Massive Investment In Cycling Announced...

[HMS_Dave]

Boris Johnson has announced funding for 250 miles of cycling networks outside of London over the next 5 years. Which has been dubbed 'mini holland' schemes. I don't know about you, but Holland isn't a big country and whats worse is that Holland is actually a smaller region of what is the Netherlands... We in the UK have a paved road network expanding 213000 miles. 250 miles of cycling network (painted lines besides a road) is clearly a massive leap forward! I bet all you cycling fans are now celebrating 🧉🍷🍺🍻

The funding is part of a £5bn pledge over 5 years which includes 4000 electric buses and bus networks, so Cycling has gotten 50-60 pence of that at least... Huzzah!

 

[I like Skol]

He does seem to be promising a lot of initiatives

 

[mjr]

And for comparison, a Holland level of spending (scaled up to UK size) would be almost £2bn just on cycling. Every year, so £10bn over 5 years. This is the basic reason why we're so far behind and keep getting overtaken now by the likes of France! Boris the cheapskate!

 

[raleighnut]

I wonder how much the EU would have contributed over the same period if Councils had applied for funding.

 

[Seevio]

I wonder how much the EU would have contributed over the same period if Councils had applied for funding.

A very very brief and not necessarily accurate google search says that over the last 6 years, the EU funded cycling in the UK to the tune of about £25M. It would appear that even if the EU were willing to spend our money on more cycling, councils prefer to apply for other things when left to their own devices.

 

[Pale Rider]

the EU funded cycling in the UK to the tune of about £25M.

We probably paid them about £35m to do it - given that we are net contributors to the EU.

But I'm sure they enjoyed lots of long meetings, and even longer lunches, on the difference.

 

[mjr]

250 miles of cycleways. There's 48 ceremonial counties in England, so that's just over five miles per county. How much do you think your county needs?

 

[Deleted member 26715]

250 miles of cycleways. There's 48 ceremonial counties in England, so that's just over five miles per county. How much do you think your county needs?

This was my first thoughts apart from I thought about 25 cities each doing 10 miles, you may as well urinate in the ocean

 

[glasgowcyclist]

Is this like his 50,000 extra nurses where 30,000 already existed? Will he really be building 10 miles of new cycle routes and repainting lines on 240 miles of existing routes?

 

[raleighnut]

Is this like his 50,000 extra nurses where 30,000 already existed? Will he really be building 10 miles of new cycle routes and repainting lines on 240 miles of existing routes?

Probably.

 

[mjr]

Is this like his 50,000 extra nurses where 30,000 already existed? Will he really be building 10 miles of new cycle routes and repainting lines on 240 miles of existing routes?

The announcement says new but there's no detail on https://www.gov.uk/transport/cycling-and-walking yet.

Further down the main Transport news page, there's a reminder that the A14 Huntingdon bypass bypass bypass alone cost £1.5bn (and they refused to build any cycleways with it). Cycling gets crumbs.

 

[glasgowcyclist]

The announcement says new

Never. Trust. A Tory.

 

[dodgy]

He needs to give me a reason to believe him, he's going to have to follow up on a lot of promises before I feel confident in believing him. I wouldn't trust him to give me directions to a pub that I can see in plain sight.

 

[kingrollo]

I used to despair at these announcements - currently my mindset is torn:-

A)Driving the car is such a pain the arse - traffic, loonies in white vans , parking - that we must be approaching 'Peak Car' - and people will realise that cycling provides a lot answers

B) The car advertising campaign will continue to blind people to the obvious and cyclists will be forced off the road - not helped by ever decreasing enforcement of traffic laws.

 

[kingrollo]

Never. Trust. A Tory.

I agree with your sentiment - But Blair set national targets for cycling, when he looked like not hitting these - he handed the targets over to local councils and as far as I know they then disappeared.