Author name: Steven Edwards

The Welsh Government has issued new Active Travel Act guidance to assist local authorities in planning for and effectively designing high quality walking and cycling infrastructure.

The devolved Government is taking a different road to England, opting to trim back its future road building plans in the face of an intensifying climate crisis, instead pledging further support to active travel; albeit with just £75 million in funding available to make progress.

Road injuries halved in low-traffic neighbourhoods installed during the coronavirus pandemic when compared against areas without the schemes, a new study has found

The improvement in safety is more than twice that created by 20mph urban speed limits.
The research, which examined police data on casualties for 72 low-traffic neighbourhoods (LTNs) put in place in London between March and September last year, also showed no apparent increase in danger on roads at their outer boundaries.
The greatest reduction in injuries was among pedestrians and people in cars, with a modest effect at most for cyclists, according to the study, which was led by Dr Anna Goodman, a public health expert at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, with academics from Westminster University and Imperial College London.

The NAO report highlights “serious weaknesses” in the way central government departments have worked with councils on how to meet that target.
Cllr Adam Harrison, Camden’s climate chief, said: “From Camden’s perspective, we have long pointed out that there is a massive opportunity gap between what we would like to do as a council to reduce carbon and what we are enabled to do given the lack of financial support and powers from the government.

“Our general funding has been cut 50% over the last decade with no let-up in sight. The other funding the government makes available does, as the NAO points out, tend to be piecemeal. This includes funding for homeowners, which also tends to be hit-and-miss and confusing to apply for.”

Damian Carrington

Slow-moving storms such as recent deluge in Germany could become 14 times more frequent by 2100

Peter Walker

Just 7% of customers travel to businesses by car

Peter Walker

A four-day loop around the King Alfred’s Way gave ample time to test the claims of faster speeds and greater off-road ease

The world of leisure cycling is nothing if not inventive when it comes to ways to sell bikes and associated bits of kit, and two of the most popular new – or theoretically new – concepts are bikepacking and gravel bikes.
As with all such ideas there is the inevitable marketing guff, but both are nonetheless interesting, if sometimes misunderstood. Earlier this week, on trend as ever, I managed both, with a four-day ride around the King Alfred’s Way, a 218-mile primarily off-road loop through the lanes, tracks, woods and ridges of Hampshire, Wiltshire, Berkshire, Surrey and West Sussex.

Don Pickrell  July 14, 2021
Subsidising employer-paid parking clogs streets, boosts emissions and isn’t fair to commuters who can’t use this perk. But there’s an easy way to fix it.