Another Transport for London consultation – the A24 in Morden

As you are no doubt well aware, Transport for London are carrying out a series of consultations on improvements to the most dangerous junctions on their network. There have only been a handful published so far, of which the Waterloo (IMAX) roundabout and the roundabout at the northern end of Lambeth Bridge have received much critical attention.

Another proposal by TfL, open to consultation, that hasn’t received quite as much scrutiny – perhaps because it is not in such a high profile location – involves the cycling improvements for the A24 Epsom/London Road in Morden. It shares some similarity with the Lambeth roundabout review, in that the main suggestion is to increase the amount of legal pavement cycling. Alongside that pavement cycling, the existing on-carriageway cycle lanes (very narrow in places) will be kept, and in some places made mandatory – a solid white line, instead of a broken one, which drivers are technically prevented from driving in. I say ‘technically’, because in practice there is very little to stop drivers from driving in these lanes.

The consultation covers quite a length of this road, and I’m going to go along it, from south-west to north-east, showing just how half-hearted TfL’s proposals are, and how – with just a little more imagination, and a bit more budgetary commitment – there is great potential for good, separated infrastructure, suitable for all cyclists of all ages and abilities, to be provided along this road. The consultation proposals also bear the hallmarks of compliance with the Hierarchy of Provision; that is, conversion of pavements to shared use in the event that the authority responsible is unwilling to reduce traffic, slow it, or reallocate carriageway space. Likewise it is presumed that those using the pavement are willing to sacrifice their journey time for the privilege of cycling away from traffic.

 This is the western end of the consultation area, looking to the north-east. As you can see, this is an enormously wide road, with a large central median, wide lanes, and wide pavements. And this is what TfL are proposing for this section –

The very narrow cycle lanes on either side of the road are going to be kept, and the pavements are going to be made ‘shared use’ (the orange colour). The blue stripe denotes a parking bay, which will be kept. This will block the existing on-carriageway cycle lane when cars are parked in it.

We can see just how bad a ‘solution’ this is for cycling along this road by examining the  pavement on the northern side at this point –

That narrow cycle lane will be kept, as it is, and this pavement will be ‘shared use’.

To me, this is a poor use of the space between the fencing and the car. The on-carriageway cycle lane serves no purpose. It will encourage very few people to use the road on a bike, and (in my opinion) narrow cycle lanes like this generally make the experience of cycling in the road much worse than if they weren’t there at all – they tend to encourage close overtakes, and hostility when you are not ‘in the cycle lane’. Meanwhile, simply allowing cycling on the pavement is not appropriate; pavements look and feel like places where bicycles are not to be expected, and conflict between bicycles and pedestrians is likely.

 Looking back, in the opposite direction. Notice the distance between the car, and the fence. There is surely enormous scope here for the construction of a wide, separated track, with a pavement alongside it; a safe and comfortable environment for cycling, that doesn’t bring cyclists into conflict with pedestrians.

On the other side of the road, the situation isn’t much better.

The proposed shared use pavement (again in orange) is only intermittent, and comes to an end, reintroducing cyclists into the carriageway just at the point at which they have to navigate around parked cars (the blue stripe). I leave you to judge how many cyclists who chooses to use the pavement would willingly undertake this kind of manoeuvre on a busy through road like the A24. (Note also that the on-carriageway cycle lane remains truncated by the parking bay). There is really no point making a pavement shared use if you are only going to do so intermittently, and you are expecting cyclists to hop on and off it.

Travelling north-east, we then come to the point where the A24 meets the A329 Central Road.

Again, we have a shared use pavement (orange), and narrow, on-road cycle lanes that are broken by parking bays (blue). This is the view from the inside of the bend –

A pretty horrible place to cycle, with drivers racing up the hill to beat the traffic lights, just behind me. Most drivers did not keep out of the cycle lane – but then again, they don’t have keep out of it. This cycle lane will remain ‘advisory’.

The road is five lanes wide here, with no crossing point for pedestrians on this side of the junction. Morden Primary School is located on the opposite corner of this rather car-centric junction. A lot of the traffic at the time I took these photographs (just after 3pm on a weekday) seemed to be schoolchildren being loaded into cars.

After this junction, the A24 becomes London Road, passing the primary school and housing on the right, and Merton College on the left.

The road here resembles a race track, with the grass strip, pedestrian barriers, and signs warning drivers of the bend.

Here, again, the proposals are to convert the pavement to shared use, and to keep the on-road cycle lane. The one slight concession here is that the cycle lane will be made mandatory (as marked in yellow).

The photograph above was taken approximately from the point of the upper left-hand arrow. The cycle lane is not, of course ‘new’; the proposal is just to convert it to mandatory. This is the best cycle lane on the entire stretch of road.

On the other side of the road, again we see that the on-road cycle lane – despite being widened – will continue to be interrupted by this parking bay.

These three parked cars were all those of parents collecting their children at the end of school. I don’t blame them – this is not a nice place to allow children to walk or cycle.

The parking bays could, of course, be kept; there is ample width on this road for a safe, separated cycling route, rather than a pavement and a cycle lane that is blocked by a parking bay. A cycle track could run, for instance, between a pavement and the parked cars, with no sacrificing of motor vehicle capacity. Evidently this hasn’t been considered; the laziest solution is just to allow people to cycle on the pavement.

This gentleman was already cycling on the pavement; the legality of doing so here is murky, and I suspect will continue to be, with intermittent areas where it is not permitted.

Further along, we come to an enormous junction, which only serves the entrance to Merton College.

The proposal is for a mandatory cycle lane (yellow), alongside a pavement converted to shared use pavement (orange). Here’s how it will look (all you have to do is imagine that the dashed line marking the cycle lane is solid) –

Are five lanes really necessary here? Is the best use of the available space a narrow cycle lane, alongside a wide shared use pavement?

The next section of the A24, looking towards Baitul Futuh Mosque. Still very wide.

The proposal here is, as before, a shared use pavement (on one side only, for some reason), and a mandatory cycle lane (yellow), interrupted (again) by parking bays.

Here are photographs of one of those parking bays, the one to the right of this map, with the cycle lane that will (pointlessly) made mandatory –

A little further on, we have this bus stop.

Cycling is not going to be allowed on the pavement here, so anyone cycling along this route will, if they wish to comply with the law, have to re-enter the road at this point, negotiating their way around the outside of buses that may be stopped here. Again, there is an extraordinary amount of width to play with here, sufficient to take a wide cycle track behind a bus stop, completely free from interaction motor vehicles or the buses themselves. But it is at this very point that cyclists are forced back into the road.

Along the next section of road that runs under the railway bridge, cycling will not be legal on the pavement either.

The cycle lane here will be made mandatory, as you can see, in yellow, on the plan below. I doubt it will be very enticing to anyone currently nervous about cycling in the road.

The final area of this bit of the A24 subject to the proposed ‘improvements’ of TfL is this section of by Morden Court, on the approach to the gyratory around the Merton Council buildings.

This is a deeply revealing photograph, because it shows that this lengthy section of this road is effectively a single carriageway in each direction, thanks to the parking bays on the right, and the bus lane on the left. This should make us ask hard questions about why the rest of this road, as seen in all the previous photographs in this post, might need to be dual carriageway, at all; the capacity is constricted to one lane at this point, so I’m not entirely convinced that the A24 immediately to the south of this area has to remain a four (and in places, five) lane road. There is scope for the reallocation of a vehicle lane for a cycle track, at least along the section until the junction with Central Road (but note that reallocation is not strictly necessary, given the existing width available).

The cycle lane on the right, as currently configured, is useless.

The Transport for London plans have at least acknowledged this, and the cycle lane is to be moved out, to run continuously along the outside of the parked cars (it will also be mandatory, as marked in yellow).

In other words, the cycle lane will run between these parked cars, and the bus.

