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news
Big Ben © Simon MacMichaelGovernment wants half of urban trips to be walked or cycled by 2030
Transport secretary Grant Shapps has said that the government wants “half of all journeys in towns and cities to be walked or cycled by 2030” – but declined to disclose what funding might be available beyond 2025.
Appearing before a virtual session of the House of Commons Transport Select Committee yesterday, Shapps was quizzed on the subject of active travel by the Labour MP Lilian Greenwood, an officer of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Cycling & Walking.
The Nottingham South MP, a former chair of the Transport Select Committee, began by asking Shapps whether the government’s forthcoming transport decarbonisation plan would include car traffic reduction targets.
The transport secretary replied: “I don’t want to give off the impression that somehow cars are bad and everything else is good, because I don’t think it’s that simple, not least when 10 per cent of new cars now are being sold electric, so it’s a little more complicated than that.”
But he added that “We want half of all journeys in towns and cities to be walked or cycled by 2030.”
Asked by Greenwood whether the Department for Transport had “conducted any research into what level of investment would be needed to achieve that target,” Shapps mentioned only the £2 billion allocated to active travel during the period 2020-25, that is the lifetime of the current Parliament.
But he added: “There’s no way that we would stop spending in 2025 on something which we consider to be such a huge priority.”
More than a year into the five-year term, however, only £250 million of that has been allocated so far, in the shape of the £225 million emergency active travel fund under which local authorities in England have been building infrastructure such as temporary cycle lanes, and the £25 million Fix Your Bike voucher scheme.
The pledge to spend £2 billion on walking on cycling from 2020-25 represents a near six-fold increase on the £350 million earmarked for active travel in the Conservative manifesto ahead of the December 2019 general election, but equates to little more than £7 per person per year.
That is far below the £17 per person per year, rising to £34 annually by 2025, called for by campaign groups belonging to the Cycling & Walking Alliance, whose members include British Cycling and Cycling UK.
Earlier this week, Prime Minister Boris Johnson urged councils in England to “crack on” with building cycle lanes and low-traffic neighbourhoods, highlighting that DfT research has found the majority of local residents support such initiatives in areas where they have been put in place.
> Boris Johnson urges councils to “crack on” with cycle lanes and low traffic neighbourhoods
In 2019, before that year’s general election, the Transport Select Committee published a report entitled Active travel: increasing levels of walking and cycling in England.
Greenwood, the committee’s chair at the time, said: ““In England, the vast majority of journeys over a mile are made in a car or van. Even for distances of one to two miles, more than 60 per cent of journeys were made by motor vehicle and fewer than 2 per cent of journeys are made by bike.
“The government must stand up for active travel,” she added. “It must show real leadership by setting ambitious targets for cycling and especially walking. It must give local authorities the support and funding they need to engage the public and make active travel a priority in their areas. It must do whatever is necessary to persuade more people to get on their bike, or Shanks’ pony.”
> House of Commons committee urges government to boost cycling and walking funding
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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What are the Givernment proposing to do to bring about a change in the attitudes of road users towards journeys made by bicycle?
Because unless something is done to allow people on bicycles to feel safe, to make non-cyclists feel safe enough to take it up - and especially to make motorists take serious steps to consider the safety of people on bikes as more important than their personal convenience in getting from A to B as quickly as possible - then words like these from the Government are meaningless blather, and those of us who want to see the Government's words become reality are just pissing in the wind.
"Transport secretary Grant Shapps has said that the government wants “half of all journeys in towns and cities to be walked or cycled by 2030” – but declined to disclose what funding might be available beyond 2025."
Well that's sorted then.
Even for distances of one to two miles, more than 60 per cent of journeys were made by motor vehicle and fewer than 2 per cent of journeys are made by bike.
Surely most people must realise that the government is wholly 'tongue in cheek and fingers crossed' with their noses lengthening by the minute over this claimed aspiration? Look what happened over the new 'Covid' cycle lanes- ripped out as soon as the Mail/ Express/ Sun/ Telegraph staring-eyed crazed nutters objected? Have you forgotten the Kensington bike lane removed to provide unlimited time parking? Have you forgotten the joke punishment for killing cyclists, and the refusal of most, if not all, police forces to take terrifying close-passing seriously?!
Quote, "We want half of all journeys in towns and cities to be walked or cycled by 2030.” Well the Tories have a plan to achieve this its called austerity, if very few people can afford a car they'll have to walk. Sure as day follows night funding for local cycling infrastructure will be lacking as will public ownership of public transport, a way to ensure rural communities aren't left out in the cold.
They could start by requiring employers to provide safe bike parking.
Simply doubling or tripling the duty on fuel might help too.
How does increasing fuel duty affect drivers of electric vehicles? the roads will increasingly become clogged by these vehicles as people change to EV's.
Actions speak louder than words.
Off topic, but (kind of) relevant:
34 bus stops away: the hurdles car-less Americans face to reach vaccine sites
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/04/rural-americans-barriers...
