Three prominent signatories to the ‘Bike Is Best’ group say there are “worrying signs” that the introduction of high quality cycling infrastructure could become a “postcode lottery”, even when local authorities receive all of the funding they have requested.

The letter is signed by Coventry’s bicycle mayor Adam Tranter, Cycling UK’s policy director Roger Geffen and the London Cycling Campaign’s chief executive Dr Ashok Sinha.

They urge Boris Johnson to give “direct encouragement” to local political leaders so that they have the “confidence to deliver” cycling schemes.

Despite the widespread support for cycling, the group claims that progress to introduce new measures is slow and in some cases has stopped before it has even started. It adds that the “huge unmet demand from people” who want to cycle but don’t feel safe enough to do so needs to be urgently addressed.

It adds that in some cases – such the introduction of Low Traffic Neighbourhoods –poor quality community engagement has provided “a platform for misinformation which jeopardises positive measures for active travel”.

To succeed in planning for active travel, it says local authorities need access to specialists to help design future proof schemes and pool knowledge to help better engage with the community. “Put simply, councils need to be better equipped to deal with ‘bikelash’,” it says.

The group also calls for a clear timeline on the creation of Active Travel England and for a professional training scheme for active travel to be offered and promoted by the Department for Transport, aimed at both officers and local councillors.

* Part of a temporary cycle lane along Brighton seafront has been removed after only a few weeks after concerns it was adding to traffic congestion and causing delays for buses.

The 600m section of cycle lane taken away ran alongside the A259 between the Palace Pier roundabout and West Street. Work began to install the 2.5km lane from the roundabout to Fourth Avenue in Hove in early August in response to the Coronavirus pandemic.

Brighton & Hove City Council’s lead member for transport Peter West said congestion on this stretch of road caused delays to bus journeys and attempted changes to traffic signal timings did not provide a solution.

CIHT Sustainable Transport Panel member and Brighton resident Mark Strong MCIHT said the council was right to have introduced the temporary cycle lane when it did to help encourage more active travel. But he added that “longer term, harder engineering” was now required to create more space for people cycling along the seafront, especially by the pier where there is currently a narrow cycle track on a very busy footway.

(Photograph: Texturemaster - Shutterstock)