Darlovelo are offering the chance of half price hire charges if bookings are made with a friend or relative. The offer coincides with national bike week 18th – 26th June 2011 which helps to promote cycling across the UK.
It is a great opportunity to introduce non cyclist to the joys of being on a bike or help people who want to cycle but want someone to share the experience with. Darovelo would love more people to think about cycling as an everyday activity which can be enjoyed with friends.
Darlovelo will be at Darlington’s Community Carnival on Sat 25th June.
We will have a range of bikes, games and information about the scheme. It will be a great opportunity to see the bikes up close, join or get involved. Look forward to seeing you there.
Small article about Darlovelo on Sport Sister, a sports magazine aimed at women. Have a look on tumblr
www.sportsister.tumblr.com
Darlington Friends of the Earth’s Matthew Snedker continues to go from strength to strength with his work on the 20′ Plenty for Darlington campaign. Here is his latest update on how the campaign to introduce 20 mph speed limits on residential roads – with out speed humps – is getting on.
First some national news
The Department for Transport has announced that it is relaxing the requirements for 20 mph signage. In a move to remove red-tape and allow local authorities more power to implement 20 mph schemes without unnecessary cost and constraints, the DfT has announced new relaxations to allow far more flexible town-wide 20 mph schemes.
Liverpool city council is entering into consultation over plans that could result in 70% of the cities roads having 20 mph speed limits. It is estimated that this plan could provide savings of over £5.2 million per year in costs associated with traffic casualties.
What has been happening in Darlington
After our successful Green Fair stall we were invited to attend the launch of Green Park’s new play area. It is a lovely space and local residents have worked very hard to update and improve the play facilities.
We met local residents and talked about all the benefits that 20’s Plenty for Darlington will bring. Face painting and the ‘Breaking distance challenge’ proved popular, we sold car & bike stickers and we added another 30 signatures to our petition.
We are pleased to announce that we have received support from George Dent Nursery School. Carol Dawson, head teacher, said “When the policy was explained to me I thought ‘What’s not to like?’ If you care about children and other vulnerable groups how could you not support this campaign. It has been proved to be successful in other parts of the country and it’s time we had it in Darlington.”
More support comes from Acorn Dairy. Graham Tweddle said “a 20 mph speed limit, would help reduce the noise generated by vehicles using the roads at night and also improve the fuel economy.” He also went on to say “What is of more concern, is the increasing number of sleeping policemen (of different styles) used by the council. These do have a significant impact on vehicle suspension.”
I have already had an approach from one councillor asking that roads in their ward be included in any trial of 20 mph speed limits.
Does your councillor know that you want slower speed on the roads where you live?
Community Carnival
We will be at the Community Carnival, with a stall in Stanhope Park. The Carnival takes place on Saturday 25th June between 11 am and 5 pm. Please come and meet the team and find out the latest news.
The next month…
I am arranging a meeting with Michael Straugheir, Traffic Management Officer, Durham Constabulary. We will be discussing the 20’s Plenty policy and looking at how to make Darlington’s streets saver for all road users.
I will be looking to meet chairs of the Borough Council’s scrutiny committees to discuss a formal request that they investigate the 20’s Plenty for Darlington policy.
You can get involved
As well as coming to see us at the Community Carnival there are plenty of ways to get involved:
High quality, dedicated infrastructure will be required if Britain is to become a mass-cycling country, according to new research. Academics from Lancaster University, the University of Leeds and Oxford Brookes University have just released the results of a three year in-depth study of cycling in four English towns (Lancaster, Leeds, Leicester and Worcester). The work is funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). Key findings are summarised on the Bike Hub blog.
The research found that, broadly, two cycling cultures existed. In more affluent communities where people largely understood the message that cycling is “a good idea”, there is none the less widespread reluctance to use the bicycle on an everyday basis. As Dr. David Horton, one of the researchers, wrote, “The idea of it is too hard, too strange, and far too dangerous. They do cycle though, predominantly for pleasure, and especially on sunny summer Sundays. Away from the roads.”
In the second cycling culture, predominantly amongst less affluent working class communities, the bicycle is simply seen as irrelevant to transport, a child’s toy. Here, the bicycle is used more as a second-rate substitute for a car due to lack of affordability of the latter. As Dr. Horton writes, “although people from these communities tend not to rate cycling very highly, some do nontheless ride, through necessity, and on the footway. They ride on footways for two main reasons: first, because they feel safer there; and second, in order to stay out of the way of cars, which they don’t want to delay”.
The research concludes that our towns and cities have, over the past 50 years, been successfully developed for car use. Now we need to re-develop them for bicycle use. And the clear and well-tested policy of slow-speed residential streets combined with high quality separated cycle infrastructure on busy urban roads is confirmed as the way forward:
“We need radically to restructure our urban mobility systems in ways which will get people out of their cars and make them cycle. Half of the infrastructural change required is underway – the push for a maximum speed limit of 20 mph on residential streets is gaining momentum. But the other half of the key infrastructural change required needs a similar push, and this push should be for very high quality and continuous segregated cycling infrastructure on our biggest and busiest urban roads, the kind of roads on which almost everyone today refuses to cycle”.
The emphasis on infrastructure is made because of successive government and local authority decisions to support some of the easier requirements for a mass cycling culture – improved cycle parking, cycle training, bicycle coops and shops, promotional events and activities, bike hire. And 20’s Plenty campaigns around the country (including in our own Darlington) are gradually succeeding in moving local authorities to accept 20mph as the default speed limit in residential streets.
But the key need to address the quality of the cycling experience on busy main roads is consistently avoided, for fear of offending “the motorist”. With endless technical examples of best practice available from countries like the Netherlands, the problem is clearly political. Yet even in this sphere, inspiring examples of successful political action to radically transform cities, such as Seville in Spain, can be found.
But in the end, it may well be down to who our politicians listen to, rather than any technical expertise or ideas of best practice. One positive sign is that cycling’s national organisations appear to be slowly coming round to the same conclusions of Beauty and the Bike, the EPSRC, and an increasing number of cycling campaigns around the country. Whether UK politicians take any notice, though, is another matter.