This is a better arrangement than a cycle lane that simply stops by the parking bay; however, it will run right alongside parked cars, with the attendant risk of being ‘doored’, seriously injured by car doors that are opened into your path, or pushed by those doors into the path of overtaking vehicles.

A more sensible solution would be to move the parking bays out, to create space for a cycle track next to the pavement, protected by the parked cars. This would have the double advantage of being safer, and also being less intimidating to cycle in.

And that brings us to the end of this stretch of road that is being ‘improved’.

It is worth mentioning where the road goes next, however; the gyratory around the Merton Council Offices, which is where the A24 flows past Morden tube.

Conditions for cycling here are unpleasant; more so than the section of the A24 considered in the TfL consultation. Not being familiar with the area, I didn’t fancy trying to negotiate my way around the gyratory on a Brompton. I gave up and walked.

Here is one of the handful of cyclists I saw using the road during the hour I spent in Merton.

These children were, understandably, on the pavement.

This area of Merton will remain a huge barrier to cycling in the borough; I’m not sure if anything is in the pipeline to humanise it, and to make it a place where children might be able to cycle in comfort and safety, without resorting to the pavement. The piecemeal, half-hearted and downright inadequate proposals on the A24 to the south of this gyratory won’t do much to help.

All Transport for London are proposing to do is to allow some cycling on some pavements where it wasn’t legal before (and still left gaps, places where people will have to cycle in the road), and converted some of the existing cycle lanes to ‘mandatory’. This is really quite scandalous, given the amount of space available along the length of this road; space that could be used to construct safe cycle tracks that are pleasant and easy to use, for cyclists of all ages, all speeds and abilities. Cycle tracks that could be used by those children that were being loaded into cars.

TfL can, and must, do something better. We really have a mountain to climb.

The consultation on this section of the A24 is open until 9th November. You can add your comments here, and the Cycling Embassy response is here. Do note, however, that work is scheduled to start on the 19th November, so don’t expect much attention to be paid to your views. 

Up, down and around the Hierarchy of Provision

The Hierarchy of Provision – the official approach to improving roads and streets with the aim of enabling and encouraging cycling – has come in for a fair bit of stick recently, from a variety of sources, including this blog.

One of the main issues, if not the issue, we all seem to have with the Hierarchy is its lack of clarity about the appropriate treatment for a particular road or street. It suggests attempting to apply a series of different measures, in order of importance, to streets, apparently regardless of the function of those streets.

This is the Hierarchy as it appears in the Department for Transport’s Cycle Infrastructure Design [pdf], LTN 2/08 –

And this is how it appears again in the DfT guidance published last month, Shared Use Routes for Pedestrians and Cyclists [pdf], LTN 1/12 (note that it has been slightly modified) –

The changes amount to an insertion of ‘HGV reduction’, and the replacement of ‘cycle tracks’ with ‘shared use’ (it should be stressed, as I pointed out in this earlier post, that this DfT document isn’t very clear about what ‘shared use’ actually means).

Finally, the CTC version of the Hierarchy of Provision included in their new briefing note, Cycle-friendly design and planning [pdf], is different again, and is, in my opinion, the worst of the three versions –

The reason it is the worst is because it advises ‘conversion of footways’ if space cannot be reallocated from the carriageway. It does not countenance the construction of cycle tracks, away from the road, if carriageway space is not reclaimed.

Personally, I believe high-quality cycle tracks should be created regardless of whether motor traffic is, or can be, reduced, if space is available. But the CTC have seemingly sacrificed good quality provision on the altar of reducing motor traffic; the type of provision seen in the photograph below would not be considered under the Hierarchy seen in the CTC briefing note.

Amsterdam. Carriageway space has not been reclaimed, nor has motor traffic has not been reduced on this road. But the footway has not been converted to ‘shared use’; a cycle track has been built away from the road.

The CTC had this to say just the other day, in response to a call for them to demand high quality segregated provision, instead of plumping for second best –

The danger with: “[d]emand the best, and who knows, we may even get what we want one day” is that it is exactly right – we don’t know, and we may not get what we want. We may get ersatz segregation, which could be far worse.

I think this comment is, frankly, a bit rich when you consider that “ersatz segregation”, in the form of the conversion of footways, is actually endorsed by their very own hierarchy, in situations where carriageway space is not reallocated.

Consider, hypothetically, that TfL won’t reallocate carriageway space or consider the reduction of traffic speed or volume on a particularly busy London road. Perhaps on the A24 in Merton, which is currently open to consultation –

We run our fingers down the CTC’s hierarchy, finding out, to our slight surprise, that we have to resort to converting this footway to shared use; the very kind of “ersatz segregation” the CTC present as a bogeyman, a reason why asking for segregation of any kind is potentially dangerous.

To me it is rather odd that ‘conversion of footways’ is even included as an option at all, especially by an organisation so wary of the perils of poor off-carriageway provision; the principle of ‘footway conversion’ lies behind nearly all the terrible ‘infrastructure’ that has made the UK something of a joke when it comes to cycling provision.

Another issue arises when we consider the application of the Hierarchy to roads like these –

That is, semi-rural roads, with little motor traffic (at least by UK standards) and speed limits of 30 to 40 mph. The Hierarchy would maintain that ‘cycle tracks’ (or, worse, ‘shared use footways’) would be the last resort here, and might not even be necessary given the low traffic volume. This is a stance that Chris Juden of the CTC has argued the Dutch take too –

Separate sidepaths are a last resort for the Dutch too. They are provided where the road simply must carry significant traffic at a much higher than cycling speed.

But this doesn’t make any sense, because there are many, many roads and streets in the Netherlands where motor traffic volume is very low indeed, and that have low speed limits, yet cycle tracks are still provided alongside them, for the ease, convenience and comfort of cyclists. This is because Dutch design starts from the principle of keeping cyclists away from motor vehicles, as much as is possible. The Hierarchy, on the other hand, starts from the principle of trying to keep motor vehicles and cyclists together, as much as is possible, which is obviously very different. (David Arditti has provided a long and detailed rebuttal of the misunderstandings of Dutch policy contained in the rest of that comment by Chris Juden).

Furthermore, DfT guidance actually advises abandoning the Hierarchy in just these kinds of situations –

if scheme objectives suggest a clear preference for providing cyclists with an off-carriageway facility, as might often be the case in rural settings, creating a shared use route might be highly desirable… Such routes can be particularly valuable where a considerable proportion of cycle traffic is for recreation, and they could be of particular benefit to children and less confident cyclists. In this situation, on-carriageway provision could be last in the hierarchy.

In other words, if you are concerned about providing for children, consider first what the Hierarchy recommends last.

Another ‘Dutch’ defence of the Hierarchy of Provision involves presenting it as a way of achieving Dutch infrastructure. One of these was on Twitter from Adrian Lord –

how can you create dutch infrastructure without HoP? Demolishing buildings instead?

The clear implication being that the Hierarchy of Provision is necessary for the creation of Dutch-style infrastructure; that cycle tracks can only be created once we have applied the measures of the Hierarchy, namely ‘traffic reduction’. If we don’t reduce traffic, we can’t fit in the cycle tracks without ‘demolishing buildings’.

For a start this ignores the fact that cycle tracks can be (and are!) built alongside roads and streets without any reduction in motor traffic. Indeed, cycle tracks are presented by the Hierarchy as the solution when you can’t reduce motor traffic volume, or speed. As, typically, these kinds of roads are already very large and wide, ‘demolishing buildings’ is obviously not necessary.

So on the one hand we are told to use the principles of the Hierarchy to reduce motor traffic volume so we can build cycle tracks; on the other hand, we are told, by the principles of the Hierarchy, to build cycle tracks when we can’t reduce motor traffic volume.

This strikes me as a recipe for complete confusion when we come to consider a busy road, because on the one hand we have some advocates of Hierarchy saying that we can only build cycle tracks if we reallocate carriageway space, having already reduced motor traffic, and, conversely, the Hierarchy itself saying that cycle tracks are appropriate where motor traffic cannot be reduced. Which is it?

