Connect2

In article <5d18c99e-f195-45d8-bf58-
[email hidden]>, [email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

Tony Raven said:

In article <[email hidden]>, [email hidden]
says...

Quoted message said:

However, local cyclists who
know much more about the traffic issues than I do are clear that the
Connect 2 project in my area - the proposed bridge over the River Tay
- will be of great benefit to current and future cyclists.

Local cyclists in Camden were clear that the Bloomsbury segregated
cycleway would be of great benefit to current and future cyclists.
Apart from being downright dangerous it was recently described as the
worst place to cycle in London

So let me get your argument straight:

1. Cyclists near the River Tay are wrong about their local area
2. Cyclists in Camden are wrong about their local area
3. Tony Raven always knows best

What have I misunderstood?

That that is not what I said. Just because local cyclists say its good
it doesn't mean they are right. I have seen people campaign for some
truly awful facilities because they didn't know the facts just as people
campaign for mandatory helmets. One million lemmings can't be wrong so
lets follow them.

By the way the assessment of the Camden segregated facility was not mine
although I agree with it whole heartedly and avoid it like the plague.

--
Tony

?The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever
that it is not utterly absurd.?
Bertrand Russell

In article <[email hidden]>, [email hidden]
says...

Quoted message said:

Tony Raven said:

I have already stated I have no problem with facilities that provided
genuine new route options for cyclists but I do have problems with those
that parallel other routes.

Simply stating "parallel" is such a stupidly incomplete description
of the possibilities that exist that it makes it an absurd piece of
tarring numerous different things with the same brush. It needs
far more context than "parallel" to be a useful point.

Has it been a bad week for you?

--
Tony

"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has
taken place"
George Bernard Shaw

In article <[email hidden]>, [email hidden]
says...

Quoted message said:

Well I know nothing of that route but I must assume it was poorly
designed or badly executed to be so unfit for its purpose.

It was although there is a group of cyclists who think their getting it
installed was a great triumph, that there should be more of them and all
the problems it has would go away if only they had done it differently.

Quoted message said:

Of course it
would be a challenge to ensure that the Connect 2 projects were
well-designed, well-executed and properly maintained. That challenge
might not be adequately met. That still doesn't damn all such efforts
as intrinsically useless.

It doesn't but on the performance so far the odds are not in its favour.

--
Tony

"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has
taken place"
George Bernard Shaw

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

Take a look at:
www.johnballcycling.org.uk/misc/a27

It shows the A27 between Portsmouth and Havant.

Just to the south of the A27 you can make out the parallel Sustrans
cycle track.

I have cycled both the A27 and the Sustrans track. The Sustrans track
is undoubtedly slower than the A27, probably 25% slower - but it turns
a challenging and, frankly, terrifying journey into a pleasure.

Do you have a problem with this Sustrans inter-town connection?

If you wanted to go from Portsmouth to Havant why would you take that
route that dumps you out nowhere useful in particular? The A27 at that
point is a continuation of the M27 but if you are going to Havant just
carry on up Eastern Road and along Havant Road into Havant

Of course instead you could cycle this piece of NCN2
http://maps.google.co.uk/?ie=UTF8&ll=50.719134,-1.85279&spn=
0.000732,0.002618&t=h&z=19&om=1
Well you can in the winter but in the summer its closed to cyclists.
Just what you need for a national sustainable transport route.

--
Tony

"Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from
the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent
disinclination to do so."
- Douglas Adams

Brian G said:

Tony Raven said:

Local cyclists in Camden were clear that the Bloomsbury segregated
cycleway would be of great benefit to current and future cyclists.
Apart from being downright dangerous it was recently described as the
worst place to cycle in London

Well I know nothing of that route but I must assume it was poorly
designed or badly executed to be so unfit for its purpose.

I've never felt even the slightest desire to cycle down it, but it is,
sometimes, convenient for skating along. Provided nobody's coming the
other way, and it would be better if they removed the ironwork down the
center.

Given that the chance of getting taxpayers money /intentionally/ spent
on improving skating provision on the road is closer to 0% than an IEEE
single-precision epsilon then I must confess to being purely selfishly
slightly pleased that it exists, but I'm still left wondering what they
were thinking.

