Mud

Here's a picture of Merton's best cycle route.

Unfortunately, as you can see, it is not in an ideal state to encourage mass cycling. The surface looks like a mixture of aggregate, sand and clay, and hasn't been well-constructed. There is no proper camber, and shallow depressions have formed all the way along and across the surface, which isn't very porous. The end result is more like a canal than a cycleway. When it rains, the surface is about 90% puddle, 10% slippery mud, and it stays that way for days afterwards. If you ride along the path when it's in this state (which it was about three-quarters of last year) your clothes will be mud-spattered and your drivetrain will last about as long as an X-factor-winner's career. Even the best of mudguards are no match for these conditions, however slowly and carefully you ride.

The other effect of the WWI-like conditions is people create their own alternatives:

This is a little shortcut that cuts off two sides of the triangle as you approach the tram tracks just before Morden Hall Park. It started off as a narrow foot track. Then people on bikes started using it because it was often more usable than the official trail. But as the track got more used, it became muddier and more eroded, so people started walking and riding on the grass by the side. As you can see, this process has destroyed the vegetation and we've ended up with something reminiscent of Glastonbury in a bad year.

This is what happens when you create sub-standard infrastructure. If instead of using 'natural' (read unsuitable) materials for the track they'd used tarmac, a lot more people would use it and there would be no damage to the vegetation surrounding the trail. There counter-argument is that tarmac isn't natural and therefore unsuitable for parkland. I don't buy that. No artificially-constructed trail is, or looks natural, even if it's made of mud. You can make tarmac unobtrusive; it is possible to create a path that is fit for purpose without ruining the natural ambience. What is really ruinous of the city environment is the idea that cyclists need to be relegated to this kind of crap, while motor traffic is free to intimidate them off even the most residential of roads. It would relieve a lot of stress on parks if people could enjoy a pleasant walk or cycle in their local neighborhood, instead of every square centimeter of streetscape being used for wider, faster roads or car parking.

I like the Wandle Trail, I really do. But it's constructed as a leisure route, not suitable for general transport use. The fact that it's a rough track wouldn't matter if it were not for the lack of alternatives suitable for those without sideburns. As it is, the alternatives are so unpalatable, the trail is pressed into service for all kinds of journeys by those not suffering from hydrophobia, while people who need to arrive at their destination without requiring a change of clothes and a new chain, are put off cycling altogether.

Commissioner Gilligan

The big news last week was that the journalist Andrew Gilligan will shortly be appointed Cycling Commissioner for London.

Various people within the cyclosphere and political circles have criticised the appointment, accusing Boris Johnson of cronyism, and questioning Gilligan's qualifications, experience and credentials. Others have been more supportive.

As far as qualifications are concerned, there must be very few people in the UK with an actual track record of designing and delivering quality cycle infrastructure in the UK - for the simple reason that there isn't any. And let's face it, the people we've had hitherto in charge of cycling, appointed by all parties including those critical of Gilligan's appointment, haven't exactly covered themselves in glory.

I don't think this job is an engineering post. It's not as if you have to design or dig up the roads yourself. It doesn't require deep transport expertise either. In fact being historically responsible for the state of the UK's highways could be a stain on your credibility. The job is, or should be, about getting the actual transport and highway experts doing the right things - being able to put together and sell a vision, and being able to understand what is needed to make cycling mainstream. And it helps if you actually ride a bike for daily transport in all conditions (as opposed to driving to a trail at the weekend with a bike on your car, or posing by a bike for a photo opportunity). That is the only way to understand the problems that cyclists face.  And by this measure, very few people charged with delivering cycle infrastructure in the UK are qualified, which could be a clue as to why it is so uniformly woeful.

Cycalogical is independent and not affiliated to any corporations, campaigning organisations or political parties. We do not get free holidays at anyone's villa in Tuscany, and no-one buys us dinner at The Ivy. So we're free to criticize and upset anyone.

