HOW CYCLING WILL SAVE BRITAIN
CREATING A CLEANER, FITTER NATION ON TWO WHEELS
Park Lane may be a place of high-end shops patronised by well-heeled clientele, but just two months ago a bike ride there was about as pleasant as ingesting a glass of cold kitchen cleaner. In the blink of an eye, the experience of riding down the second most expensive street on the Monopoly board has changed beyond recognition. What was an acre of tarmac has been rapidly civilised, dividing it into a safe, wide lane for cycling, leaving a narrower aperture for promenading drivers.
This follows the realisation that, with public transport reduced to 15 per cent of its capacity, London’s roads would grind to a wheezing halt if serious steps weren’t made to improve road efficiency by making way for cycling. As London’s walking and cycling commissioner, Will Norman, puts it, cycling schemes that would normally take two years to implement are being deployed in just a matter of weeks – week after week. When the world is in crisis, the bicycle is a saviour of sorts. Facing weeks of lockdown, confined to our homes for all but exercise and essential trips, as a nation we dusted off our bikes and took to the empty streets – and we liked it.
National cycling charity Cycling UK’s Duncan Dollimore sees this as a vindication of what many have long known: a lot more people will cycle when they don’t have to mix with heavy traffic.
“We often hear it said that more people won’t cycle in the UK,” says Dollimore. “They say, ‘It’s too hilly, it’s too wet, it’s not in our culture’ and we have always countered that is rubbish. Now we see the evidence of that – we are seeing that people will cycle, given the right conditions. We have had this social experiment where the roads look different and people are cycling. The idea that people won’t do it has been blown out of the water.”
A bike ride a day…
Sport England found cycling was among the most popular forms of lockdown exercise, including among families, with 18 per cent of those cycling doing so with children. In Scotland cycling counters recorded up to 130 per cent increases in cycling during lockdown, with counters in Kirkcaldy, Larbert and the Clyde Tunnel in Glasgow clocking increases over 100 per cent in May. In April, a counter in Dunfermline recorded a 214 per cent increase – and Cycling Scotland is strongly urging people to cycle for everyday trips as the nation emerges from the coronavirus crisis.
But a global pandemic won’t make our existing health problems disappear, with inactivity contributing directly to one in six deaths in the UK and costing £7.4bn per year to business and wider society, according to government figures. PreCovid more than a quarter of adults in England
did less than 30 minutes of physical activity per week. Cycling and walking are often referred to as ‘miracle cures’, reducing death rates, lowering the risk of heart problems and benefiting people’s mental health.
Scarlett McNally, an orthopaedic surgeon and cycle campaigner, says the greatest benefits of exercise are for the least active sector of the population. “The biggest change in health is people moving from doing nothing to doing something, so it’s never too late.” McNally would like to see exercise prescribed by doctors, but says people have to want to do it in the first place.
Getting in the habit
Cycling for everyday trips, such as to work, can weave activity into everyday life: a daily cycle commute of just 15 minutes each way, five days per week, meets our exercise quota for moderate activity. McNally continues, “I’m really hoping we’re about to get on that wave of people understanding it’s important and knowing that every day counts, every moment really matters. Try to find ways to get exercise into your day, even if it’s a bit cold out there.”
Dollimore believes post-Covid we may heed this advice. “People have ignored public health experts for decades, when they were saying we should invest more in prevention rather than cure. People are now thinking because something visible has happened, maybe we should listen to what they are saying.”
As Dollimore puts it: “We’ve been told public transport networks will operate at 10-15 per cent of capacity, and that social distancing will likely be around for 12 to 18 months. There isn’t much of a choice in this – and in the absence of alternatives people will drive more if we don’t replace public transport with something else.”
When the UK government announced a £250m package in May for emergency walking and cycling infrastructure, it stressed the importance of spending in areas with high public transport levels. Cities such as Manchester, London, Glasgow, Edinburgh and Sheffield recognise this.
Pedalling for the people
Dame Sarah Storey, active travel commissioner for the Sheffield City Region, is part of a team that’s rapidly implementing a plan to fast-forward existing cycling and walking plans in the area. This plan was signed off in June and includes creating a network of cycle routes that will start as trial routes using temporary measures, then if residents like them they will be made permanent. Dame Storey said the cycle network will be “built as quickly as it can be within the constraints of funding”. The region will receive £7,186,000 of government emergency funds to do this.
