“Derisory” and only “a wish list” – campaigners slam government’s cycling delivery plan

I started reading it but lost interest when I discovered that walking is an 'alternative' travel option.

I must be living on the ragged edge of society as I thought than walking was a pretty normal and mainstram way to get around.

Compare and contrast the will of the Government over cycling infrastucture with that for bending over backwards for frackers and letting them rape and pollute our country with barely any recourse available for us to stop them.

The first one will create a serious dent in our CO2 emissions and the second will only increase them.

The way the commenters on this website queue up to put the boot into Sustrans reminds me of a mob of Sun readers attacking a paediatrician's office.

The problem here is not a charity which is desperately trying to get cycling accepted as a normal, healthy part of our society. It's a government which doesn't give a toss about anything which isn't "economic growth". In other words, stuff which burns oil and wows foreign investors.

Sustrans understand this completely, so why are the baying mob of bloggers, Twitterati and internet experts so slow to catch up?

Oh joy!

They have an aspiration to explore an investment.

Well don't we all. I have an aspiration to explore whether I can invest in that £9000 Pinarello; but my wife will make damn sure I never do...

This looks like the "little as possible" option. I've never believed that either the DfT or the Treasury had any serious wish to promote cycling. It's too low tech for prestige schemes and brings in relatively little tax. A happier, fitter, longer lived and worst of all frugal nation, where's the profit in that?

Local Councils always get the criticism on here for not appearing to know what they are doing, which in some instances may be the case. However, this is probably at most half the problem.
The Council's cycling officers may well come up with decent ideas to begin with, however once they enter the process of political backing is when things fall apart. Local 'car centric' residents will get on their high horses, the Ward Councillors will suddenly develop wobbles when they see potential votes being lost, and all of a suddent the officers are being asked to just stick a bit of meaningless paint down instead.
The very prominent rise of the 'U-kippers' recently rather depressingly shows where the tide of popular democracy is going, and it's not in the direction of increased cycle infrastructure.

There are a fundemental issues with this plan.

1st - It's not a plan frankly. It's a document with some soundbites.

2nd - It puts the onus on LAs etc to voluntarily register an interest for cycling & walking scheme money. As we have seen with the New Forest debacle, some don't care about cycling & some are so motor-centric that they are almost anti-cycling. There should have been a statutory duty applied to authorities similar to the active travel bill in Wales to devlop & deliver.

3rd - Targets are unbelievably low and unambitious with stupidly long timescales.

4th - No new money on the table (yet) ad what is there already is spotted into certain key locations though CCAFs and other grants.

5th - Design standards. LAs are still building poor tight shared paths full of conflict. If we did get real commitment and some money it needs to be spent on good quality designs borrowing from the best on the continent

Let's face it, it will NEVER get any better. The UK is a fucking crap country to ride a bike. The politicians don't give a crap about cycling and neither do motons or any one else not connected with cycling, so this creates a pretty miserable and dangerous experience unless you ride very quiet leafy lanes in deepest countrysideshire, but even then, you risk being flattened by some cunt in a 4x4 driving too fast and close or some other cunt in a white van taking a short cut driving at an insane speed that they never see you let alone avoid you. Cyclists are at best seen as irritants and an inconvenience, or at worst, a menace - fair game to be run down. The courts give pathetic sentences even if the driver even makes it to court. This peeps is cycling in the UK. Get used to it as it ain't never going to change. Mr Toad rules the road.

Surely a big problem here is that Cyclists I assume count for such a small part of the electorate. Therefore committing £10 per head of the population to improve cycle infrastructure is political suicide.

What needs to happen is all parties to sign up to a unilateral agreement to improve cycling infrastructure to achieve the long term goals of reducing the burden on the NHS, reducing congestion, reducing emissions.

That way, no party can pledge to reverse or slash the cycling infrastructure funding when/if the general public start to baulk over their taxes going on cycling... after all, they pay their road tax for the roads already. or something.

Robert Goodwill is a waste of space as cycling minister. He has no commitment to make a difference for cyclists. He is there as an apologist for a the government, to make excuses for doing nothing.

Our cycling minister is pathetic.

Jason Torrance said: "Today’s aspiration...is a welcome step in the right direction".

Perhaps he was distracted learning about badgers or building a bench somewhere. Do Sustrans know what transport means?

Typical of the government all talk and little action.

That's why all this talk of "we need £10 per head spending on cycling" is a really bad idea without an actual infrastructure plan in place.
Get the planning and design sorted FIRST.
Then cost it.
Then build it.

Giving someone a shedload of money and saying here you go, this is equivalent to £10 per head, go and spend it on "cycling" is rubbish - all that'll happen is a load more random green paint on the roads and lots more "cyclists dismount" and "end of cycle route" signs go up.

Need a NATIONAL plan, not just farming it out to councils and telling them to do what they think is best - that way you end up with all sorts of random crap, not a joined up network.

It's all good words. Who will enforce the actions?

"the DfT claims that current spend is £5 a head a year"

…£4.95 of which goes on turbo roundabouts, gravel car park resurfacing, some blue paint, and a man who sprays little pictures of bicycles onto pavements.

The remaining 5p per head is given to Sustrans to buy the ingredients for their bicycle-powered smoothies.