We've been critical on this blog of Gilligan in the past for his weak grasp of safety statistics, but we're prepared to give him the benefit of any doubt. He seems to say the right things: The Times quotes him thus:

"I believe that the way to win arguments is to stress what better cycle facilities can do for London as a whole – reducing air pollution and crowding on the Tube, for example – rather than just for cyclists." 

and in 2010 he wrote:

"Twenty years ago, Berlin's cycling rate was not much more than London's now. The city authorities raised it five-fold with a concerted programme of building segregated bike lanes, bike stands and special traffic lights to get cyclists across difficult junctions. By the standards of a rail scheme, it cost virtually nothing. Safety is would-be cyclists' number one fear, a mostly undeserved one since the number of accidents has fallen even as the number of cyclists has soared. The segregation gave Berliners confidence to overcome that fear."

So Gilligan should get our full backing, provided he makes as much noise as possible in support of mass cycling, thumps the table at recalcitrant politicians, civil servants, local officers and car-centric highways engineers, confronts the anti-cycling lobby, and shows up the hypocrisy of those who claim to support cycling but do nothing about it while Britain slides into an epidemic of ill-health caused by our sedentary lifestyle. It's a shame the post is only part-time.

Let's not forget that while Labour are happy to criticise this appointment, and to talk up cycling while in opposition, the party's record while in power has been underwhelming. While they cannot be held entirely responsible for the current situation where there is a presumption against cycling built into the roads and justice systems, they failed to do anything meaningful about it during 13 years, and in some respects made it worse. The Traffic Management Act 2004 - which introduced the 'network management duty' used by TfL to justify the Blackfriars Bridge anti-cycling scheme - was Labour Government legislation. They messed around with the Road Traffic Act, but failed to tackle the loopholes that continue to allow killer drivers to escape with a small fine and a hard stare from the judge. On infrastructure, Labour spent a lot of money with little return in terms of enabling ordinary people to cycle.

However, any cycling commissioner has dark forces ranged against him (or her). Anyone who takes any notice of local politics will know the tsunami of opposition that greets any attempt to restrict parking or driving no matter how marginal the actual effect. That aside, there are still many barriers that make it very difficult, time-consuming and expensive for even well-intentioned and motivated local authorities to put in place decent infrastructure, such as the need to obtain a Traffic Order (a veritable orgy of bureaucracy) just to put a mandatory cycle lane in place. And then there's the problem that no-one's in overall charge. No one body or individual is either required or empowered to make decent cycle routes a reality. Responsibility for roads is split between different authorities: central government, TfL, the 30-odd London boroughs, and there are also organizations like Sustrans in the mix, so the buck tends to just get passed around. Hopefully the all-party inquiry which gets under way tomorrow will throw all that into focus and trigger action,  legislation and funding. All parties need to get behind cycling, because it will be just too easy for cynical politicians to take advantage of nimbyism on issues like parking to derail progress, and condemn us to another 20 years of car dependency, traffic congestion, obesity and transport poverty. We live, as ever, in hope of infrastructure rather than inquiries, and of cycling rather than commissioners...

Dangerous

We don't normally do stories about injustice on this blog, because it would be a bit like writing about punctures. There's just too many of them.

This story about the bloke who took his 4x4 up Mount Snowdon caught my eye though. His abortive ascent got him a 22-month jail sentence, for "dangerous driving".

Dangerous, it seems, has the opposite meaning in a court of law than it does in everyday life. If you destroy someone's life with a large truck while using a mobile phone, that's not dangerous. If you kill someone by opening a car door, that's not dangerous. But if you drive a car up a mountain, at night when there's no-one around, and in the process no-one gets killed or injured, that is dangerous.

At Cycalogical, we don't want to encourage people to drive 4x4 vehicles anywhere, except if you're a farmer or othewise have legitimate business off-road or in conditions where 2-wheel drive vehicles can't be used. 4x4s are extremely dangerous when used irresponsibly, for example driving to the shops in London, because of the high carbon emissions which will endanger future generations in the shape of climate change. That's not illegal of course, it's just immoral. But there are plenty of road users who are committing crimes that result in death and injury, and are dangerous by any reasonable definition of the word, but don't seem to meet the impossibly high standards of the UK law's definition of "dangerous".

Time for those in charge of the criminal justice system to buy a dictionary?