Another example. A similar kind of point to that made by Adrian Lord was presented in a series of tweets from Mark Strong –

As a local I can tell you that [Old Shoreham Road in Brighton] actually is good example of hierarchy of provision.

It was only possible due to Brighton bypass leading to traffic reduction on old A27.

Plus more recent decisions to reduce A270 speed limits to 30 from 40.

This is same basis that has allowed #lewesrd scheme to go ahead (not that I wanted bypass)

Again, a claim is made that it was a policy of following the Hierarchy of Provision that enabled the cycle tracks to be built. In this case, Measure 1 (traffic volume reduction) was achieved by the construction of the A27 bypass around Brighton and Hove (which runs parallel to the A270, the Old Shoreham Road), and Measure 2 (traffic speed reduction) was achieved by lowering the speed limit on the A270, from 40 mph to 30 mph. Once these measures had been implemented, then the tracks on Old Shoreham Road could be built.

I note, in passing, that we could also interpret the Hierarchy completely differently. We could use it to call for the implementation of cycle tracks on Old Shoreham Road with its pre-existing high volume of motor traffic, travelling at higher speeds, because it states that cycle tracks are the necessary solution on roads with high traffic volumes and speeds. In other words, cycle tracks should be built on busy roads as a first principle; we shouldn’t have to wait for other roads to be built as a way to reduce volume, or to wait for the speed limit on the road to be reduced before we start construction.

There is a further, final problem with this claim that the upper principles in the Hierarchy are used to ‘pave the way’ for off-carriageway provision, and to make it possible. Namely that, in reality – in the way the Hierarchy is used in both CTC and DfT guidance – those upper principles are presented as ways of rendering cycle tracks unnecessary. For instance, from LTN 1/12 –

Table 4.2 [a speed/flow diagram] gives an approximate indication of suitable types of provision for cyclists depending on traffic speed and volume. It shows that adopting the upper level solutions in the hierarchy (i.e. reducing the volume and/or speed of traffic) makes on-carriageway provision for cyclists more viable.

I have seen similar claims about the function of the congestion charge in central London; that it has rendered cycle tracks unnecessary because of the reduction in motor traffic. Incidentally, this is a position that the CTC are hoping will prevail on Lambeth Roundabout, in that they have opted for a design that is only suitable for considerably lower motor traffic volume. But we also have the same CTC officer stating that the congestion charge is also making carriageway reallocation for infrastructure possible, just down the road –

the reason TfL was able to remove a lane from Millbank for the 2m wide cycle lane was because traffic volumes were relatively low – ie, measures at the top of the Hierarchy had already been implemented (congestion charging).

We need the Hierarchy to reduce traffic so we can put in infrastructure; but we also need the Hierarchy to reduce traffic so we don’t need to put in infrastructure. So, bizarrely, reductions in traffic volume and speed are presented as ways of enabling cycle tracks to be built, but simultaneously, they are also presented as ways of making cycle tracks unnecessary.

Whether these ambiguities are symptomatic of the Hierarchy itself, or in the way it is able to be interpreted, is probably immaterial. The fact is that the Hierarchy is woefully vague, even downright confusing, and it desperately needs to be updated with guidance that is precise about what kind of provision is necessary on a particular kind of road or street.

If you haven’t already done so, do read Joe Dunckley’s take on the Hierarchy, and David Arditti’s lengthier analysis of CTC policy based on it

How sincere is the CTC’s support for quality segregation?

NOTE – This piece makes much the same points as this earlier one by the Alternative Department for Transport. That post is well worth reading; I hope this one isn’t too repetitive

Earlier this month the CTC published a news item entitled

CTC declares support for quality segregation while still opposing “farcilities”

The article states

CTC’s new briefing calls for all busier roads to have “some form of dedicated space” for cyclists. It recognises the potential benefits of this taking the form of quality segregated facilities where the highway authority has the will to provide these to a high standard, whilst making it clear that all cycle facilities should “be safe and feel safe, showing that society positively values those who chose to cycle, and avoiding any impression that they are a ‘nuisance’ to be ‘kept out of the way of the traffic.”

CTC therefore urges that segregated facilities should normally be created from existing road-space rather than pavement space. They should avoid creating conflict, either with pedestrians, or with motor vehicles at junctions – given that 75% of cyclists’ collisions occur at or near junctions – ensuring that cyclists have at least as much priority at junctions as they would if using the road.

The briefing note [pdf] the CTC have presented makes these same points, in greater detail.

Now this kind of ‘quality segregation’ is precisely what the London Cycling Campaign are asking for at the roundabout at the northern end of Lambeth Bridge, in response to Transport for London’s (now closed) consultation.

The LCC are demanding – instead of shared-use pavements and ambiguous zebra crossings – a Dutch-standard segregated cycle track, with priority across raised tables, created from reallocation of carriageway space and not from the pavement. It would look something like this.

Courtesy of London Cycling Campaign (flipped for clarity)

Given the CTC’s support for the benefits of high quality segregation, and its appropriateness on busier streets, one would surely have expected them to endorse the LCC’s demands, and to call on Boris Johnson and Transport for London to implement an analogous solution at this roundabout.

But they aren’t.

Our preferred option in this situation would be to redesign the layout of the roundabout along ‘continental’ lines – that is, with a single lane roundabout and small curve radii single exits and entry lanes.

A ‘continental’ style roundabout is not one with segregated tracks. It is simply a roundabout with tighter geometry, a single lane on entry and exit, and more ‘perpendicular’ entry and exit angles. The CTC document references this table from TfL’s London Cycling Design Standards –

The table gives the dimensions of a ‘continental roundabout, and in turn references TAL 9/97, a Traffic Advisory Leaflet produced by the DfT, covering continental design geometry of roundabouts. As can be seen from this diagram in that leaflet –

a ‘continental’ roundabout at Lambeth Bridge would merely have more perpendicular entry and exit points, tighter geometry, and a single lane on entry and exit. It would not have segregated tracks.

The CTC do mention the London Cycling Campaign demands for a segregated track, pointing out that priority needs to be given to cyclists entering and exiting the roundabout on the tracks.

Whilst we understand that the London Cycling Campaign have proposed fully segregated cycle tracks around the roundabout, we feel this is sensible only if priority over entering and exiting traffic can be provided to cyclists.

They then helpfully point out how this priority can be achieved, in accordance with current regulations –

by extending the zebra raised table to the mouth of each exit and entry way, enabling priority cycle crossings to be provided in accordance with TfL and DfT

The question, therefore, is why such a design is not being presented as the CTC’s first option, given that it meets all their criteria for ‘quality segregation’ on busier streets. Why have they chosen not to demand it, as the LCC are doing, and why are they instead opting for a ‘continental’ roundabout, that, while it would amelioriate conditions for cycling, would still leave the roundabout quite an intimidating prospect for the more nervous – the young, the old and the slow?

Now it may well be the case that Transport for London refuse to implement such a solution (for much the same reason that they might refuse to implement the CTC’s preferred option of a ‘continental’ roundabout – given that both the CTC option and the Dutch segregated option have a similar effect on motor vehicle capacity).

But this is an ideal time to start asking. Cycling safety, and boosting cycling in the wake of the Olympics, are high on the political agenda. The Mayor of London has pledged his support to London Cycling’s Go Dutch campaign, which commits him to

Make sure all planned developments on the main roads that they controls are complete to Go Dutch standards, especially junctions.

The Mayor has made a clear commitment to implement precisely the kind of infrastructure that the LCC are calling for. The time is right to start holding him to account.

The CTC, however, aren’t even bothering to ask the Mayor for what he has promised, despite their claim to support ‘quality segregation’.

Why?