Starts
its relevant as an example of this is what a wholly car dependent society ends up looking like.
but literally the Guardian could have picked any number of examples from the states, theres very little concept of providing access to people without a car to anything over there.
They may claim that it's a priority, but money talks and it's saying that they'd rather be building more roads for cars.
It's not even necessarily about building infrastructure - they could change road laws to prioritise pedestrians and active travel. First, allow left turn on red for two-wheeled vehicles and make it a default that one-way roads allow two-wheelers to go the wrong way if their way if clear. Second, change pedestrian lights to give priority to the pedestrian - no more of this beg button shit. Third, give clear priority to cycle lanes over side roads - maybe with some type of tiger crossing.
This. ^^ I don't agree with all the details necessarily, but the money and the lack of action speak far more than words.
“There’s no way that we would stop spending in 2025 on something which we consider to be such a huge priority.”
A priority so huge that they have devoted £2bn to it. So huge that it dwarfs the road building programme of £27.4bn, and HS2, £106bn. And they aren't even spending that £2bn and don't appear to have a coherent, logical, thought-out plan for doing so.
Has the meaning of "priority" changed overnight and I missed the memo?
EDIT; just out of interest, how much are they spending on electric cars?
2nd EDIT; Maybe they could spend some of that £2bn on secure parking at NHS sites?
which is absolutely insane! I just don't believe that 60% of one or two mile journeys are going somewhere where you simply must get in a car...
I agree but that depends on many factors, there are places with no pavement so walking is faily dagerous, there are places where pavements are so parked on you can't walk safely either.
Further to that some housing esttes are designed so that a 2 mile walk becomes a 4 mile walk instead, there needs to be a change to planning by central government rather than letting councils look like the bad ones everytime.
That was kind of my point - I don't believe that 60% of places meet your criteria ("places with no pavement so walking is faily dagerous, there are places where pavements are so parked on you can't walk safely either").
I think for some people there is a social stigma thanks to a rather juvanile society. They'll drive miles to go for a 'walk' but wouldn't dream of walking to a shop and back carrying a bag, that's regarded as something a poor person does.
This is particularly true in some sections of british society, when I went o Sri lanka with the wife (who's from there) it quickly becamse evident why so many of the weathy are obsese, to excert yourself in any way is unbecoming and any labour is paid for, no suprise that when they came to England this continued. To be fair it's also true for my mother (English), they won't change unless you make it difficult for them to drive, better still you'd save a lot on NHS funding later.
I don't disagree. The related view is that a bicycle is either some sort of kid's toy or a poor person's tool ("Poor bloke! Can't afford a car!" - to paraphrase one J. Clarkson).
It's 0.3 miles on foot to our local mid-sized Co-Op but we've seen several able-bodied neighbours drive there repeatedly (0.8 miles each way) for a few items. A couple of them even go jogging so aren't afraid of exercise.
I know several people who wouldn't consider walking the 1 mile or so to their office, even though at our old office one junction is really clogged at 5pm which would see a couple of them queueing for 10 minutes.
We are also 1 mile from a large hospital and many of people in the estate work there but it seems a large proportion of them will drive, even though they may have to pay to park their car.
This is why "encouraging" just won't effect real behavioural change.
Remember, you can't possibly transport groceries for a family of four without a car. But somehow, you can move all those groceries through the store and out to the car using an unpowered shopping trolley.
Although to be fair it normally takes 2 people to do that or sometimes the whole family !
I don't ever recall seeing any of them with more than 2 carrier bags. Very few shoppers bother to get a trolley and push it round the store, it's not a huge shop so people are often only going for a small number of items. Most will drive to a retail park across town for their 'big' shopping trip.
I've also seen 2 different couples drive barely more than half a mile to take their dog for a walk in a nearby field. Those dogs (and the owners) could benefit from walking to the field as well as around it.
Yes I've known people I worked with who would drive rather than walk just 1.5miles, and then drive to the gym,which they pay membership for,to get their exercise.
And you see the same attitude whenever car parking in Towns/cities comes up, newspapers are full of angry motorists demanding the right to park for free anywhere they like.
How do you force those people out of their cars when they are literally welded to the steering wheel and any and every journey they view through the prism of but how do I drive to that?
In my local rag the standard reply is "you trying taking a baby or an elderly infirm parent anywhere without a car".
Sad to think things are being opposed on such an absurd binary level.
* teddy not included
highly dangerous helmet !
The other one is "how can you expect anyone to cycle up North Hill" ?
It's about 300m long, so you could cycle a third maybe even half if you are not that fit and walk the rest. Even walking from the bottom won't take more than 3 or 4 minutes.
There is too much of trying to think of any reason, however trivial, to use a car.
Here's the thing: if they want that to happen, they might need to spend some money...
Spend the money!? Revolutionary radical, heretic!?
It's just resting in their account.