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Cycling, Environment, Transport, Transport policy, UK news - April 26, 2019

If you build them, they will come: record year for cycle counters

New superhighways and better networks are helping cycle lane usage boom across the UK

Cycle lanes are one of the most efficient and healthiest ways of moving people. A single bike lane can transport five times as many people as a motor traffic lane, without the air and noise pollution. This is good news for everyone, whether you drive, walk or cycle – or breathe.

What’s clear from the data, though – despite occasional bizarre claims to the contrary, and attempts to have lanes removed – is that to reap cycling’s benefits you have to build proper infrastructure. But if you build it, they will come – and the cycle counters prove it.

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Cycling, Environment, Life and style - April 2, 2019

Should we stop using the word ‘cyclist’?

A recent study found many drivers see people who use bikes as less than human. Part of the problem is the language we use

As the repair man rummaged around in my gas oven, I tried to explain something to him about cyclists.

“We ‘cyclists’ are no more a homogenous group than you ‘vannists,’” I said.

Should cyclists be licensed and insured?

Labour peer Robert Winston has asked about regulating cyclists. An imagined transport minister responds

On Monday, the scientist and Labour peer Robert Winston is to formally ask a question in the House of Lords about what assessments ministers have made “for requiring adults riding bicycles in city centres to have a licence and third-party insurance”.

Below is the entirely imagined response I would like the government to make to him.

How to get more women cycling in cities

To cut greenhouse gas emissions we need to increase cyclist numbers and that means getting more women on their bikes

So much of the world around us is designed for men; from the mundane (public toilets and smartphones) to the potentially deadly (stab vests and crash test dummies). My own research, recently launched at the C40 Women4Climate conference, revealed similar trends in how we design cities and formulate transport policy, with devastating consequences.

Transportation accounts for up to one-third of greenhouse gas emissions from the world’s biggest cities and traffic is the largest source of toxic air pollution. To create sustainable, healthy and liveable cities, we need to increase the number of cyclists on our streets, and that means getting more women on their bikes. In San Francisco, only 29% of cyclists are women; in Barcelona, there are three male cyclists for every female cyclist; in London, 37% of cyclists are female.

London’s cycle network overhaul has come to a standstill

Sadiq Khan’s claims to have built 140km of cycling infrastructure are simply false

Among the more amusing frauds of the energy company Enron was the time, in 1998, when it decided to create an entire fake trading floor at its Texas HQ – complete with TVs, computers, and shirtsleeved guys shouting down phones – to fool Wall Street analysts visiting for its annual general meeting.

Now, however, the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, appears to be aiming for something even more ambitious – an entire fake cycle network. I am in south-west London, in an alley about six feet wide, wedged between a railway line and the back garden fences of Southdown Road. According to Khan, this is the Wimbledon to Raynes Park Quietway, part of the 140km of cycle infrastructure, which he claims to have built since taking office.

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cycling RSS

If you build them, they will come: record year for cycle counters

Should we stop using the word ‘cyclist’?

Should cyclists be licensed and insured?

How to get more women cycling in cities

London’s cycle network overhaul has come to a standstill

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