London looks set to copy Paris’ example by rolling out a city-wide scheme of free bikes. Good stuff, but of more interest to established and budding self-sufficients in the capital (and those travelling in from the suburbs) is a parallel plan to introduce 12 bicycle motorways. These will offer a ‘network of quick, simple, and safe routes for cyclists’ that should give bikes and pedestrians greater priority over the city’s motor traffic.
The bikes scheme is ambitious enough, with racks for 6,000 publicly funded cycles every 300 metres, the ultimate goal being to encourage one in every ten journeys in the city made on bike.
The budget? £500m.
The bicycle motorways will consist of a dozen radial Cycling Corridors, dedicated Bike Zones with 20mph speed limits, and dedicated routes to cut the time and effort required to travel between key destinations like waterways and parks.
These Bike Zones look like being massive, covering a radius of 5km from key town centres. Slowing down all of the traffic in such a large area is going to have a heavy impact on drivers, and for them it’ll be a hard sell. For the moment, though, reception seems to be largely favourable, with the Guardian quoting Edmund King, president of the AA, saying ‘The current system of haphazard provision for cyclists is not good for them or for other road users. I think separating out cyclists can only be good for everyone and the only provision I would raise is that we still need to have roads for the movement of trucks, cars and buses – so we need to make sure we get the balance right.’ (source)
Of course, this will all take time, but the first Corridor should be in place by next year, with others following closely behind.
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