-dan

Tony Raven said:

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

Take a look at:
www.johnballcycling.org.uk/misc/a27

It shows the A27 between Portsmouth and Havant.

Just to the south of the A27 you can make out the parallel Sustrans
cycle track.

I have cycled both the A27 and the Sustrans track. The Sustrans track
is undoubtedly slower than the A27, probably 25% slower - but it turns
a challenging and, frankly, terrifying journey into a pleasure.

Do you have a problem with this Sustrans inter-town connection?

If you wanted to go from Portsmouth to Havant why would you take that
route that dumps you out nowhere useful in particular?

I would say that Havant Tescos, the town centre and Havant Station can
be particularly useful.
www.johnballcycling.org.uk/misc/hvnt

The red line shows the Sustran's route into Havant, which goes under
the A27 alongside a tidal stream estury to emerge at Tesco, and a
short hop to the town centre (West Street). The station is off the
image, but a little further to the north of West Street. The broken
red line shows an alternative crossing which I have yet to explore.

However, I have to admit that my final destination was neither Tescos,
West Street or the Station, but the next town along, Emsworth. This
has it's very own cycle underpass crossing the A27 connecting it with
Havant, before the route joins the road network once more.
www.johnballcycling.org.uk/misc/ems

Quoted message said:

The A27 at that
point is a continuation of the M27 but if you are going to Havant just
carry on up Eastern Road and along Havant Road into Havant

I have done that too. The lights and roundabouts make is even slower
than the Sustrans route, and cycling through Portsmouth's light
industrial area is nothing compared with cycling along the salt
marshes.

Tony Raven said:

I came to my "right answer" the same way as I did for helmets - by
studying the evidence and finding my original beliefs had no
evidential basis. You seem to have come to your answer through
anecdote and common sense. If you have the evidence that cycle
facilities significantly increases cycling levels and make it safer
please share it.

Evidence that cycle facilities increase cycle levels: Kesgrave High School.
Evidence that cycle facilities, many of which are not suited to the faster
confident cyclist (shared use paths, often with stupid design mistakes),
increase cycle levels: Kesgrave High School.

Major difference between Kesgrave High School and other middle class schools
? Massive quantity of cycle paths leading to the school from most of its
surrounding catchment, provision at the school for cycles, and related
stuff, to be stored safely.

Safety data ? I don't have any. And I suspect a 1500 pupil school is too
small to give meaningful safety data.

Consequences for adult faster cyclists: The occaisional "get on the
cyclepath" shout, which can be ignored, confident of support from the new
Highway Code wording. Fortunately for most "faster cyclists" trying to get
across the area, the main "cycle to school" routes are perpendicular to the
main "get across the area" roads.

- Nigel

--
Nigel Cliffe,
Webmaster at http://www.2mm.org.uk/

In article <[email hidden]>, [email hidden]
says...

Quoted message said:

Tony Raven said:

I came to my "right answer" the same way as I did for helmets - by
studying the evidence and finding my original beliefs had no
evidential basis. You seem to have come to your answer through
anecdote and common sense. If you have the evidence that cycle
facilities significantly increases cycling levels and make it safer
please share it.

Evidence that cycle facilities increase cycle levels: Kesgrave High School.
Evidence that cycle facilities, many of which are not suited to the faster
confident cyclist (shared use paths, often with stupid design mistakes),
increase cycle levels: Kesgrave High School.

Major difference between Kesgrave High School and other middle class schools
? Massive quantity of cycle paths leading to the school from most of its
surrounding catchment, provision at the school for cycles, and related
stuff, to be stored safely.

Or the massive difference is a school that actively encourages cycling
and walking to school. So they also have high levels of pupils walking
to school on segregated walking facilities that every school has and
that existed for years before cycling and walking started to increase at
Kesgrave. AIUI Tom is achieving similar cycling results with his school
by active encouragement and I don't think he had a single cycle path
built to do it. Meanwhile schools in Milton Keynes with the
comprehensive Redway system of segregated cycling don't see the same
effect. You need more than one anecdotal smoker living to 100 to show
that smoking causes you to live longer.

--
Tony

"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has
taken place"
George Bernard Shaw

Tony Raven said:

Not at all. The overwhelming probability is that any attempt to
install cycling facilities in the UK will be badly done.

