Elections

Encouraging and facilitating walking and cycling, along with improvements to public transport, as alternatives to over-reliance on private cars, are essential components of the Green Party agenda.

The main challenge continues to be safety and there are two main aspects to this. The first is the potential (and sometimes real) threat to safety from other road-users, for example in not allowing cyclists enough room. The second is potholes and other poor surfaces which can cause accidents to cyclists, especially at night, or after rain when they are full of water, and difficult to see. Dedicated routes for cyclists and pedestrians and speedy repairs to damaged road surfaces would go a long way towards reducing these two hazards. More dedicated cycle routes might take a while to achieve, but a programme of pothole repairs could be implemented relatively quickly with the right motivation and support.

Removing VAT on bicycles would probably help a bit, too.

I agree that these matters should become a greater priority, whilst also recognising that there are are financial and staffing considerations involved, too. I would strongly support the creation and maintenance of a strong evidence base to identify priorities and examples of good practice to inform solutions. This would provide the foundation for policies and implementation.

Encouraging children to walk or cycle to school where possible has important health and other benefits. However, there are two main safety issues here. The first is the danger of accident or injury posed by motor traffic to both cyclists and pedestrians. The second, more insidious, is the danger caused by exhaust fumes to the health of children, in particular. This second risk is compounded by vehicles waiting to collect children from school which continue to have their engines running.

School Street Schemes are an excellent idea, although not always practical to implement (for example, if there is no reasonable alternative route or parking place for vehicles). Nevertheless, there remain many locations where they do not currently exist, but it would be practical to create them. The responsible authorities should be encouraged to create more of these schemes, and to do so as expeditiously as possible.

This is important not just for every village, but every community and, indeed, the country as a whole. Encouraging walking and cycling are really important and the authorities need to be made aware, though evidence and examples of good practice, of the need to develop safe walking and cycling networks and provided with the resources necessary to do so.

This document is a good start in bringing walking and cycling networks up to a decent standard. Once again, evidence and examples of good practice must be brought to the attention of County officials to encourage that they will use and affirm LTN 1/20 (and its successor documents). Organizations, Councillors and the press all have a role to play in achieving this because the key factors in bring about all the improvements referred to in this document are an evidence base, a groundswell of public opinion and political goodwill.

The two main issues which I noted in reply to the first question in this survey both apply to these cycling routes as they currently stand, so improvements are certainly needed. Whichever of the alternative routes are used there are challenging road conditions and attendant safety concerns.

The first step in achieving improvements would be to gather evidence regarding the current cycling routes, their dangers and shortcomings. This would involve consultation with stakeholder individuals and organizations, as well as demographic studies. The same individuals and organizations can be invited to contribute ideas and suggestions about the improvements required and consulted as the improvements are carried out. Once again, evidence, public opinion and political support are essential in this process.