Some thoughts on the Lambeth Bridge Roundabout

The Cycling Embassy have published their response to Transport for London’s consultation on their proposed improvements to the roundabout at the northern end of Lambeth Bridge, as seen below.

The Embassy response essentially mirrors the suggestions of the Dutch Cycling Embassy, and Rachel Aldred. It argues that providing for two categories of cyclists on this roundabout (by allowing some cyclists to use the pavement, while recognising that many will continue to use the roundabout) results in sub-optimal provision for both groups.

Cyclists on the pavement are brought into conflict with pedestrians, and have the unenviable task of trying to cycle across zebra crossings, with dubious priority. They also have to leave and re-enter the carriageway at dangerous places, and at sharp angles; for instance –

Meanwhile those cyclists who continue to use the carriageway will find that this scheme has actually made things worse for them. The conflict points on exit and entry remain; for instance, from Millbank, the cycle lane and vehicle lane open out into two vehicle lanes, and onto Millbank, two lanes quickly merge into one –

At these locations this conflict will be kept, and the carriageway will be narrowed by the pavement build-outs, constructed over the existing hatched areas, and widening of the existing islands, like the one seen in the picture above.

A bold solution would be to redesign the roundabout, providing one treatment that is suitable for all cyclists to use; namely a Dutch-style roundabout, with a wide segregated track around the perimeter. Indeed, this is precisely what the Dutch Cycling Embassy recommend, having visited the site last week.

Courtesy of Royal Haskoning (pdf)

It would look like this –

Courtesy of London Cycling Campaign

The tracks would run, with priority, across the proposed raised tables for the existing zebra crossings. Department for Transport regulations currently permit priority for cycle tracks, on such a raised table. Strictly, the zebra would have to be separated from the cycle track by two zig-zags, although there is surely room for experimentation in the separation, bringing the two closer together.

The one outstanding issue is, of course, that this roundabout requires a single vehicle lane on entry and exit, and around the roundabout; the existing roundabout has two lanes on entry and exit, as well as around it, and this arrangement is maintained under the proposed improvements.

Clearly a reduction in the number of lanes on entry and exit would affect the motor vehicle capacity of the roundabout. However it is worth noting that all the roads approaching the roundabout are single carriageway, and that on several of the arms, the two lane queuing space is particularly short. Indeed on some of the arms, motor traffic seems to enter in single file already.

Lambeth Bridge approach

Horseferry Road approach

I also took this ten minute video of the entry from Millbank (you can also the entry from the bridge in the background, to the right).

This was at rush hour. If you don’t want to sit through the entire video, I can tell you that only on a handful of occasions did motor vehicles enter the roundabout side by side; the great majority of vehicles entered in single file, from both the visible arms. So there is already some scope for reduction of the number of lanes on entry and exit, to make the roundabout safer, and to create space for a cycle track.

We should also consider that sensible transport policy in a major city should involve trying to get people out of cars and onto modes of transport that use space more efficiently, and that aren’t as polluting. Creating safe ways of negotiating roundabouts like this one are a sensible way of enabling bicycle use, instead of car use. Charlie Holland has taken a look at the bridge, and discovered that there is a huge amount of capacity here, if we consider how many of the private vehicles are single occupancy. It’s high time that sane modes of inner-city transport were prioritised, at the expense of inappropriate ones, rather than the other way around.

And, of course, Boris – who Transport for London answer to – has only this year pledged his support to Go Dutch, which demands that he

Make sure all planned developments on the main roads that they controls are complete to Go Dutch standards, especially junctions.

‘Going Dutch’ means high-quality, wide segregated tracks around the perimeter of the roundabout. It doesn’t mean putting cyclists on the pavement.

The consultation is still open today – responses can be submitted here

LTN 1/12 – a failure to understand off-carriageway cycling

The Department for Transport published a new document last month, Shared Use Routes for Pedestrians and Cyclists [pdf] – or ‘LTN 1/12’, to give it its technical title. The document is designed to be used in conjunction with the more general LTN 2/08, Cycle Infrastructure Design. There are some signs of positive change in this document, which does represent an improvement, of sorts, over LTN 2/08. In particular there is a discussion of ‘hybrid’ cycle tracks, which make an appearance for the first time; these are semi-segregated tracks of the kind seen on Old Shoreham Road in Brighton.

Unfortunately, however, the more general impression of the document is that it is still more than slightly hamstrung by the assumption that different kinds of cyclists need different kinds of routes, and consequently that different kinds of provision are appropriate, in parallel to each other. Further, the document assumes that ‘on-carriageway’ provision is preferable to ‘off-carriageway’ provision, even when that ‘off-carriageway’ provision actually encompasses cycle tracks; the document is also a little confused about what the terms ‘off-carriageway’ and ‘shared use’ actually mean.

From the introduction –

1.8 … [This note] expresses a general preference for on-carriageway provision for cyclists over shared use

That is, if cyclists’ needs aren’t ‘accommodated’ on the carriageway, by means of cycle lanes, then ‘shared use’ is the alternative. Another alternative, namely not accommodating cyclists on the carriageway, but not making them share a route with pedestrians, is not considered under this formulation, although confusingly hybrid cycle tracks are presented, without it being clear whether they are an ‘on-‘ or ‘off-carriageway’ solution.

The assumption that the only two alternatives are putting cyclists on the road, or making them share with pedestrians, is again present in point 1.9 –

in rural areas, a high quality shared use route away from roads might be a prime objective

‘Away from the roads’ = ‘Sharing’.

But of course, it is possible to provide routes for bicycles away from roads which aren’t ‘shared use’ at all, such as this example in Assen, which amounts to an off-carriageway ‘road’ for bikes, with pavement alongside.

The explicit creation of cycle tracks, away from the road, rather than a blending of space used by both by pedestrians and cyclists, is not addressed in LTN 1/12. Indeed Figure 2.1, on page 8 of the document, presents the choice starkly –

If you can’t ‘improve conditions’ on the carriageway, then create ‘shared use’. That’s it.

But the DfT’s terminology is actually a little confused. When they use the word ‘shared’, they actually mean both ‘shared’ and ‘not shared’, best illustrated by this photograph and caption from later in LTN 1/12 –

By any reasonable understanding, this isn’t ‘shared use’, at all – it’s a cycle track, with a pavement separated by a verge. But because the only alternative the DfT’s flow diagram presents for off-carriageway provision is ‘shared use’, they are forced into contradictory formulations like this one – ‘segregated shared use’, which really makes no sense whatsoever.

This confusion stems, I believe, from a general reluctance to insist upon universal off-carriageway provision, suitable for all cyclists; the assumption being that off-carriageway provision need only be suitable for ‘wobblers’, and thus is acceptable for ‘sharing’ with pedestrians.

3.4 The hierarchy generally discourages designers from taking cyclists off the carriageway, and Table 4.2 in Chapter 4 indicates that, for roads with 85th percentile speeds of 40 mph or less, on-carriageway provision is always a possible option. This could involve new cycle lanes, or widening of existing ones… Where it is decided to introduce a shared use facility alongside a road, it is important that the needs of cyclists who choose to remain in the carriageway are not ignored.

This of course begs the question of why cyclists would choose to remain in the carriageway, despite a ‘shared use’ facility (be it, in reality, non-shared or shared) being created especially or them. The answer, of course, is that the facility that has been created is most probably substandard rubbish.

There should never be a situation where off-carriageway provision has been created for cyclists, with the built-in expectation that many cyclists won’t use it. Yet this very same assumption is enshrined in the DfT’s own guidance. Consequently the construction (or ‘construction’) of awful facilities is tacitly endorsed. Take this sentence from later in the document, for instance –

6.26 When converting a footway to shared use, it is particularly important to try to ensure pedestrian and cyclist movement is relatively unobstructed by sign posts, lamp columns, etc.

And similarly

7.54 Where a footway is converted to shared use, care is required to ensure the route is not unduly obstructed by lighting columns, signs and other street furniture.