“The messaging from the Department for Transport (DfT) has been about pop-up cycleways and getting people around on bikes for longer distances,” explains Storey, “so while we’d initially anticipated front loading with low-traffic neighbourhoods to drive down the need for cars, and for those short journeys, it looks as though the priority will be cycling superhighways or active travel lanes.”
Keith Irving, chief executive of Cycling Scotland, agrees. “Our view is that the top priority to ensure that more people cycle is dedicated, segregated cycling paths, separate from traffic. Increasing access to bikes, places to store them and cycle training wherever required are the other measures to ensure even more people can enjoy
“WE’VE BEEN TOLD PUBLIC TRANSPORT NETWORKS WILL OPERATE AT 10 15% OF CAPACIT Y, AND THAT SOCIAL DISTANCING WILL BE AROUND FOR 12 18 MONTHS. THERE ISN’T MUCH OF A CHOICE IN THIS AND IN THE ABSENCE OF ALTERNATIVES PEOPLE WILL DRIVE MORE IF WE DON’T REPLACE PUBLIC TRANSPORT WITH SOMETHING ELSE”
DUNCAN DOLLIMORE
cycling for essential journeys or exercise. Enabling people to start or keep cycling will be vital as we find our way out of the current pandemic to ensure that we tackle the ongoing climate crisis.”
Dame Storey says quieter streets during lockdown have made it easier to talk to residents about reallocating road space. “People have been walking and cycling more, they’ve been using their vehicles less, so we’ve found low traffic neighbourhoods everywhere. People have experienced something that we never anticipated would be possible,” she observes.
While around 47 local authorities, representing around half of the English population, have longterm plans for walking and cycling that they could bring forward, there is a separate challenge for smaller towns and rural areas. Off-road routes or park and ride schemes may help people replace those public transport trips.
According to research, with electric bikes more than one in four commutes across the UK could be done by bike – and e-bike sales have rocketed in the UK. Although official sales figures don’t exist, Cycle to Work provider Green Commute Initiative says it saw a tripling of turnover this year to June.
Even the AA president, Edmund King, sees cycling as a key part of our transport future. He says: “AA surveys indicate that people are thinking differently about their journeys. If local authorities can put in infrastructure to help people walk and cycle, and eventually for public transport, that can make a credible difference. I think there will be less resistance because people are out there, and they have seen the benefits of walking, cycling and running.”
History on repeat?
During the flu pandemic of 1918 people were advised to ‘ride a bicycle and keep well’. Carlton Reid, cycling historian, Forbes journalist and author, says history tells us if we want a large shift to cycling during a crisis, we need a lot of people cycling already – which is bad news for the UK, where just 1 per cent of all trips are made by bike. During the oil crisis in the 1970s people had no choice but to cycle. Whereas in the Netherlands a bike lane-building boom ensued, in the UK we missed the boat. The good news, Reid says, is that emergency cycleways will help those who want to, to cycle – and that change is happening rapidly, including in his home town of Newcastle.
“You couldn’t possibly have imagined a year ago even a fraction of what Newcastle is now doing, but it’s such a short window. Historically we didn’t capitalise on previous surges in demand.” He says people need to feel subjectively safe cycling, as they do in the Netherlands. “We have got to put the hard infrastructure in, but it’s not just kerbs,” asserts Reid. “We have a demonstration that people will get on bikes when there are fewer cars around.”
Cycling doesn’t need to be expensive. In England 42 per cent of people over the age of five already have access to a bike – and the government launched a £50 voucher scheme people can spend on repairs. Although savings
are variable, depending on their current travel patterns, Cycle Scheme reckons a person can save £3000 per year by switching from driving to cycling, including petrol costs and depreciation value of a car. Then there’s the saving on carbon dioxide emissions and boosting life expectancy. Cycling UK’s James Palser adds, “Although by cycling to work you aren’t spending on a parking ticket or petrol, you will need to put a bit aside for maintenance – things like new tyres and brakes, and servicing.”