Doing the Lambeth Walk - In Berkshire?

This blog lampooned TfL's bizarre proposals to tart up the Lambeth Bridge/Millbank roundabout back in October, and encouraged readers to make their views known via the consultation process. Well, it looks like a lot of people did exactly that, and the recently-published results of the consultation do not make comfortable reading for TfL. However, credit where credit's due, they are abandoning the original proposal and looking at a roundabout with segregated cycle facilities. Hooray!

The consultation report says:
"Some of the measures suggested by respondents, such as a segregated cycle track around the outside of the roundabout with cyclist priority at slip roads, would be new features on London’s roads, and therefore require off-street trials. We have started building the infrastructure for these trials at the Transport Research Laboratory in Berkshire, and we will work with our stakeholders to ensure their views are considered as part of this work."

This is nonsense. Cycle-friendly roundabouts have been around for a while now on the Continent. We do not need to re-invent the wheel: and people do not cycle differently on the Continent (except they are rather more relaxed and less fearful. And they're on the other side of the road). So here's an idea. Given that this idea obviously works in practice, why not build it in London instead of Berkshire?

The existing roundabout is deadly. While the TRL are trialling something safer in a field out in the sticks, cyclists will continue to be at risk here in the smoke. Given the choice between something that is crap, and something else that has been proven in another country not to be crap, why would you want to put up with the crap for another year or two while a bunch of boffins in a lab prove that the new stuff  that isn't crap, is not crap, and spend a lot of your money doing so?

One other issue from the consultation report arises from the following sentence:


"we will concentrate our resources on developing more substantial improvements that meet the expectations of Westminster Council and other stakeholders"

Given Westminster Council's record on cycling, that statement is profoundly worrying. What exactly are their expectations? The opposed the shared space, like almost everyone else, but what else do they oppose? We should be told.

Cake

Happy Birthday to the Tube, which is 150 years old and showing its age. The Standard reports Mike Mike Brown, head cheese of London Underground, is out with the begging bowl. And he's not after 150 candles to put on a cake. "Without an additional £12 billion to pay for a gap in funding for upgrades to Bank, Monument and Holborn stations and the modernisation of the Piccadilly and Bakerloo lines, the reliability of the Tube will be compromised and money wasted on repairs", he wheedles.

So let's get that straight - this is not much more than just keeping the existing system running.

Let's consider what we could do with a tenth of that money spent on cycling - £1.2bn. Even at an average cost of £1M/mile, you could build over 1000 miles of Continental-style cycle infrastructure. It wouldn't all be segregated tracks - we'd also have filtered permeability and offroad routes. And maybe one or two cycle bridges. No-one in London need be out of range of a quality cycle route. Kids would be able to cycle to school or to the park. Pensioners would be able to cycle to the shops. Ordinary people without sideburns or an Olympic medal could cycle to see friends, or even to work! And I mean ordinary people - people with a suggestion of muffin-top or man-boobs who today use cars to go everywhere, because a quality, subjectively safe cycle network would guarantee no more 'taking the lane' against HGVs, or having to cut across 3 lanes of fast-moving traffic. No more lycra, no more hi-viz, no more helmets. And no more cycling on the pavement.

It's not unrealistic to expect that with this investment we could end up with Continental levels of cycling, so instead of having maybe 2% of journeys made by bike, we could have 10%. Or even 20%. Londoners would be healthier, with lower rates of heart disease, cancer, diabetes, and all the other maladies associated with lack of exercise. That alone would likely save in excess of £1.2bn from the NHS budget. There would be less transport poverty, with journey costs massively reduced with cycling replacing expensive public transport and car travel. Many Londoners would likely no longer need to keep a private car, using taxis or car clubs for occasions where motor journeys are necessary. And with fewer cars and car journeys, we'd have quieter, more peaceful, less dangerous neighborhoods, no more parking problems (and fewer parking fines). Motor journeys would be quicker due to less congestion. We'd also have a lower carbon footprint and reduced pollution. Local authorities could sell off surplus car parking for house-building, raising revenue and easing the housing crisis. Building the cycle infrastructure would generate jobs of course.

