Cheadle and Gatley Lib Dems are moving
Your Lib Dem team for Cheadle West & Gatley Learn more
by Lib Dem team on 3 October, 2012
Although we might not have the millions of pounds London has been able to put into its “Boris Bikes” and cycle highways, in Stockport we’re good at making effective use of what we do have.
That’s why I’m putting around £100,000 into improving cycle facilities in our district centres across the Borough, and asking councillors in each area what they think should be the priority in their patch.
The options are:
We can do a lot of that with the £100,000 (see page 93 of the Area Committee agenda for more details, including how much we estimate each item will cost).
Different areas will have different priorities, depending on what’s on the ground at the moment and what they want to achieve, so I want to get guidance from the local councillors right across Stockport on how they would prioritise these items in their area, along with any specific issues they feel need addressing, so we can get on and do the work.
5 Comments
Iain,
This is great news, I have been a cyclist basede in Gatley for a long time and cannot understand why more people of all ages aren’t cycling. Here is a couple of tweaks that I would make to encourage the local people. The Mersey valley trail is great for an off the road bike, I cycle to the old Tatton Arms in Northenden and either go to sale water park or the opposite direction to the “Pyramid” Stockport, these are both safe rides. The other ride is out to Ashley via the old styal road that used to go round the back of the airport or past Etrop Grange hotel and past the Romper pub to Castle Hill and into safe open country cycling.
The down side of both rides is the journey on the busy roads. If a cycle lane could be incorporated alongside the new tram lane on Ringway road this would enable local folk to access open country safely. Similarly a cycle lane to Northenden would encourage people to use the mersey trail.
Andrew Ashton
Thanks thats good news, cycling needs to be encouraged as it keeps us fit and helps reduce traffic pollution and many peoples blinkered reliance on the car especially for short journeys. I hope that we can have a cycle lane down the busy A34 from Gatley/Cheadle lights up to Parrs Wood sometime soon. I would however like to see some form of enforcement of people mainly youngsters cycling with no lights in the dark and taring down the pavement with no caution. Cyclists with no lights was a rare thing many years ago but like the idiots using their mobiles on the move is very prevalent nowadays, for safety reasons parents should ensure their children have working lights.
The most important thing you could do is look at the Dutch model of cycling infrastructure. Installing good quality, segregated cycle tracks alongside major routes (like the A34, as Paul mentioned) would be a good start. The other proposed options do nothing to address the problem that currently stops the vast majority of people from considering cycling as a viable means of transport in the UK – namely, the hostility of the existing road system. Spending money on padlocks, leafleting campaigns information boards, etc. is a waste of money, as these do not address the underlying problem.
Also, while £100,000 may sound a lot, it’s a drop in the ocean in comparison to the spending on roads for motorised transport. (For comparison, the projected cost of the A6 to Manchester Airport relief road is £290,000,000.) If you want to achieve something, rather than make a token gesture, then you will need to give this a much higher priority and find more funding. The money is there for proposed road developments – why not for cycling infrastructure?
Hi Adam,
As part of the proposed relief road, a new segregated cycle path will be built along the entire length, and new links included to nearby roads to make it as useful as possible for local cyclists.
We are also looking at how we can improve cycling facilities with off-road tracks along sections of the A34.
You’re right – if we had millions more pounds, we could of course do much more, but for me it’s about making the best use of the money we have available.
I strongly disagree that doing other things is a “waste of money”, and I’m going to a seminar in a couple of weeks led by Dutch cycle facilities experts to see what we can learn from them (having lived and cycled in the Netherlands for a couple of years myself, I’m reasonably familiar with their approach).
Hi Iain,
Thanks for the reply. It’s good to see that you’re keen to make a difference and are trying to improve things.
Regarding the leafleting/advertising approach – I think it can be useful if you have something good to inform people about. However, the best result one might expect at present is that you’ll succeed in getting some people to try cycling as a recreational activity. But I suspect most will remain unwilling to use a bike as a means of everyday transport on the roads due to the perceived danger. For example, even with heavy advertising, convincing average mums and dads to let their primary school children cycle to school with the present road conditions is highly unlikely. Things need to feel much safer before that would be a viable option for most people, and proper cycling facilities is the best way to do that.
I’m sure you are more familiar with the Dutch system than I am, but the Dutch don’t cycle because of good advertising – it’s because they have excellent infrastructure which makes it feel like a safe and pleasant way to travel.
Anyway, I’m glad you’re keen to try improve things, so thanks again.