Graham, Tom and Ian

Your Lib Dem team for Cheadle West & Gatley Learn more

Vélocity 2025 bid includes more Cheadle and Gatley cycling improvements

by Lib Dem team on 16 May, 2013

Greater Manchester is bidding for £20 million of Government funding to provide a major boost to cycling across the area.

Only one large city region will win, but if we get it we’ll see major improvements – including a lot of segregated cycle paths – built by the end of 2015. You can see more details of the Vélocity 2025 bid here.

For Cheadle and Gatley, winning the bid would see:

  • Gatley Station become a cycling station, with cycle parking facilities and improvements to local roads to make cycling to the station easier and safer.
  • Segregated cycle path along Manchester Road from Mill Lane (by the cemetary and Alexandra Hospital) to Parrs Wood (linking up with further safe cycling routes into Manchester City Centre).
  • Improvements to path alongside the Mersey from Manchester Road, towards Stockport.  This will provide an improved off-road cycle route both into Stockport and to the new Metrolink station at Parrs Wood.

We should find out if Greater Manchester has won this funding in the next six weeks.

These improvements would be on top of what’s already a major cycling boost secured for the Cheadle area that includes

  • Improved cycling route through Cheadle, from Wilmslow Road to the Alexandra Hospital.
  • Off-road cycling route from Cheadle/Gatley along Kingsway into Manchester
  • Cycle route through Brookfield Park, past the Village Hotel into Bruntwood Park
  • New and improved cycle paths across Bruntwood Park as part of the £300,000 BMX track scheme
  • Cycle route enhancements near Cheadle Royal

Why do all of this?  Even taken all together, it’s a small amount of money compared to what we spend just maintaining existing roads across Stockport, but the rewards are potentially great.

If we can get even 5% of people to switch from cars to bikes for short journeys, we’d see a major improvement in congestion and shorter queues at junctions.  Those people would be healthier too, so they’d cost the NHS less.  If we can get more people cycling, the money we spend on facilities should be saved on health and road repairs many times over.

 

 

 

 

   6 Comments

6 Responses

  1. Sam Sanderson says:

    Looking forward to the planned changes, fingers crossed for the others too!

  2. Trevor McLean says:

    It is about time that cyclists started to use the cycle lanes already provided, instead of diceing with death between cars. There is also a case for better sinage on the one near Cheadle Royal Hospital. There is no clear indication of where to get on it if you do not already know

  3. Chris Leuty says:

    Cycle lanes are not always suitable. For example, the one you mention near Cheadle Royal Hospital has a road sign in the middle of it! Two on-road cycle lanes that I sometimes use between Gatley and Manchester – Upper Chorlton Road in Whalley Range and Parrs Wood Road in Burnage – always have cars parked on them, thus forcing cyclists to move in and out of the motorised traffic flow.

    I think it’s about time that certain drivers started to take more care on the roads – e.g. sticking to speed limits, not using mobile phones, stopping at red lights – thus improving safety for ALL road users, including other drivers. As a cyclist and driver, I see far too many drivers breaking the law and driving in an unsafe manner on a daily basis. Yes, some cyclists might go through red lights too but the consequences of this action will in no way match the potential of a large chunk of metal moving at high speed.

    Ian’s final paragraph above makes good points about reducing congestion and improving health. We should be doing all we can to encourage cycling and I support the Velocity bid for funding. However – and I have said this before – as a cyclist, I don’t want to be forced to use cycle paths; I pay towards roads too and I have the right to use them.

  4. Iain Roberts says:

    Hi Chris,

    I don’t know where the idea of forcing cyclists off the roads has come from – I’m happy to confirm that’s nothing I’ve heard being even vaguely discussed and I would certainly oppose it if it were to be.

  5. Chris Leuty says:

    Hi Ian, I’m just doing my bit to help ensure that it doesn’t happen. Trevor appears to think that cyclists should use them, and it’s a comment I’ve heard from other people previously.

  6. Chris Leuty says:

    To expand on my last comment, Trevor stated that cyclists should use cycle lanes and by implication get off the roads where all those dangerous cars are. Not that it’s the cyclists that are making the cars dangerous, of course.

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