Author name: Steven Edwards

Blake Houghton was part of gang targeting cyclists and motorbikers

A 19 year old who robber was part of a gang that stole a motorbike and bicycle in Sheffield after mugging their owners has been jailed for two years and three months.
Blake Houghton admitted two counts of burglary, two of robbery and one of dangerous driving when he appeared at Sheffield Crown Court yesterday, reports the Sheffield Star(link is external).
The court heard that the teenager was one of four occupants of a car, all wearing masks, who forced a motorcyclist to stop on the city’s Shirecliffe Road, with one of his accomplices making off with the motorbike.
Prosecuting counsel Matthew Burdon told the court that the victim had been squeezed by the driver of a Seat car who, like his three passengers, was wearing a mask, with the motorcyclist threatened with violence to force him to give them his motorbike.

When I was a small boy I lived in Edinburgh in the 1960s, with family & friends in Glasgow, and could only watch in horror as communities where some of the lived were destroyed or blighted forever by the M8: https://glasgowlive.co.uk/news/history/what-m8-did-charingcross-anderston-15847121 Replace the M8!

14 February 2022
Transport for New Homes says parking takes up a lot of space and impacts severely on public realm and good urban design
Greenfield housing estates are adding hundreds of thousands of new car journeys to roads, increasing congestion, increasing carbon emissions and air pollution, a new study suggests.
The Building Car Dependency report, released by Transport for New Homes, states that a typical greenfield development is designed in every way around the car – with as many as two to three car parking spaces per home. 

Islabikes to mass-produce model specifically for adults with achondroplasia, after working with campaign group
Peter Walker

Steve Scott from the Dwarf Sports Association worked with the company to develop the bikes.
For much of the 15-plus years Islabikes has existed, the UK company’s managing director Tim Goodall recalls, adults with dwarfism would regularly get in touch, asking to come in to try out one of the bikes they make for children.
The company, he said, was happy to oblige, if aware of the implications: “It was the best option out there, but it was still pretty awful. It did feel like it was a problem that could be solved through better design.”
And that, in the end, is what has happened. The Ludlow-based business has become the first bike manufacturer in the world to mass-produce models specifically designed for the requirements of people with disproportionate dwarfism.

Richard Masoner 25 February, 2014

Petition update 9 Mar 2022 — 
The Secretary of State for Transport wants to make a new decision on the Stonehenge road scheme. He first asked National Highways for responses to five matters he wishes to consider i.e.  Alternatives, Policy, Carbon, Environmental Information and Any Other Matters. 
National Highways has responded. (See “Documents” tab in this link) and the Secretary of State for Transport has now invited comments on those submissions and any other relevant information.
The submissions by National Highways are technical and lengthy.  The Stonehenge Alliance and its expert advisers are preparing a full technical response which we will share in due course.
However, it is important that the Secretary of State for Transport hears from the wider public on these issues.  We’re therefore asking as many people to respond as possible, to raise some or all of the points below.

3/3/22 Simon Cox
Having estimated the cycling sector could potentially create upwards of 100,000 jobs by 2050, French government minister Guillaume Gouffier-Cha has been tasked with exploring possibilities to “rebuild an economic sector of cycling”.
This comes after a December 2019 conversation with French Prime Minister Jean Castex, which resulted in a request to assess the impact of cycling on the economy, the environment, and a wider French society.
For historical context Guillaume Gouffier-Cha states, “At the end of the 1970s our country was one of the world leaders in the bicycle industry. Everything collapsed in the space of a few years to the detriment of an almost total dependence on Asian countries.”

The information National Highways wants to present to you, to persuade you to support this damaging development, with dates for local exhibitions, some of them staffed by National Highways’ staff and consultants, can be found on their Arundel webpage www.nationalhighways.co.uk/our-work/south-east/a27-arundel-bypass.  Our recommended way to respond is to send your own comments in your own words either via email or post: