London.

Game, set and match to the authorities versus those trying to encourage cycling.