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Portsmouth City Council consulting on painted cyclewaysPortsmouth City Council.jpg

Portsmouth City Council consulting on painted cycleways

Concerned about the high rate of cycling casualties in the city
by Alex Bowden
Thu, Feb 19, 2015 10:47
5

Portsmouth City Council has revealed a series of plans to create more space for cyclists reports Portsmouth News.

The plans were revealed at a meeting of Portsmouth Cycle Forum by road safety officer, Oliver Willcocks. They include a cycleway along the northern side of Goldsmith Avenue nearest the railway station as well as removal of parking; and a shared pathway and cycleway on the western side of Milton Road, from Velder Avenue to St Mary’s Hospital. About the latter, Willcocks said: “This is what the school wants and people have been asking for.”

He also revealed plans for a cycleway along Havant Road at Cosham, saying: “We are consulting on making space for cyclists. And we’re consulting on removing parking along the northern side of the road for pretty much the whole length from the main Cosham roundabout out to the city boundary to the east.”

While adding that parking would still be allowed near the main shopping area, he said that the design was ‘still very much an open book’.

The council is keen to improve Portsmouth for cyclists after it was revealed that the city has the highest rate of cycling casualties outside London with 183 collisions last year.

In September, a number of cycle accident ‘hot spots’ were identified and Portsmouth Cycle Forum was asked to come up with ideas with a number of suggestions put forward at the recent meeting. However, Forum chairman, Jon Spencer, believes that major changes to road layout will be required.

“The worst places for cyclists are all found on 30mph roads. In the residential streets, we have got a 20mph speed limit. That is not where these accidents are happening.

“The question is what do we do? In the short term, the council needs to go to these hot spots to see what we can do. Longer term, we probably need more substantial engineering to be done to redesign the roads and address the problem.”

Portsmouth
Portsmouth City Council
Portsmouth Cycle Forum
Alex Bowden

Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.

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5 comments

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contender | 9 years ago
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Portsmouth is a microcosm of all that is wrong about UK cities.

It's flat, weather is OK, most destinations close together. Could be good. But then there's

main roads in and out of the island that don't welcome bicycles. Roads to/from end of Motorway where nobody expects a bicycle.

A seafront that finally rolled out a good bike route: right up until you get to the busy bit where they abandon you. Oh, and that seafront road is one where they didn't bother dropping the speed limit, even though there's all the families walking to/from the seafront.

And you have a large proportion of the population who hate 'the cyclists'.

Yet this was a "cycling town", with extra funding for cycle facilities? What is there apart from some magic paint on a few roads that everyone ignores?

More paint isn't going to address it. More fundamental changes are needed. Which is going to come from the top, not some planning dept trying to keep everyone happy.

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kev-s | 9 years ago
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i cut through the city twice a day on my way to work and back

i feel safer on the larger roads like goldsmith ave and the tail end of the eastern road going into velder avenue as they tend to be nice and wide, clear view ahead etc...

Where i feel the most unsafe is on the side streets as they are narrow, cars on either side, lots of side roads

As soon as im on the side streets im even more cautious and try to anticipate other road users next move

I constantly get cars trying to squeeze past me, from behind and when coming towards me, cars pulling out from the side roads not looking properly or thinking they have enough time when they don't

Plus the fact no one really bothers to stick to the 20mph speed limit

Unfortunately there's not much that can be done about that, just one of the downsides of riding in a densely populated city

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darrenleroy | 9 years ago
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Portsmouth could be a cyclist's paradise: closely packed streets and housing and everything close to one another. The only hurdle is convincing residents to ditch the cars (it's sometimes impossible to park in those closely packed streets) and allow cycle routes to make getting around easier.

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Scrapples | 9 years ago
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Once you get off the shared cycle track into Portsmouth along the Eastern Road you really do take your life in your hands, the amount of taxi's on the island don't help at all either. Maybe a better solution would be to close a 'path' through the streets to all traffic, but that would mean limiting parking in certain areas which they could do by limiting the amount of parking permits. But we all know that won't get any backing

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Housecathst replied to Scrapples | 9 years ago
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Scrapples wrote:

Once you get off the shared cycle track into Portsmouth along the Eastern Road you really do take your life in your hands, the amount of taxi's on the island don't help at all either. Maybe a better solution would be to close a 'path' through the streets to all traffic, but that would mean limiting parking in certain areas which they could do by limiting the amount of parking permits. But we all know that won't get any backing

I agree, the eastern road isn't too bad up to the point you have to take to the back steets and deal with miles and miles of double parked cars. It's either that or taking your life in your hands on the nightmare that is the london road

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