Author name: Steven Edwards

We’re already making our voices heard:

• MPs and Peers from across the political spectrum came along to our campaign bus to talk about why the way forward is public transport

• We put up ads at Westminster tube station to ensure that parliamentarians notice our campaign messages

• Hundreds of people have already emailed their MPs about the campaign

And we’ve seen some success: at last, part-time commuters will be able to buy flexible rail season tickets. We’ll be watching closely as more details emerge – it’s vital that the tickets offer a decent discount.

A sustainability and smart city specialist think tank has made a string of policy recommendations, including delivery of London markets by cargo bike, in a bid to enhance public interest in the practicalities of utility cycling versus defaulting to car use.
The 26-page Fare City assessment, authored by architect and former public policy shaper Charles Critchell draws on a body of pre and during Covid research, including the meticulous analysis of cargo bike delivery businesses like PedalMe, which famously employs its own data scientist to develop the firm’s inner city efficiency.

Metro Mayor Steve Rotheram is calling for a revolution in how people in our region get around as he launches a major campaign for people to ditch short car journeys.
He said putting walking and cycling on an equal footing with public transport, in the Liverpool City Region would be key to making improvements to the planet and people’s individual health.,
The campaign comes as part of a wider election pledge to deliver a fully-integrated “London-style Transport System” serving the Liverpool City Region.
To encourage motorists to leave their cars at home, the combined authority is investing £30m in a 600km Active Travel network of cycle paths and walkways.

When it comes to tackling the really big challenges of our world, you might not immediately think of cycling and walking as solutions. But it’s time to recognise the potential of the humble bicycle and our own two feet.
First, though, I have a confession. You know how most children learn to ride a bike around five or six? Well, I learned late – about 11 or 12 – and have always been a very, very nervous rider. What’s more, having learned, I left it more than three decades before doing anything more than a few minutes of uncomfortable wobbling. We went through six prime ministers, drainpipe trousers, Duran Duran, the invention of the internet, email, Twitter, Facebook, the bacon sandwich incident – and still I resisted two wheels.

Amelia Hill Sat 22 May 2021
Ed Miliband only mastered the art of riding a bicycle aged 50 – and was put off using an adult tricycle because he was worried about the paparazzi, he reveals in a new book serialised in the Guardian on Saturday.
Admitting he had always been a “very, very nervous [bicycle] rider” as a child, the now 51-year-old hired an electric bike while on holiday in France and “had an epiphany”. “This”, he said, “was the eureka moment”.

Now, I have covered LTNs many times in this blog and so this week I thought it might be interesting to talk about the five principles. I am a fan of the details, but a little step back to look at principles is always a good idea as it helps us understand how things fit together. This post is essentially the long-hand version of the slides I used in my talk.

The five principles crop up in all sorts of UK cycling planning and design policy and guidance – even in the most dire of the genre! It is no surprise that they pop up in the new English design guidance, LTN1/20 Cycle Infrastructure Design, and they are covered in some detail in Chapter 4. It’s also worth stating that in fact they equally apply to planning and designing for walking. The reason for this is that these principles major on the human experience of self-propelled travel.

The true measure of the seriousness of the planetary crisis is not destruction but discontinuity.
My most succinct working definition of a “discontinuity” is a watershed moment, one where past experience loses its value as a guide to decision-making about the future. It’s a critical concept, so I’m going to do my best in this week’s email to quickly explain what it means to me, and why it may be useful to you.
The planetary crisis is what I call the interlocking, complex, accelerating changes our actions are bringing on in the natural world. Climate change is the largest problem within this crisis, but it is interconnected with ecosystem degradation, biodiversity loss, topsoil loss and water shortages, threats to food systems, changes in ocean chemistry, the release of rivers of toxic chemicals into the biosphere, invasive species and so on. We can talk about them as separate challenges, but in reality they are all one crisis. And it is getting worse, fast.

“We will watch the London trial with interest, but we do not permit – and we have no plans to permit – the use of e-scooters in the parks,” she added.