‘Relatively unobstructed’ and ‘not unduly obstructed’, are, of course, highly open to interpretation.

The problem, as always, lies with the dire categorisation of cyclists that endorses the ‘dual network’ principle of pavements for the inexperienced or nervous and cycle lanes, or nothing at all, for the experienced and confident. This is imported, without alteration, from LTN 2/08 –

4.1 LTN 2/08 Cycle Infrastructure Design provides detailed advice on the underlying principles of designing for pedestrians and cyclists. Key amongst these are the core design principles, the identification of certain cyclist categories (the ‘design’ cyclist), consideration of traffic speeds and flows, and the hierarchy of provision.

Who are these cyclists?

4.4 Cyclists, like pedestrians, do not comprise a homogeneous group. The five basic design cyclist categories identified in LTN 2/08 are:

• fast commuter;

• utility cyclist;

• inexperienced and/or leisure cyclist;

• children; and

• users of specialised equipment (e.g. cycle trailers, tricycles, handcycles).

4.5 Their needs, and hence the type of provision required, can vary considerably. For example, children or inexperienced cyclists might welcome the comfort of off-carriageway provision, while confident commuter cyclists might prefer to use the carriageway to keep journey times to a minimum.

This statement that cyclists will choose to continue using the carriageway is repeated later –

 4.13 Implementing shared use does not necessarily rule out the need to improve conditions on the carriageway, as some cyclists might choose to continue using it.

An explanation of why these ‘confident’ cyclists would continue using the carriageway, in spite of ‘shared use’ (which needn’t actually be shared) being supplied away from it, isn’t stated, but the document itself provides some clues –

4.7 For cyclists, the potential disadvantages of leaving the carriageway include poor route continuity and increased potential for conflict with pedestrians (who may also be disadvantaged).

And, of course, conflict with those sign posts, street furniture and lamp columns that LTN 1/12 accepts will be present, but not ‘unduly’ so. It’s these features, among others, that explain why cyclists wishing ‘to keep journey times to a minimum’ will often continue to use the carriageway.

But why should off-carriageway routes be discontinuous? Why should there be conflict with pedestrians on them? Why should off-carriageway routes have to accept the present of street furniture within them? It’s frankly amazing that the DfT’s own standards arrive with the built-in assumption that what the DfT is going to provide for cyclists is not going to be acceptable. Laced through all this is the assumption that off-carriageway provision is necessarily slow and a bit rubbish, and consequently the ‘comfort’ that off-carriageway provision supplies will come at the expense of convenience.

This is a bogus and deeply damaging belief. It permits the half-arsed creation of ‘shared use’ on existing pavements, because it doesn’t matter if slow cyclists have to weave around street furniture and pedestrians, as they’re only interested in feeling safe. And it serves to hinder the creation of infrastructure that is suitable for all cyclists, and that prioritises their convenience, comfort and safety.

Indeed, the document is quite clear that off-carriageway provision should only be employed for one particular reason –

4.6 The road network is the most basic and important cycling facility available. In general, cyclists need only be removed from the road where there is an overriding safety requirement that cannot be met by on-carriageway improvements

This amounts to an explicit rejection of cycle tracks like that seen in the picture of Assen, except on the grounds of ‘overriding safety’. The idea that cycle tracks could be a more pleasant and attractive alternative to the carriageway, like that track in Assen, is not apparently considered. Throughout the document, the emphasis is on keeping cyclists on the road at all costs, and only providing routes away from it (and only for a sub-group of cyclists) when everything else has failed.

4.8 LTN 2/08 introduced a hierarchy of provision to assist in the design decision process for cycle improvement schemes. The hierarchy encourages practitioners to explore on-carriageway solutions first, the aim being to discourage practitioners from resorting too readily to shared use where it might not be appropriate.

The strange logic employed in this particular paragraph disintegrates when we look at the next two points –

4.9 The hierarchy [of provision] is often a good starting point, but it is important to understand that it is not meant to be rigidly applied. For example, if scheme objectives suggest a clear preference for providing cyclists with an off-carriageway facility, as might often be the case in rural settings, creating a shared use route might be highly desirable.

4.10 Such routes can be particularly valuable where a considerable proportion of cycle traffic is for recreation, and they could be of particular benefit to children and less confident cyclists. In this situation, on-carriageway provision could be last in the hierarchy.

Here, again, we have the awful assumption that off-carriageway provision is most suitable for ‘recreation’, and wobblers. But most importantly, these two paragraphs amount to a statement that you shouldn’t use the Hierarchy of Provision (HoP) if you are considering the needs of children and less confident cyclists. Indeed, it says that if you are concerned with ‘benefiting’ children and the less confident, you should provide first what the Hierarchy suggests last.

I can’t think of clearer evidence of what is so desperately wrong with the Hierarchy of Provision; an implicit admission that it endorses solutions that privilege confident existing cyclists, at the expense of children, the slow, and the more nervous.

A more sensible approach to coming up with appropriate treatments for street and roads is actually included in the document, a table which is taken originally from Chapter 4 of Transport for London’s London Cycle Design Standards.

Notice how the preference for ‘on-carriageway’ solutions still pervades even this table; even on a road with a 40 mph limit and 10,000 vehicles per day, the table recommends cycle lanes, ahead of cycle tracks.

However, this table represents a much more sensible approach, because unlike the Hierarchy of Provision, it doesn’t attempt to work backwards by trying out various kinds of solutions on a particular road or street until the most appropriate one is found. It specifies a treatment, given the function of the road, rather than trying to avoid a particular treatment at all costs. As David Arditti has written

It makes no sense to call [cycle tracks] a “last resort” where it is the automatic, universal solution for a certain type of road… The whole concept of a hierarchy of provision makes no sense, from this perspective. Decisions on appropriate solutions for any road have to start from a decision on the function of a road, not from a universal template hierarchy.

Much the same point is made by Joe Dunckley –

[The Hierarchy of Provision] approach[es] things the wrong way around: bringing a set of pre-ranked preferred solutions to a road and trying each one in turn to see which one fits. The correct approach — the one that the Dutch apply — is to start with the purpose and properties of a road: whether it is the main A-to-B road, or a little residential or access street; whether it needs to carry big dangerous trucks and buses; and so on. Once you’ve answered those questions, there is no need to try different solutions on for size: when you understand the problem, the appropriate solution follows.

So this table would represent a considerable improvement over the Hierarchy of Provision if it was used as the basis for implementing infrastructure. Bizarrely, however, it is only used in this document as a way of illustrating how the Hierarchy makes on-carriageway provision more and more suitable.

[Table 4.2] shows that adopting the upper level solutions in the hierarchy (i.e. reducing the volume and/or speed of traffic) makes on-carriageway provision for cyclists more viable. LTN 2/08 provides detailed advice on traffic volume and speed reduction.

In other words, keep trying to turn all roads into quiet residential streets. (Incidentally,  LTN 2/08 actually has very little or nothing to say on reducing traffic volume).

We then come to the improvement in LTN 1/12 – the discussion of hybrid cycle tracks, like this new one on Old Shoreham Road.

As I mentioned earlier, the document is vague about whether these actually represent an ‘off-‘ or ‘on-carriageway’ solution; the best it comes up with is a statement that the tracks have the ‘advantage’ of

allowing cyclists to remain ‘in’ the carriageway

The inverted commas allowing the authors to present an off-carriageway treatment as an in-carriageway one. The authors also have the unenviable task of trying to fit these cycle tracks into the overall ‘Hierarchy of Provision’ strategy, leading them to write unintelligible paragraphs like this one

As a result of these advantages the hybrid track might, in certain circumstances, prove to be a better solution than, say, junction improvements, hence the need for a flexible approach in determining the priority for on-carriageway measures within the overall hierarchy.

