#BikeIsBest Advocacy Digest - Edition No.14

#BikeIsBest Digest Edition No. 14 | Wednesday, May 18th 2022 | View in browser

Hello and welcome to this week’s newsletter, where we’re celebrating the launch of a national e-cycle pilot in England, some new active travel schemes, a rare appearance of Lycra in the #BikeIsBest newsletter and Detective Superintendent Andy Cox’s national challenge to cycle and run around the country unifying police forces against road danger.

EBIKES, GARMS AND REDUCING ROAD HARM

But seriously, this week we see three major barriers to active travel addressed at a national level: road danger (or fear thereof), infrastructure and access to e-cycles. 

BIG STORIES FOR CYCLING ADVOCACY

LOAN RANGER

Big announcements from The Department for Transport, including a new e-bike loan pilot, where people in Greater Manchester, Leicester, Luton & Dunstable, Hull and Sheffield can borrow e-cycles free, helping them cycle further and farther. There’s also training and access to non-standard cycles in the programme, run by Cycing UK and partners. Many (including us) would also like to see purchase subsidies - as we know cost is a major barrier 

MINI-HOLLANDS TO… GREAT BIG ENGLANDS?

There’s funding worth £200m for active travel schemes outside of London, also via Active Travel England. Chris Boardman, the national Cycling & Walking Commissioner, says he wants councils to promote the safety benefits of things like low traffic neighbourhoods, reframing the narrative in terms of what voters have to gain, not what they may lose. Among schemes will be ‘mini-Hollands’, akin to London’s successful outer London cycling and walking pilots. 

ANDY COX CHALLENGE 2022

Detective Superintendent Andy Cox, head of police road collision investigation, is running and cycling 200 miles this week to raise money for RoadPeace and raise awareness of road danger. Each day he’s meeting different people, including police from other forces and celebrities, to try and change the narrative around road crime. You can support his efforts here.

MAN RIDES BIKE

Richard Ayoade is often seen cycling in South London with his family, but a celebrity cycling home after an event in the same city he lives still constitutes news in these parts. He looks good doing it, and we think he’s a great role model for other well-dressed men about town to hop on a Brompton of an evening, instead of hailing a cab.  

KIDS BIKES THEY ARE A-CHANGING

Karen Gee, head of bike brand Cycle Sprog, looks back on the development of kids’ cycles across her career to date. From heavy frames with stabilisers and princess decals, to lighter-weight machines across cycling disciplines, she tells BikeBiz readers how things have transformed for the better. 

THE WAY WE MOVE IS CHANGING

This week we launch our first campaign of 2022. We Can, You Can is a celebration of the many faces of cycling. The way we move is changing. And the people leading the change are like me and you. We can, you can.

Watch it now
 

OTHER HEADLINES

ZARA DOES…CYCLE CLOTHING

Lycra goes mainstream with ranges of women’s (and men’s) cycle clobber. While folks shouldn’t feel like they need special clothes or equipment to ride a cycle, the fact cycling attire has made it to the high street is yet more evidence of its becoming part of the national conscience. The cycle-shorts-as-fashion has been doing the rounds for a couple of years now, too.  

INTERESTING GRAPHIC OF THE WEEK

Women are underrepresented in cycling in the UK but this isn’t the case all over the world. This graph from a 2020 study by Dr Rachel Aldred and colleagues shows where countries and cities are in terms of gender representation. Flagged by an urban mobility conference in Leipzig this week. 


Source

ACTIVE TRAVEL PHRASE OF THE WEEK; TRAVEL CORRIDOR

Travel Corridor. Previously associated with pandemic travel between countries, this travel corridor is one of the 134 schemes Active Travel England is funding, in Gloucestershire. The scheme will apparently involve “reduced traffic and high-quality cycle routes”

Until next time,

Founder, #BikeIsBest

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