How employers can help
Riding to work improves mood, reduces stress levels and cuts the number of sick days you’re likely to take – and it’s enjoyable. Scarlett McNally sees commuter cycling as an easy win for health. “Bearing in mind the limited money in the economy, I would recommend supporting people to try to be as active as possible,” she says. “I’d try and support businesses to put in cycle to work schemes, support cycle parking everywhere, as well as opening up routes so that people are able to cycle.”
The Cycle Friendly Employers (CFE) scheme is an international accreditation scheme that employers can sign up to in order to help their employees cycle. James Palser is Cycling UK’s CFE accreditation project manager. He says employers can find out how staff are travelling and whether they are willing to cycle, then supply facilities like decent bike parking and lockers to help them do so. It’s also about advertising what’s on offer – including the Cycle to Work scheme, which lets staff buy a bike through their employer, tax-free. “Companies can save £120 per employee per year through Cycle to Work, which when you have a thousand employees really starts to add up. You can put that money into encouraging more people to cycle,” says Palser.
The cycle commute won’t use the same busy roads you’d drive and mapping apps, such as Komoot and Cycling UK’s journey planner, can help you find quiet routes. Cycle training, which is free in all London boroughs and some outside the capital, will boost rider confidence and skill.
For Brian Deegan, technical advisor for Manchester’s cycling and walking commissioner Chris Boardman, cycle training is key. “I think it’s on employers, particularly if you’re encouraging people to ride into work, to say to their staff, ‘Well, do you need any training?’ Having that confidence in where to position yourself on the road and how to interact with cars is a skill that everybody needs.” Deegan adds, “Lots of stuff we’re building is going to be transformational, but it’s probably
“WE NEED THE WORKFORCE TO TRAVEL TO WORK ON B IKES . IM ’ DO ING A CALL OUT TO EMPLOYERS TO SAY IF YOU ’RE ASK ING PEOPLE TO R IDE IN , MAKE SURE THEY ’RE CONF IDENT , THEY HAVE THE SK ILLS AND THEY KNOW HOW TO DO IT”
BRIAN DEEGAN
going to come in different phases. It’s going to take six to 12 months to really get those final routes going. In the meantime, we need the workforce to travel to work on bikes. I’m really doing a call out to employers to say if you’re asking people to ride in, make sure that they’re confident, they have the skills and they know how to do it.”
Tim Hollingsworth, chief executive of Sport England, says it’s important that employers look at their facilities and ask if there’s secure parking to leave bikes and space for showers and changing rooms, so that they can help their employees feel comfortable about cycling into work. “It’s when you create the right environment, the right conditions, that people will build cycling more into their life,” believes Hollingsworth.
Bike life
People are being asked to make big changes to their lives and there’s understandably a measure of fear. People will say closing residential roads to through traffic amounts to trapping them in their homes, but evidence shows that when there is less traffic on a street, people like it. During ‘School Street’ trials by cycling and walking charity Sustrans, where roads were closed to through traffic at drop-off and pick-up time, 90 per cent of parents supported the measure, and residents reported feeling less of a prisoner in their own home because normal traffic chaos was removed.
People often wrongly believe that reducing road space for cars increases congestion. However, a 3.5m-wide lane can carry just 2000 people in cars, or 14,000 people on bicycles. To move the most people, cycle lanes are king – helping more people ditch their cars, so leaving space for those who really need to drive.
Acorn Road in Newcastle, an upmarket shopping street in leafy Jesmond, was made one-way in 2016, with a contraflow cycle lane and wider pavements replacing parking spaces. Business owners worried about the impact on trade, including a hardware shop owner now quoted in a Sustrans’ Bike Life report as a scheme cheerleader. One of the benefits of pop-up or trial infrastructure is that people can see their streets in a different way, and decide if they like it. Often they do. As Dollimore puts it, “There’s a lot to be said about putting the infrastructure in and letting people see it’s not the end of the world.”
The car has long held a monopoly over our streets, with impacts on every aspect of our lives – many of them negative. Society has been shaken to its foundations, and we may decide we want something better for our future. We may want to rethink the Monopoly board entirely.