‘Junction improvements’ are, of course, preferred higher up the Hierarchy than these kinds of tracks, hence this formulation. But why can’t cycle tracks go hand in hand with junction improvements? Once again the bizarre oppositional structure of the Hierarchy leads us into difficulty; the use of the phrase ‘flexible approach’ is an indication that the Hierarchy is pretty useless at telling us what to do.

Indeed the document recommends abandoning cycle tracks at junctions, presumably on the assumption that the tracks can’t be designed well enough to make priorities clear –

On the approach to [junctions], it is recommended that the kerb delineating the track ramps down to carriageway level, then ceases. Returning cyclists to the main carriageway in this way is particularly useful at side roads, where it should be clear to motorists that cyclists have priority when passing the junction.

As it happens, the cycle tracks on Old Shoreham Road continue across side roads, without returning cyclists to the carriageway. I am personally of the opinion that priority could be made clearer here, but I don’t see any reason to abandon the tracks completely at junctions with side roads.

The main problem with this document is a fundamental failure to treat off-carriageway cycling provision with any degree of seriousness; with the rigour that roads themselves are designed, in order to make off-carriageway provision as smooth and continuous as cycling on the road itself. By way of a final illustration, within the section ‘Provision Alongside Carriageways’, (which itself contains the basic assumption that what is usually being provided is a pavement with a stripe down it), we find this depressing passage –

Section 8.10 of LTN 2/08 Cycle Infrastructure Design suggests that conflict [at bus stops] might be reduced by swapping the footway and cycle track positions over so that cyclists pass behind the bus shelter (where present) and any people waiting. However, these crossover points can become areas of conflict, and the resulting markings add to visual intrusion. In view of this, it might be better in such situations to simply dispense with segregation altogether.

(‘Segregation’ here being that painted line on the pavement). So the best approach to addressing how off-carriageway cycling provision skirts bus stops is… just to give up.

LTN 1/12 serves to demonstrate that the Department for Transport don’t really understand that off-carriageway provision should be a universal concept on certain categories of roads and streets, suitable for all types of users. Because it doesn’t, it continues to permit the implementation of substandard solutions that aren’t attractive, which make the journeys of the more nervous, the slow, the young, and the old deeply inconvenient, as well as compromising the amount of space available for decent solutions for all.

I hope that starts to change.

Emperor Way, Fishbourne

Emperor Way in Fishbourne forms part of the National Cycle Network, Route 2. It connects the village of Fishbourne with Chichester, allowing cyclists to get to the underpass under the A27 without having to cycle on the A259 through Fishbourne itself.

Map from Cycle Streets. Roman Way runs to the north of the Fishbourne Palace site. The A259 is labelled here as Fishbourne  Road West.

It’s a pleasant, quiet and safe route.

Emperor Way, skirting the car park of Fishbourne Roman Palace

The Emperor Way path.

Unfortunately all is not well.

The path runs across private land owned by the Sussex Archaelogical Society, who have decided that they need to expand their site at Fishbourne. The path, as they see it, does not fit in with their expansion plans. They have voiced security concerns, particularly in the light of vandalism, which has been tied to the presence of the path around their site.

Those security concerns are probably somewhat overblown. If there is a problem with intruders, it is equally valid for other parts of the site not flanked by the path, which have the same fencing. The real issue, I suspect, is that the path bisects the land, and that keeping it would present a problem for future development, particularly securing the site at night.

I don’t think the Sussex Archaeological Society can necessarily be blamed here. They own the land, and it is up to them to see fit as to how they use it. From their press release [pdf] –

In 1995 the Sussex Archaeological Society agreed to lease a strip of land to Sustrans at Fishbourne Roman Palace, one of its historical sites, for the purpose of enabling a cycle path to be built. The Society made this generous offer on the basis that this was not a permanent arrangement and that its effectiveness in supporting visitors to the site would be reviewed over time. The lease for the usage of the land is established on a permissive basis. This has never been, and is not, a public right of way.

The real issue is that it has been left up to a charity, Sustrans, to build a national cycle network, all by themselves, and to do it in places by making arrangements to lease land from private bodies. This is simply an unacceptable way to built a cycling network. It is obviously going to go wrong when these private bodies – who generously leased the land – then need to use their own land for different purposes.

If the Emperor Way route is lost, then it would be an absolute disaster, because anyone wishing to cycle from Fishbourne to Chichester, or vice versa, would have to cycle on the A259 through the village. This is not a pleasant road.

 Those children who currently use Emperor Way to cycle west to Fishbourne Primary School, or to cycle east to Bishop Luffa school in the outskirts of Chichester, would have to cycle on this road, as would anyone who wishes to cycle into Chichester from Fishbourne.

An open meeting is being held on Thursday evening at the Fishbourne Centre. It is to be hoped that the trustees from the Sussex Archaeological Society, and residents and users of the path, can come to some form of agreement about a route for cyclists (and walkers) across the site. You can send your views to the trustees in advance of that meeting, using the CTC form here.

A challenge to pedestrianisation

Long-time readers of this blog will no doubt be familiar with the story of East Street in Horsham. This is a narrow town centre street that used to be a one-way road, with narrow pavements and plenty of on-street parking, open to vehicles at all times. During 2010 it was converted into a ‘shared space’, with access restrictions imposed, limiting entry only to vehicles loading on the street, and vehicles displaying disabled blue badges, parking on the street.

Then this year a decision was made by the council to close the street entirely to motor vehicles between the hours of 10:30 in the morning, and 4:30 in the afternoon. The background to that decision, and some more history of the street, can be read here.

To summarise, the main problem was a reluctance of most of the people shopping on, and using, the street to ‘share’ the environment with motor vehicles, particularly the larger delivery lorries. The narrow width of the street also meant that the restaurants along the street – of which there are several – could not use the street itself for al fresco dining while it was still open to motor vehicles.

The council sensibly took these concerns on board, and now the street is closed during the main shopping hours of the day, while still open to bicycles, in both directions. I’ve written effusively about the great improvement this made to this part of the town here.

The current arrangement works well; deliveries can be made before 10:30, and after 4:30. These are times when the street is less busy. For the intervening six hours, tables and chairs can come out onto this street, families can let their children play without concern, and the street is quieter and much more pleasant. The improvement, in just two years, has been vast.

East Street, 2010

The same location, 2012

However this partial closure has not met with the approval of all residents; one has voiced his concerns in the local paper this week.

The husband of a disabled woman is angry at plans to permanently pedestrianise East Street, robbing her of suitable town centre disabled parking.

This is incorrect in one immediate respect. The street is not being ‘permanently’ pedestrianised; as I have made clear, the pedestrianisation is only between the hours of 10:30am and 4:30pm.

“The perverse thing is they have already made the changes on a trial basis. It’s just bizarre,” Mr Davis said. “In the whole of Horsham there’s almost nowhere that can accommodate her at all.”

Quite how a scheme can be trialled without actually making the changes that need to be tested is not clear. It is not at all ‘bizarre’ that a trial might actually involve making the proposed changes, to see how they work.

Further, the idea that the closure of one street, which has only a handful of disabled parking spaces on it, is ‘robbing’ this man’s wife of disabled town centre parking, or has the result that there is ‘almost nowhere’ in the town that can accommodate his wife, is hyperbolic.

There is a vast amount of disabled parking available in Horsham’s numerous town centre car parks, as well as plenty of on-street disabled parking bays, to say nothing of the ability of those displaying blue badges to park on any double yellow lines, without causing obstruction, for three hours.

Mr Davis’ wife, who has a rare variation of muscular dystrophy which affects her arms and legs, is able to drive through her wheelchair with the use of her fingers. But the loss of disabled parking in East Street, because of changes, means it is harder for her to make it into the town centre independently.

