Bristol:Cycling City Radio 4

[the snail]

There's a programme about the cycling city project on r4 now. A post-mortem, seems like not a great deal has been achieved at the expense of a lot of money, rather depressing.

 

[BSRU]

There's a programme about the cycling city project on r4 now. A post-mortem, seems like not a great deal has been achieved at the expense of a lot of money, rather depressing.

It was on the tv this morning, 22 million spent and a 33% increase in cycle journeys, which may have occurred without spending any money, they expected to at least double the number of cycle journeys.

 

[Hilldodger]

Leicester lost out to Bristol for the money but we've ended up doing far more without the cash through other funding and things like Sky Ride.

One of the reasons given by Cycling England for us not getting the money was that we just do things anyway.

 

[mgarl10024]

Take a look at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-12663323

 

[summerdays]

I find it difficult to take a proper objective view of it. There may be issues over whether the funds have been spent in the best way possible and I don't know in which ways they could have been spent better - I'm neither a financial bod or someone who does large scale planning. Different groups wanted different things out of the scheme - and they were never going to please everyone. What I do know is that I was pleased when Bristol was chosen and that I do think that I have benefited from the scheme in multiple ways. Today I was in part of Bristol that I don't go to very often and I noticed that they have replaced a couple of barriers that used to annoy me with much wider ones making my journey easier. I frequently use one of the new paths which takes a hillock and a corner out of many of my journeys.

The 3 years is a short period of time to bring about change, and they didn't even have the full 3 years. I heard them say on the radio this morning that they were applying for more funds to continue. I certainly want to see cycling kept on the simmer pot rather than disappear to the back of the cupboard now the 3 years is up.

It will be interesting to see how the other cycling towns do as well when we get the full reports next year.

Out of interest what has Leicester done (without the big sums of cash)?

 

[sheddy]

'The leader of the opposition Conservative group on Bristol City Council, Geoff Gollop, said the new cycle routes were to the detriment of motorists.
He said: "The Cycling City initiative brought in match-funding which has delivered new cycling routes but these have largely been achieved at the expense of the majority of road users - by reducing road space or capacity. "Whilst we recognise the merits of promoting cycling as a leisure activity for the individual - delivering personal health benefits and helping to improve the environment for all - this form of travel is unlikely in the near future to be a major means of commuting.'


So said the berk

 

[summerdays]

Most of the new routes were away from roads and therefore didn't take up road space - on Hartcliffe Way they put in a new beside the road path by extending into the vegetation. Admittedly they have taken out some car parking spaces to allow more bicycle parking in places.

I'm trying to think which new routes actually take away from motorised road users - and this is what I can come up with:
Prince Street Bridge - which I don't think was done for cyclists and that not all cyclists like.
The Muller Road traffic light crossing narrows the road - however as it is used as a garage forecourt by the near by garage it didn't take away any space from the motorist really.
Two central 20 mph zones which motorists may see as reducing capacity.
Though I'm sure there are others... perhaps they see the new bike signs painted on the roads as taking away their sole use idea?

 

[Hilldodger]

Out of interest what has Leicester done (without the big sums of cash)?

We have a history of working together on projects and the council supports us. Plus we have very supportive media.

But mainly it's because we have three successful community bike projects (including Cyclemagic) and welll established bike clubs, festivals, bike film festival etc. We've just spent 15 years building our relationships and events up.

Check out the upcoming Building Cycling Cultures conference here in June

 

[summerdays]

We have a history of working together on projects and the council supports us. Plus we have very supportive media.

But mainly it's because we have three successful community bike projects (including Cyclemagic) and welll established bike clubs, festivals, bike film festival etc. We've just spent 15 years building our relationships and events up.

Well we definitely DONT have supportive media ... the exact opposite .. as I think they are trying to generate conflict to increase the number of page views.

So maybe we need to assess how Bristol is doing in another 12 years time then... and hopefully it will be good news.

 

[sheddy]

BM

 

[downfader]

Well we definitely DONT have supportive media ... the exact opposite .. as I think they are trying to generate conflict to increase the number of page views.

So maybe we need to assess how Bristol is doing in another 12 years time then... and hopefully it will be good news.

Ahh the Bristol Evening Post. Home of the trolls Si Clist and "George/Shergar". The laughing stock of journalism, that even the Daily Sport laughs its arse off at.