It all sounds a bit too good to be true, doesn't it? Maybe we'd be better off sticking to the tried-and-tested formula of congested, dangerous roads and overcrowded, massively-subsidised but still expensive public transport.

Changing Times - "War on Britain's Roads"

This time last year, I didn't think I'd be praising a Murdoch newspaper, or Transport for London. I also didn't think I'd be lambasting the BBC.

The Times's excellent Cities fit for Cycling campaign rolls on, with added poignancy this week with the start of the trial of the truck driver accused of seriously injuring Times journalist Mary Bowers. This crash was the trigger for the campaign.

Meanwhile, Transport for London's latest plans for the Bow roundabout "genuinely impresssed" the Cyclists in the City blog.

Not so impressed with the BBC's "War on Britain's Roads" documentary. This has attracted widespread opprobrium, from people ranging from Ian Austin MP, co-chair of the All Party Parliamentary Cycling Group, who branded it “stupid, sensationalist, simplistic, irresponsible nonsense”, Telegraph motoring journalist Chris Knapman, British Cycling, Chris Boardman, and AA head Edmund King . In fact, to call this a documentary is stretching the definition of the word beyond its elastic limit. It's a sloppy, irresponsible piece of journalism unworthy of the Daily Mail at its most cyclophobic, let alone the BBC. A lot of the footage is lifted straight from YouTube. In that sense it's a bit like a piece of GCSE media studies coursework - but no A*. Must do better. The passage about red-light-jumping cyclists merges straight into the bit about cyclist crashes, victim-blaming by implication. And no statistics to set the record straight. Nothing from the Highway Code either, to tell the talking-head cabdriver or the viewers how much room to leave a cyclist when overtaking, or why cyclists 'take the lane'. Then a six-year-old film of an alleycat race. No footage of illegal car racing on roads, of course, as if that would ever happen.
The fact is there is no war on Britain's roads. A war is an armed conflict where both sides go out to harm each other. Deliberate attacks with a motor vehicle are quite rare, and with a cycle, pretty much unheard of (you're more likely to injure yourself than someone else unless you know what you're doing). While aggression and dangerous driving are undoubtedly a problem, cyclist collisions are not usually caused by the extremes of recklessness on the part of either 'mad' drivers or cyclists that the film tries to portray. The more prosaic truth is it's mainly ordinary motorists, distracted by mobile phones, driving a little too fast for conditions, not looking or looking but not seeing, lacking in the skill to expect the unexpected or to anticipate what's going on in front of or around them. Unskilled cycling plays a part, but much more it's crap cycle infrastructure, which fails to protect cyclists from harm and demands an extremely high degree of skill and vigilance on the part of the rider. If the film does one thing well, albeit unintentionally, it is to illustrate how important segregated lanes are. No coincidence that a significant amount of the footage seemed to have the Cycle Superhighway blue lanes in - which tells you all you need to know about Boris's paint-and-PR scheme.

In the BBC's recent high-profile disasters connected with journalism on the Savile affair, no-one died. I predict that people will die as a result of this film, which encourages people already leaning that way to view cyclists as irresponsible, selfish and slightly unhinged. Of course, the programme won't appear as a 'cause of death' on any coroner's report, but it will add to the fog of misinformation, victim-blame and demonisation of cyclists, which feeds into animosity and a lack of tolerance and consideration, that ultimately leads to fatalities. I wonder how the film-makers sleep at night. Maybe the BBC should take a few lessons in journalistic ethics from News International.

Gearing Up

Gearing Up is the title of the London Assembly's investigation into safer cycling in London.

This has been generally well received by the cycling blogosphere: Cyclists in the City described it as "compelling reading...packed with common sense and with the facts and data to back up that common sense".

Cycalogical broadly agrees that it's a useful document, well-researched and showing that at least some London politicians finally 'get it'. But it's just paper and ink...or bytes, if you read the PDF version. And the first thing you need to know about this report is it has very little relevance in the real world. That's because the London Assembly has very little relevance. It has no actual powers, beyond the ability to produce reports like this one and to ask questions of the Mayor. It has no real ability to force the Mayor to do anything, or to prevent him from doing anything, except with regard to the budget and certain strategies, and even then a two-thirds majority is needed. In the words of Andrew Boff AM, “The Assembly’s job, to hold the Mayor to account and raise issues of interest to Londoners, is all very worthy, but largely futile."

