London East-West and North-South Cycle Superhighways

[Richard Fairhurst]

Two big schemes announced today - new north-south and east-west routes across London (KX-Elephant & Castle, and Tower Bridge-Paddington), mostly separated ('Dutch-style') along the sides of major roads.

The TfL site is up and down like a yoyo at the moment and keeps asking for password entry to look at the docs, but I've done a brief writeup of each:

East-west: http://cycle.travel/city/london/news/revealed_london_s_new_dutch_style_east_west_route

North-south: http://cycle.travel/city/london/news/north_south_route_is_half_super_half_highway

There's a few details to quibble with (like the crazy detour around Hyde Park) but in general this looks pretty good to me - I can imagine using the east-west one a lot to get across London from Paddington.

 

[srw]

There's already a safe east-west cycle route across London, which thousands of commuters use every day - along Cheapside and Holborn (Bank junction and Holborn Circus have recently been rejigged to make them much better to use), then right along Red Lion Street and along quiet roads where cyclists dominate to Marylebone. The proposed east-west route is a much longer way round. The Parliament Square cut-through is welcome - it's been an obvious quick win for years for getting from Waterloo to the West End. I can't see the rest doing a great deal to encourage more cyclists.

 

[apb]

this looks great: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-29042532

London doing this puts a pressure on other cities to follow suit. very excited about this.

 

[simonsch]

Fan-bloody-tastic. This is a real win. I was hoping they were going to deal with Parliament Square before the political momentum is lost. I go between Waterloo and South Kensington every day, and this section of the route is very welcome. I look forward to seeing more details. It can't help be better than the current situation.

 

[Glow worm]

this looks great: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-29042532

London doing this puts a pressure on other cities to follow suit. very excited about this.

Certainly looks a lot better than a lick of blue paint. There's a bit more on this blog. The RAC are against it, so it must be good

 

[simonsch]

"It would be a mistake to think London is clogged up with selfish drivers in their cars," says Stephen Glaister, Director of the RAC Foundation.

Really?

 

[srw]

Looking at it in more detail, it's a technician's solution to a behavioural problem. The City of London has had the right idea - make the streets favourable to cyclists by rephasing traffic lights, redesigning junctions, imposing a 20mph speed limit (which people do, by the way, stick to) and painting bicycle symbols down the middle of streets. It works and is cheap.

No doubt thousands of people will use these new whizzy lanes, which will be hailed as a success, but I suspect that with one or two exceptions like the Parliament Square contraflow I've already welcomed the same effect could be had for much less money over a much wider area using more intelligence.

 

[Brains]

As daily user of part of the route and working directly on the route why does the route go down the Embankment/A3211 ?
A far more logical route in terms of where people actually work and that would disrupt far less traffic would be to follow the A4, that is Eastcheap, Cannon Street, Fleet Street, Strand

Does anyone know why they have taken the less logical route (Cost maybe ?)

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.5093466,-0.1108043,16z

 

[srw]

It's only Embankment that's wide enough to have bits taken out of it for a fully segregated lane. Eastcheap is reasonably narrow at the east end, Cannon Street is pretty narrow all the way, the bit round St Paul's would need large chunks taking out of the pavement, etc etc etc.

Of course people will carry on following the desire line. Working in the City, if I wanted to ge to Embankment I wouldn't go past Monument onto Lower Thames Street, I'd take the direct route via Queen Vic Street to Blackfriars.

 

[spen666]

I do not share the enthusiasm of others for these plans. Having looked in great detail today at the East West Route from Tower Hill to Bird Cage Walk, I think it is a huge step backwards for cyclists.

Why?
1. Two way cycle lanes make it inevitable that at busy times you will have idiot cyclists riding towards you on wrong side of lane. Anyone riding against the flow on these routes will be taking huge risks

2. The bus stops will be a nightmare as pedestrians will be walking all across them without concern for cyclists meaning you will need to pass them at walking pace at rush hour. This could be overcome with railings to limit pedestrians to one place to cross, but won't happen. You will get pedestrians queuing for buses on the cycle lane at busy bus stops.

3. The positioning of boris bike hire stands on the island encourages people to cross the cycle lanes on foot.

4. When heading west along the embankment and wanting to turn into Northumberland Avenue, it appears you have to stop in the cycle lane, blocking it to those heading towards Parliament, whilst waiting for traffic signal to allow you to cross the road. I am sure this is not right or intended, but from the plan it looks like this is the situation


From Tower Hill to Parliament Square, I would be happy for them to do nothing at all. I would rather ride as part of the traffic.

 

[subaqua]

I hope the joining onto the end of CS whatever that goes Barking Tower hill is done half decent and not the utter feck up the start of the blue paint now is at stratford

 

[subaqua]

and i luuuurve the way it just stops at Parli' square waiting for royal parks to agree . if I am going down embankemnt I would use 'thumberland avenue and the mall to get to HPC.

not liking having to go through the tunnels either. its a fug in there anyway in a vehicle

 

[Brains]

One other big issue with the Embankment route is there is nothing to the left of the route, just the river. so in effect this route goes around the edge rather than where the people actually want to be, which right through the middle

So whilst I would not go so far as to call it a great step backwards, due to the routing it is a tiny step forwards.
Route it through the middle (A4) route, and it becomes a very useful bit of London infrastructure

 

[Brains]

It's only Embankment that's wide enough to have bits taken out of it for a fully segregated lane. Eastcheap is reasonably narrow at the east end, Cannon Street is pretty narrow all the way, the bit round St Paul's would need large chunks taking out of the pavement, etc etc etc.

Solution: If it's not wide enough for cars and bikes, then remove the cars
But I think actually the A4 route would be wide enough all the way, but you reduce the number of cars and redirect them onto the Embankment

 

[EthelF]

Solution: If it's not wide enough for cars and bikes, then remove the cars
But I think actually the A4 route would be wide enough all the way, but you reduce the number of cars and redirect them onto the Embankment

One step at a time I guess. We're getting there gradually. After 20 years of cycling across London this is the best proposal I've seen. NL's network was not achieved in one day either. Embankment does look to me like a good starting point for a major E-W axis. Once that is established as a huge success (inevitable, IMHO, given existing cycle traffic levels along the route and potential target market), hopefully other route3s will be added to form a trans-London matrix. I can dream, can't I?
Clearly the devil is in the detail, but despite reservations I am positively inclined towards the proposals as a whole.