In the last 5 years here I've seen a great improvement in
understanding of how to do a reasonable job. The above just writes
off anything before it's happened,

Quoted message said:

You can either
spend all your time hoping that next time you will have educated them to
do it a bit better, although that has been going on for years without
visible impact

As above, that's simply not the case.

Quoted message said:

or you can take the simple pragmatic approach of
dissuading them from trying in the first place given that the roads are
good

FSVO "good". You still seem to be labouring under the
misapprehension that what works fine for one for 1 Tony will scale
perfectly to any numbers of any other cyclists, and *it won't*.

Quoted message said:

the cycle facilities are likely to encourage them to tamper with
the roads and make them worse and the cycle facilities they install will
need a lot of effort to try to get them to make them usuable. The
Cambridge Cycle Campaign spends a lot of time and effort trying to
educate the Council and then having to campaign for them to put right
what they have just installed. There seems to be no evidence that the
Council is learning from this exercise.

But what works and is releavnt inside Cambridge doesn't necessarily
apply to, say, the A9 between Blair and Pitlochry. And you need to
realise that different roads and different cycling populations
(quality and quantity) aren't all best served by the same
one-size-fits-all solution.

Quoted message said:

I came to my "right answer" the same way as I did for helmets - by
studying the evidence and finding my original beliefs had no evidential
basis. You seem to have come to your answer through anecdote and common
sense. If you have the evidence that cycle facilities significantly
increases cycling levels and make it safer please share it.

But the evidence for paths etc. is confined to limited geographies
and populations. It is *not* a safe assumption that what goes for
the MK Redways will go for the road from Arisaig to Mallaig, while
it *is* a fairly safe assumption that the hardness of tarmac and
the force of gravity and the basic performance of a skull will be
the same in each place. You are assuming the circumstances will
lead to perfectly scaling results, but my *informed* common sense
that's a step further than the research really allows you to take.

Define "signifiant" for increasing cycling levels... If you
compare the people who cycled along Dundee Riverside before the
parallel path went in then it's a *huge* increase, several hundred,
probably thousand, percent. In national terms not very much, in
local route terms a lot. You can select whichever sort of evidence
you want according to the point you've decided to make... I've
never claimed it's safer, but I'll certainly claim that in a lot of
places it's a damn site /nicer/, and "nicer" does get people out on
it. It might primarily be weekend leisure cyclists, but today's
weekend track using leisure pootler is tomorrow's road-going commuter.
And don't be foolish enough to think it's an exclusive one or the
ohter choice. A case in point, if I'm going to Broughty Ferry by
bike and I'm in a hurry then I'll take the road, if I'm not in a
hurry I'll take the Grassy Beach cycle track along the river front
because it's a joy to ride along where the 4 lane main road is just
a good way of getting there quicker.

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net [email hidden] http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

Tony Raven said:

No, but assuming that because its a local cyclist group they will know
what's best is not always a good assumption.

But it seemed the case you were willing to assume it would be a
fair assumption that they won't possibly know what's best...

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net [email hidden] http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

Tony Raven said:

Has it been a bad week for you?

It has. A highly intelligent man with lots of cycling experience
of my e-acquaintance has turned his brain off and is assuming one
size fits all on the basis of completely insufficient evidence, and
I find that a great shame.

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net [email hidden] http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

Tony Raven said:

Or the massive difference is a school that actively encourages cycling
and walking to school.

And there are some really good programmes out there to support this.
Here is the principal one:

http://www.sustrans.org.uk/default.asp?sID=1102425335218

Richard

In article said:

On Fri, 30 Nov 2007 19:36:09 -0000, Tony Raven

Quoted message said:

You forgot to include the gritting in winter when its icy. Cambridge
spent millions on a cyclist bridge but have said they cannot afford the
costs of gritting it in winter. So in winter its left icy.

When I was in Cambridge I used a cyclist bridge over the railway
daily. I cannot recall a problem with ice.

Different cyclist bridge. The railway one has a roof. The new one over
the A14 doesn't. The A14 one is a useful shortcut if you want to go
from St John's Innovation Centre to Tesco, or from much of Milton village
to the Cowley Road Park and Ride site, but would obviously be more useful
in winter if it was gritted.