I'm not going to dissect the whole report here, because there's nothing actually groundbreaking in terms of concepts. It's all stuff you could have read on this blog and others for years. Instead let's look at what the Assembly are recommending, and focus on the recommendations directly related to infrastructure.

"The Mayor should establish a new target for cycling in his 2020 Vision statement due in December 2012. In the statement, he should bring forward his target of 5 per cent cycling modal share from 2026 to 2020. He should also establish a new target of 10 per cent cycling modal share by 2026 to reflect the Mayor’s ambition to create a ‘cycling revolution’ in London."

Yeah right. But the point is action, not targets. Targets are as pointless as words like "cycling revolution",  if you can't meet them, and the proven ways of increasing cycling modal share are:
a) decent, subjectively safe infrastructure;
b) crashing the economy into the ground and raising transport fares so people can't afford to get around any other way.
So one box ticked then. Onwards...

"The Mayor should appoint a Cycling Commissioner to champion cycling and realise his target to increase cycling. The Cycling Commissioner should be responsible for the publication of a biennial London Bicycle Account to inform Londoners of what TfL is doing to improve cycle safety, increase investment in cycling, and encourage more Londoners to cycle."

Not a bad idea to have singularity of leadership. Or to have more accountability. But without real power to force local boroughs like Westminster to do things, or a real budget, or the will, knowledge and ability to force TfL out of their time capsule when it comes to road design, will the Commissioner really achieve anything?

"Doubling the amount of funding for cycling"

There is a lot of talk in the report about how much money is spent on cycling. But the report fails to identify the incredibly lousy value for money we get from what is currently invested. The report acknowledges that London's cycling spend is half that of the Netherlands, but doesn't link that to the fact that London has about  tenth of the cycle journeys. Therefore our windmill-loving, tulip-growing Continental neighbours enjoy five times better value for their money. In fact - almost unbelievably in these straitened times -neither the word "value" nor the phrase "value for money" occurs anywhere in the main report. I don't know what the Tory members were doing when this report was being written - after all, they style themselves as the defender of the poor old taxpayer. Maybe they were quietly snoozing at the back?
There is no point in doubling the spend, if it just doubles the amount of crap, narrow, advisory lanes that quit when the going gets tough. There's no point in doubling the number of superficial road makeovers on which cyclists continue to be injured. There's no point in doubling the number of reports written about cycling, or doubling the number of advance-stop-boxes full of motor vehicles. We need more money, but we must recognize what we shouldn't be spending money on, as well as what we should be spending money on. In other words, we need a vision.

"Consider the case for a dedicated cycling fund as part of the Local Implementation Plan (LIP) process. This fund could be matched by boroughs."

Well it is certainly true, as was predicted by this blog waaay back in 2010, that getting rid of ring-fenced funding for cycling has been disastrous. But it is also true that most boroughs are utterly ineffective at creating worthwhile, value-for-money cycle schemes. The last thing we should be doing is giving boroughs any money without telling them exactly what they must do with it. There needs to be a single, London-wide vision of a network of quality, subjectively safe, Continental-style infrastruture, and not a penny should be spent on schemes that are not aligned with that vision.

"The junction review should be able to demonstrate substantial and innovative changes to the space and protection given to cyclists at the junctions. The changes should take account of best practice in Denmark and the Netherlands, and be in line with the Mayor’s commitment to Love London Go Dutch."

No argument with that. However the report fails to point out something this blog recently said: there is little point in having quality junctions that don't have decent links between them. Isolated spot treatments are not part of Continental best practice, for the very good reason that a route is only as safe as its most dangerous part. And it's got to feel safe to attract people who don't currently cycle because of fear of traffic. Busy roads with pinch-points, multiple traffic lanes and the odd narrow advisory lane punctuated frequently by parking bays will sound familiar to anyone who currently cycles in London, and simply don't hit the mark.

