Cycling Shorts

This article was published in 1999, in Newsletter 23.

Campaign member David Green will be running more Bicycle Maintenance evening classes at Coleridge Community College this April. This hands-on course covers routine tasks such as fixing punctures, adjusting gears and brakes, and chain lubrication, as well as less frequent overhaul jobs such as removing freewheels, adjusting headsets and bottom brackets, stripping hub bearings, and truing wheels. The course is on Tuesday evenings, from 7.30 to 9.30 pm starting 20 April. For more information, call Coleridge Community College on 712340 or 712341.

The City Centre Management Team has published their glossy Management Plan for 1999 to 2001, and some of our suggestions for inclusion of cycling after the first draft have been incorporated. For example, the section formerly known as ‘pedestrianisation’ has become ‘pedestrians and cyclists’, and work on this will now include an update on cycle parking needs and strategy. The performance monitoring will include counts of cycle parking and, one hopes, levels of cycle usage. And better still, planning of the counts has started already.

Don’t forget the eagerly-awaited Josie Dew reading at Waterstone’s, at 6:30 pm on Thursday 22 April. Tickets are £2 in advance, or £3 on the day.
STOP PRESS: The date of this event has been been changed to Tuesday 20 April.

We’re organising a bonus country bike ride to Anglesey Abbey on Sunday 16 May, to support the City Council’s Environment Week. It leaves at the earlier time of 1 pm. See the Diary for details.

Thank you to Newnham College JCR for the recent donation to Cycling Campaign funds – a very welcome bonus.

Work has started on Phase 2 of the Peterborough Millennium Green Wheel – a network of cycleways, footpaths and bridleways which will circle the city, with spokes to the centre. The Grand Opening of phase 2 will be held on 5 September. The project, managed by Peterborough Environment City Trust, is due for completion on September 2000. Half the money is being provided by the National Lottery’s Millennium Commission, and the other half is coming from sponsorship and donations.

Bristol: Project Bike produces an excellent free glossy 16-side magazine, called Cycling Matters, which is packed with hints and tips on cycling. 10,000 copies are produced quarterly and distributed free. It includes coverage of the brilliantly-named Take a Stand initiative, where small businesses are urged to claim up to two free Sheffield stands each, for installation on private property. Great stuff.

I’ve just discovered that the Suffolk Cycling Strategy, of August 1997, is on the Web. It covers four areas: Transport, Planning, Leisure and, crucially, Promotion

Overheard at a recent local meeting of transport professionals: ‘local councils don’t seem to realise that cyclists are continuous in both space and time.’ This was in reference to proposals for cycle routes which require cyclists to levitate through a tricky section, for example, or teleport to the other side of a road or section of shops.

Clare Macrae