Tony Raven said:

AIUI Tom is achieving similar cycling results with his school
by active encouragement and I don't think he had a single cycle path
built to do it.

Funny you should say that!

My cycle training programme had an assessment recently by Cycling
England. In the report I was described as a "one-man Bike It!". Bike
It! is the cycle training part of Sustrans.

in message <[email hidden]>, Peter Clinch

(') said:

Simon Brooke said:

Quoted message said:

moan moan grumble grumble grumble. How many long distance cycle
tourists do you know that don't carry maps?

Exactly.

Exactly what? You can do Aberdeen to Thurso with one map which
bothers marking eateries and campsites and has cycle-specific info
(such as suggesting an alternative route but noting you do need to
carry bikes onto a foot-bridge by steps, and if off-road sections
have access gates and if so how many anbd where). You can't do
that without Sustrans.

Michelin. And the same map takes you down to Carlisle.

Quoted message said:

I can cycle a short distance and have a sign to a place and a
direction to it that is from a cyclist's perspective. I never used
to get that. Without it, if I want to go to Perth or Forfar I'll
find myself on the A90, and I really /don't want to do that/.

I have never seen any sign on any NCN route which adds routing or direction
information, which wasn't there before the NCN came into being. Apart, of
course, from these monstrosities:

http://www.leicestershire.gov.uk/pheonix_green_signpost.jpg

which, as /you've/ never seen one, are clearly not common.

Apart from that there's only the little square number signs, which are
infrequent and intermittent, and if you miss one you're stuffed.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

The roads were there. As you have agreed, anyone going cycling in an
unfamiliar area has to take a map anyway, so you cannot argue the
signing is a 'benefit'. The condition of the roads is unchanged.

There's a very, very big difference between having a map for the
odd double-check and having to constantly refer to it. And that
big difference is complete and frequent loss of momentum. And if
you try and pretend that doesn't matter, then I shall call you for
talking utter tosh.

When touring in unfamiliar country I have my map on top of my bar bag,
precisely so I don't have to stop to consult it. But if you're claiming
that the NCN signing as currently instituted is sufficient to prevent the
regular need for a map, then...

--
[email hidden] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

[ This .sig subject to change without notice ]

in message <[email hidden]>, Brian G

(') said:

Simon Brooke said:

I've said - and I say again - that on a case-by-case basis, I'll support
useful strategic links. But I won't support Sustrans, since they seem in
my experience to be a Bad Thing, actively harmful to my and other
cyclists' interests.

Herein lies a local problem, though. I pretty much agree with what
you've said about Sustrans in this thread. However, local cyclists who
know much more about the traffic issues than I do are clear that the
Connect 2 project in my area - the proposed bridge over the River Tay -
will be of great benefit to current and future cyclists. The project
has only grown legs as a result of fitting in with Connect 2. I've
voted for that scheme, therefore, in support of the views of colleague
cyclists. I don't believe that in doing so I've suddenly given my
blessing to all of the work of Sustrans.

I don't see a problem with supporting this particular scheme while
continuing to campaign for local road improvements and against
unnecessary and harmful cycle paths.

No, neither do I. If it's going to get something done that's useful to you,
by all means go for it.

--
[email hidden] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

my other car is #<Subr-Car: #5d480>
;; This joke is not funny in emacs.

In article <[email hidden]>,
[email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

Tony Raven said:

AIUI Tom is achieving similar cycling results with his school
by active encouragement and I don't think he had a single cycle path
built to do it.

Funny you should say that!

My cycle training programme had an assessment recently by Cycling
England. In the report I was described as a "one-man Bike It!". Bike
It! is the cycle training part of Sustrans.

....and sponsored by Cycling England. I think Bike It is a generally
excellent scheme other than where it tries to build Sustrans routes to
divert them from the roads (which only makes it less likely they will
become accustomed to using the roads and therefore cycle outside of
school where using the roads becomes unavoidable)

But just because Halfords has some good bike outlets with knowledgeable
staff it does not mean that I should like their general philosophies
(car and cycle helmet promotion) or much of what they deliver for
cyclists (poorly set up BSOs of the type you have suffered from). Ditto
Sustrans (getting cyclists off the roads is the key to more cycling)

I have looked at local to me CONNECT proposals and their logic escapes
me.