"The Mayor and TfL should prioritise the removal of remaining one-way gyratory systems in the junction review."

Maybe we should keep one or two, just so we don't forget why we got rid of them.

"Mayor and TfL should examine the case for introducing 20mph limits at more junctions."

Pointless if unenforced. Traffic police in London are more endangered than polar bears...and with the Coalition going cold (geddit?) on speed cameras, a 20MPH limit is about as effective an ashtray on a motorbike. The report does ask TfL to report on how 20MPH is to be enforced, but it doesn't make any recommendation.

"Review TfL’s use of traffic modelling to judge the effect that protected space for cyclists would have on cycling and other traffic."

But the point is not to model the status quo. We know from international experience that people adapt their travel habits to what's convenient and available. To develop policy, we should be using an holistic model of a 21st century city. We should be modelling public health and quality of life, and pollution, and noise, and community cohesion, and road danger, as well as traffic, in the knowledge that London's economic success depends on being a city people want to live, work and play in. Historically, roads policy has been determined as if London's sole purpose was to shift as much motor traffic as possible as fast as possible, and that is wrong. The report does touch on some of these issues, but the Assembly has failed to make a clear recommendation that will stop traffic modelling being used to obstruct safety.

"The Mayor’s Roads Task Force should identify locations where TfL could pilot temporary protected cycle routes in 2013. It should draw on lessons from trialling changes to road layouts in New York and operation of the Games Lanes during London 2012."

We don't need to pilot anything. Quality cycle infrastructure has been done before in other cities. There is nothing new that needs to be trialled or evaluated. There is no merit to doing anything temporary - this will just waste time and money. While we do nothing, people die - both in collisions and as a consequence of a sedentary lifestyle. The point is to change London into a cycle-friendly city as quickly as possible.

"Mayor and TfL should publish the revised London Cycle Design Standards by February 2013. The revised standards should include the Love London Go Dutch design principles"

The report alludes to the fact that the current standards are not standards at all, but guidelines that are frequently ignored by highway engineers who are following a different agenda. There is no point in having standards that are not mandated, whether they contain Dutch principles or not. The standards need to be part of an overall vision.

"The Mayor and TfL should provide the Committee with information on the cycling infrastructure measures it is reviewing in the International Benchmarking exercise by February 2013."

If you're wondering what the benchmarking exercise is, it is comparing London infrastructure with Copenhagen. Stop laughing. Anyone who cycles in London doesn't need a benchmarking exercise to tell them how crap it is.

"The Mayor and TfL should report to the Committee by February 2013 on TfL’s plans for the Mayor’s proposal for a new east-west route. The Mayor and TfL should provide details on the proposed length and location of the route, how it will be built to Go Dutch standards, the timetable for construction, and estimated costs."

I refer you to my previous post on this subject.

"The Department for Transport (DfT) should introduce legislative changes to traffic regulations to enable TfL to use new cycle safety solutions. TfL should also write to the DfT to renew the case for transport authorities to install internationally-proven cycle safety measures."

It's interesting that David Cameron recently accused Whitehall officials of being 'risk-averse'.Not when it comes to cyclists. They are quite happy to see immense risks being heaped on riders if it means the DfT don't have to get up off their backsides. The idea that we need to have trials of measures that have been proven to work for decades on the Continent is ridiculous, when you think the alternative is the lethal cocktail of car-centric regulations and road design we have today. The DfT probably wouldn't call the fire brigade if their house was burning down, because they're more worried about their curtains getting water damaged.

 In summary, the Report makes a lot of valid points and represents a shift towards the vision of a cycle-friendly city that this blog has been campaigning for. But its recommendations are too circumspect, and it fails to make the crucial point that cycle infrastructure is not about spot treatments and standards and isolated interventions: we need to start by defining the desired end-state: something like the successful Continental cities, where motor traffic flow isn't an issue because people get around by bike as much as possible. Given that vision, you take steps towards it, building individual routes up to the required standard. There will be some pain along the way as people adjust and change transport mode, but not as much collective pain as thousands of people watching thousands of loved one die of preventable diseases caused by pollution and inactivity.