It is obviously terrible that Mr Davis’ wife has a serious illness. However the town centre is still entirely accessible by car; East Street is not the only route into the town centre. Nor can it seriously be said that there is no longer anywhere to park in the vicinity of East Street. There are two car parks very close by (a matter of 50-100 yards away) both with plenty of disabled spots. I marked these on this satellite map of the surrounding area –

The red circles mark disabled parking bays in existing car parks. Neither are more than 100 yards, by pedestrian routes, from East Street, which runs diagonally from top left, to bottom right.

There are also several streets nearby (including the Carfax, the Causeway, Denne Road, and Park Place) where blue badge holders can park legitimately on double yellow lines. All these locations are of the same order of distance from the restaurants on East Street as one disabled spot on the street could be from a restaurant on the same street.

The particular issue Mr Davis seems to have is that he and his wife are no longer able to park right in front of one or two restaurants on East Street during the middle hours of the day.

The county council declined to comment on whether the only way to reach the new parking bay outside Ask, when the barriers are up in East Street, is to reverse up a one-way street, or on Mr Davis’ call for the consultation to be suspended, or whether a proper impact assessment has been carried out.

If Mr Davis and his wife wish to visit the Ask restaurant, they don’t have to reverse up a one-way street to access a disabled parking bay (which would of course involve breaking the law). They can simply park in the Carfax on a double-yellow line –

This Lexus is parked legitimately on double yellow lines, with a blue badge, in the Carfax. The Ask restaurant is just beyond the ‘no entry’ sign, with the turqoise hoardings. The disabled bay Mr Davis wishes to access, but can’t between 10:30 and 4:30, is by those hoardings.

Or alternatively in the Causeway, again on double yellow lines, with a blue badge.

There are spots available in the Causeway, where this van is parked. The Ask restaurant is marked by the yellow advertising board, about 50 yards away (also visible in the picture above).

Admittedly this means his wife may have to travel up to 50 yards to reach the front door of the restaurant, instead of just ten yards, but in a motorised wheelchair this slight difference in distance is negligible in comparison to the more general difficulty of getting into and around the restaurant.

Similarly there are plenty of other shops and restaurants in Horsham that are inaccessible by car. (Indeed, at a rough estimate, I would say that 80-90% of the shops in Horsham town centre do not have parking spots in front of them – this is partly what makes the town centre so attractive). The main shopping street, West Street, has been completely pedestrianised since the 1980s, as is the case with Middle Street.

West Street. You can’t drive or park down here.

The Carfax, similarly, has been largely pedestrianised for decades, like the Bishopric. The shopping centre, Swan Walk, is of course not open to motor vehicles, nor is Piries Place, where Waitrose is found, along with several other shops.

The disabled have accessed, and continue to access, all these shops and restaurants by the simple method of parking nearby, and then finishing their trip without a car. A car is not necessary for the final stages of these trips.

While I wholeheartedly believe that town centres should be made as friendly for the disabled as possible (and I think uniform surfaces, and cycle tracks, have a big part to play in that role), the disabled cannot expect to be able to drive a car right up the front of every single shop they wish to visit. Why East Street should prove to be an exception is not clear to me.

A man using his mobility scooter to travel down East Street. No car required.

Designing for different types of pedestrians

The Department for Transport’s Cycling Manual – Cycling Infrastructure Design [pdf], or LTN 2/08 – contains this ‘classification’ of different categories of cyclists –

1.3.8 The different categories of cyclist include:

• fast commuter – confident in most on ­road situations and will use a route with significant traffic volumes if it is more direct than a quieter route;

• utility cyclist – may seek some segregation at busy junctions and on links carrying high­ speed traffic;

• inexperienced and/or leisure cyclist – may be willing to sacrifice directness, in terms of both distance and time, for a route with less traffic and more places to stop and rest;

• child – may require segregated, direct largely off­ road routes from residential areas to schools, even where an on ­road solution is available. Design needs to take account of personal security issues. Child cyclists should be anticipated in all residential areas and on most leisure cycling routes; and

• users of specialised equipment – includes users of trailers, trailer­cycles, tandems and tricycles, as well as disabled people using hand­cranked machines. This group requires wide facilities free of sharp bends and an absence of pinch­points or any other features that force cyclists to dismount. Cycle tracks and lanes where adult cyclists frequently accompany young children should be sufficiently wide to allow for cycling two abreast. This enables adults to ride alongside children when necessary.

Perversely this classification is not used to inform the design of cycle infrastructure that is suitable for all these groups to use; instead it is used to recommend designing different kinds of cycling infrastructure for these different types of cyclists. The most telling quote being

In order to accommodate the sometimes conflicting needs of various user types and functions, it may be necessary to create dual networks offering different levels of provision, with one network offering greater segregation from motor traffic at the expense of directness and/or priority.

It is assumed here that cyclists who don’t like cycling amongst vehicles are quite happy to make their journeys longer and more inconvenient as a consequence. Presumably only those people who don’t want to use the road network, as is, are those ‘inexperienced’ or ‘leisure cyclists’, content to wobble around bus stops, dismount at every major junction, and give way at every side road. It’s a disastrous and wrongheaded assumption. As Joe Dunckley has written 

The effect of the “dual networks” principle in LTN 2/08 is that neither “network” is satisfactorily designed. The low-traffic “network” can be designed down: it can concede priority, take circuitous routes, share busy pedestrian spaces, and even advise dismounting — yes, LTN 2/08 says elsewhere that those solutions are undesirable, but, hey, this is just the training network, they’ll soon graduate onto the road so what does it matter? And when it then comes to fixing the main roads and busy junctions, engineers will “take into account the type(s) of cyclist expected to use it”, conclude that the inexperienced and nervous cyclists will be usingthe other “network”, and design the roads and junctions accordingly.

I had been meaning, for some time, to parody the attitudes exhibited in this guidance by making an analogy with pedestrians. How we might ‘take into account’ the different kinds of pedestrians, and how they need different kinds of infrastructure. A silly commentary on how ‘joggers’ might be confident about using the street environment as is, while children and the disabled might be less confident and require segregation.

But it turns out that the DfT are actually beyond parody.

3.4.2 The design pedestrian types are:

• Commuter – prefers a fast direct route between home and work or when accessing public transport, regardless of quality of environment;
• Shopper/leisure walker – looks for ease of access, attractive retail environments, and attractive routes;
• Disabled person – requires level, clearly defined easy access and careful attention in the design and placement of street furniture, including resting points. Satisfying these requirements will also satisfy the needs of all other users, especially older people, people with heavy shopping/young children, and people with temporary impairments or low levels of fitness; and
• Child – requires a high level of segregation from motorised traffic and/or other measures to reduce the dominance of motor vehicles, such as speed reduction, together with good passive surveillance from other users. These are important factors where children and young people make independent journeys, especially journeys to school.

I haven’t made this up – it’s from LTN 1/04, Policy, Planning and Design for Walking and Cycling [pdf]. The ‘cyclist classification’ in LTN 2/08 is lifted straight from this document.

Amazingly there’s even a ‘Hierarchy of Provision’ for pedestrians, which is deliciously bonkers –

Consider first –

Traffic reduction

Speed reduction

Reallocation of road space to pedestrians

Provision of direct at-grade crossings

Improved pedestrian routes on existing desire lines

Consider last –

New pedestrian alignment or grade separation

That is, an approach to designing for pedestrians that is just as hopeless as the one for cyclists; one that fails to designate what a particular road or street is for, and to then apply an appropriate treatment for those cyclists and walkers that will be using it. Namely, a treatment that will satisfy the needs of all types of cyclists and walkers simultaneously.

Now of course it is sensible to take into account the fact that there are different types of walkers and cyclists; but something has quite obviously got lost in translation between the initial classification of types of users, and the kind of provision that is then recommended. We wouldn’t design pavements that fast walkers wouldn’t want to use because they’re littered with obstacles; nor would we compromise on the way pavements are designed for children, or for those in wheelchairs, or parents those with pushchairs, because they’re not confident enough to walk or wheel in the road.

Why should we settle for these fudged compromises when it comes to cycle infrastructure?