This one connects nowhere in particular by apparently building a cycle
track through a "spare span" of a bridge that already carries a quiet B
road through the other span. Even then the A road itself is
sufficiently quiet and straight with good sight lines that there are no
problems crossing it as a family at other crossing points.
http://streetmap.co.uk/streetmap.dll?G2M?X=423290&Y=100630&A=Y&Z=3
http://www.sustransconnect2.org.uk/schemes/project_detail.php?id=132

This one does not do what it claims. First, very few people cycle in
Royston. Second the direct route from the communities served west of
the rail line to the town centre and schools would not go that way. Far
better to put a contraflow cycle lane on Queens Rd to connect the
station to the schools without having to detour via Mill Road and a long
chunk of A10 (with lots of side roads, entrances and drives on the
shared use pavement). Journeys into town just goes straight down
Kneesworth street and get rid of the stupid while paint narrow cycle
lanes and pinch points the Council have installed.
http://www.sustransconnect2.org.uk/schemes/project_detail.php?id=98
http://streetmap.co.uk/streetmap.dll?G2M?X=535598&Y=241255&A=Y&Z=1

A total waste of money that would be better spent on cycle training
schemes and driver education IMO. That doesn't mean that they haven't
accidentally come up with a good scheme amongst the total of 79 but all
the ones I looked at in my necks of the woods left me asking Why?

--
Tony

"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has
taken place"
George Bernard Shaw

In article <[email hidden]>, [email hidden]
says...

Quoted message said:

Tony Raven said:

Has it been a bad week for you?

It has. A highly intelligent man with lots of cycling experience
of my e-acquaintance has turned his brain off and is assuming one
size fits all on the basis of completely insufficient evidence, and
I find that a great shame.

Maybe its time for me to give this group a rest for a while.

People here used to think that about someone who defied common sense and
suggested cycle helmets weren't all they were made out to be. Some of
those people went on the look into the data themselves and were
surprised to find themselves convinced too. There's a lot of people
here treating cycle facilities as they used to treat helmets. The data
does not support them either being safer or encouraging more cyclists
(they may divert some cycling from other routes through misconceptions
about their safety or because of the greater aggression of motorists
towards cyclists who don't use them - vide Milton Road Cambridge). I am
seeing a lot of anecdote and Russells teapot response. There is a cycle
facility somewhere that is safe, increased cycling and where a helmet
will save your life - it is after all common sense. I have looked
extensively into the evidence as I did with helmets; have you?

That does not mean that new links for cyclists in the road network
should not be built but I don't have the faith that you seem to have
that Sustrans understand what is needed or are capable of providing it.
Can you for example explain this Connect to me?
http://www.sustransconnect2.org.uk/schemes/project_detail.php?id=132
http://streetmap.co.uk/streetmap.dll?G2M?X=423290&Y=100630&A=Y&Z=3

Let them sort out the current messes they have produced first before you
give them more money and power. Just think what £50m could achieve with
Bikeability training and programmes of the type Tom has at his school to
get pupils cycling.

--
Tony

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all
progress depends on the unreasonable man."
- George Bernard Shaw

Tony Raven wrote on 01/12/2007 11:49:

Quoted message said:

Let them sort out the current messes they have produced first before you
give them more money and power. Just think what £50m could achieve with
Bikeability training and programmes of the type Tom has at his school to
get pupils cycling.

But that's not the option! It's 50 million to Connect2, Sherwood forest,
the Eden project or the Black Country. That's what we're trying to
promote and decide between, not what 50 million could be better spent on!

I may agree with you that training the children is an excellent value
for money way of spending resources - I remember my cycling proficiency
and the help it gave me - but in this context it boils down to one
question: Would we like more ('free'😉 money spent promoting cycling in
this country? From my point of view the answer is 'yes' and that's why
I'm voting for Connect2.

Peter

--
http://www.scandrett.net/lx/
http://www.scandrett.net/bike/

Tony Raven said:

Just think what £50m could achieve with
Bikeability training and programmes of the type Tom has at his school to
get pupils cycling.

£35m would be sufficient to give every 10 year old child in the
country good quality cycle training.

This assumes a 10 year old population of 700,000.

Unfortunately, that is not a voting option.