Thanks to Sally Hinchcliffe for spotting this

‘A million more cyclists’

Some news that may or may not excite you –

British Cycling and Sky are thrilled to announce that 1 million more people are now cycling regularly than were in 2008.

Obviously more people cycling is good news; British Cycling are providing plenty of opportunities for people to experience – albeit intermittently – pleasant conditions for cycling, which should be applauded, as far as it goes.

But how exactly has this headline figure of ‘a million more cyclists’ been arrived at?

The independent annual survey was conducted by GFK NOP and looked at people’s current cycling behaviour versus their riding in the previous year.  The survey measured cycling behaviour over a 12 month period and asked about the number of times a person cycled. A ‘regular cyclist’ is a cyclist who has cycled at least 12 times in the past year.

Of course the definition of ‘regular’ is open to question, but using a bike just 12 times a year doesn’t strike me as being particularly ‘regular’, at least if we are taking the word to mean ‘happening frequently’, rather than just ‘at consistent intervals’. (If I walked to the shops just twelve times a year, and drove on every other occasion, I doubt you would say I was a ‘regular’ walker.)

The story gets shakier still –

Since 2009, we have influenced one million more people to cycle at least 12 times a year. Some of these people will not have cycled before and will be new cyclists, while others are occasional or lapsed cyclists who have increased their cycling frequency.

In other words, a proportion of these ‘new’ cyclists are people who were already ‘occasionally’ cycling. The exact proportion isn’t given, and nor is a definition of ‘occasional’; the research, or at least what little of it has been released, is unhelpfully vague.

At a reasonable guess, out of this quoted figure of a million, many hundreds of thousands of people who were already cycling perhaps 5-10 times a year are now cycling 12 or more times a year. These ‘occasional’ cyclists are now magically transformed into a million new ‘regular’ cyclists, by means of a slight increase in the number of times they hop on a bike every year.

We might even suppose that a very high proportion of these million new ‘regular’ cyclists are actually people who were cycling occasionally already (that is, less than 12 times a year), and have merely used a bicycle a handful more times.

This is hardly secure evidence of any transformation in the amount of cycling in Britain, and is probably best dismissed as some clever marketing, to be added to the collection of premature and misjudged announcements of a ‘boom’ in cycling.

Graph by Joe Dunckley

The ‘Safety in Numbers’ delusion refuses to die

Having just written a fairly lengthy analysis of the problems with (and outright myths behind) the ‘Safety in Numbers’ theory, I find that the Times, under the auspices of their Cities Fit For Cycling Campaign, have just published an interview with the founder of Rapha, Simon Mottram, giving him a public platform to air precisely those dubious, fact-free claims about cycling safety that are often built on the uncertain sand of that very same ‘Safety in Numbers’ concept.

I am not going to repeat all the evidence that shows why ‘Safety in Numbers’ is not only unproven and impractical but also morally dubious as a ‘safety’ strategy; please refer to my previous piece, if you haven’t done so. But I will quickly skim over some of the standout claims from the Times piece.

The headline runs

‘Weight of numbers’ will bring safe cycling

And beneath it

Mr Mottram, who founded Rapha in 2004 as a high-end clothing brand aimed specifically at road cyclists, has insisted that the key to safer cycling lies with its rising popularity.

He said he would like to see lower speed limits enforced, but crucially more bikes on the road and in popular culture. “We will get a long way through sheer numbers,” he added.

This is a fairly extraordinary statement at a time when the rate of cyclists being killed and seriously injured has risen for three consecutive years, despite increasing numbers. The evidence is even there in the sidebar of the Times, mere inches away from where these words appear.

Even the CTC – for so long the prime advocates of the ‘Safety In Numbers’ theory – are now accepting the obvious –

Roger agrees that we shouldn’t dangerise cycling. However the safety in numbers effect is starting to fizzle out and we need to consciously work at cycle safety as improvements won’t happen naturally.

Even setting aside this basic evidential problem with the ‘Safety In Numbers’ concept, Mottram’s idea that “we will get a long way with sheer numbers” is itself desperate, wishful thinking, on two counts.

The first is the assumption that – contrary to all the evidence – this country can build a mass cycling culture out of thin air.

The second is that we will have to go a very long way indeed before the safety benefits of pure ‘numbers’ become tangible. As I wrote last week

At some distant point in the future we may hit a point at which sufficient numbers of people walking and cycling, and few enough are driving, that relative safety is achieved, without any change to the environment, but that is some way off, and the route to that point is unclear, and may be littered with the bodies of cyclists and pedestrians.

In a paper published in 2009, Rune Elvik argued that a doubling of pedestrian and cyclist volume, with corresponding mode shift away from driving, would not, alone, reduce the KSI burden, and may actually increase it. Indeed, he suggests that, without any change in the environment, it is only when the amount of driving is reduced by 50% (with corresponding mode shift to walking and cycling) that we may see a reduction in the total KSI burden. That is an enormously long way to go by ‘Safety in Numbers’ alone, with an  increasing KSI burden in every year that we attempt to get people to switch to bicycles.

That is, if we are relying on “sheer numbers”, we will have to have a remarkable and unprecedented drop in driving levels before we see an absolute reduction in deaths and injuries. And – most importantly – that increased safety would come principally from that reduction in motor vehicle volume, not from ‘numbers’ of people on bicycles or on foot. It is motor vehicle volume and speed that is an established predictor of safety for vulnerable road users; the alleged causal connection between numbers and safety that keeps on being parroted, week after week, simply isn’t proven.

It’s not proven because, while a non-linear relationship between numbers and safety has been established in a number of data sets, there are serious questions about the temporal direction of that relationship – with the best evidence suggesting that it is actually safe conditions that attract greater numbers, rather than the other way around.

It’s also not proven because there are serious questions about confounding variables – confounding variables that affect both safety and numbers simultaneously, and must serve to explain why the general relationship between safety and numbers over the last 50 years in the UK is so confused.

And there are, finally, serious questions about the exact causal mechanism that is assumed to produce greater safety from more numbers. Jacobsen speculated that it might be because drivers behave better as they are become confronted with more and more cyclists; this remains speculation, despite it now being repeated as fact.

We should be ignoring ‘Safety In Numbers’ as a strategy principally because there are already established and uncontroversial methods of improving the safety of pedestrians and cyclists; methods that involve the adaption of the environment to reduce the hazards posed to them by motor vehicles. This can involve lowering the numbers of vehicles using streets, or removing them completely, or reducing the numbers of potential interactions between motor vehicles and cyclists. In other words, it is the structural separation of motor vehicles from pedestrians and cyclists that is the best way to improve the safety of the latter group (and, tangentially, the best way of increasing numbers).

Unfortunately this is precisely the opposite of what Simon Mottram thinks should happen. As he is quoted in the Times –

I do think special cycle lanes can help, but I don’t like the principle of segregation. There is no reason why bikes and vehicles can’t coexist on the roads. That must be the goal.

The trouble with this point of view – especially given the reliance upon boosting numbers as a way of ensuring safety – is that the vast majority of people do not want to coexist on the roads with motor vehicles, while cycling, and keep saying so. That is why the modal share for cycling in this country remains so execrable. People want to be able to cycle free from interactions with motor vehicles; they want safe, quiet routes to and from the shops, and to and from schools. They don’t want to share those routes with lorries, buses, vans and cars, however slowly and carefully we can imagine they might be driven.

Conversely, the countries that have the very highest levels of cycling are those that do their very best to separate cyclists from motor vehicles. The evidence is there, right in front of our very eyes, but it continues to be ignored by those like Simon Mottram, who for some reason don’t like the idea of being separated from motor vehicles, and assume that because they are happy cycling amongst them, everyone else must be persuaded to come around to their point of view, despite their stated preferences to the contrary, and despite the evidence that no country has ever achieved a mass cycling culture by these methods.

It’s almost staggeringly conceited.