CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Infrastructure

Time to be optimistic!

(42 posts)
  • Started 5 years ago by Harts Cyclery
  • Latest reply from Morningsider

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  1. Harts Cyclery
    Member

    I've been trying to tell people that I'm quite sure big positive stuff is a-coming. The first glimpse of that should be at Feb's TEC.

    And, if you don't believe me, maybe you'll believe MCA:

    Colville-Andersen

    @copenhagenize
    33m33 minutes ago
    More
    After meeting with a big group of planners from City of Edinburgh for a long, energetic session yesterday, I left feeling optimistic. ME! Of all, impatient people. Lotsa plans, energy & drive. I hear rhetoric all across the world. Yesterday was different. Let's watch #Edinburgh

    Posted 5 years ago #
  2. crowriver
    Member

  3. Harts Cyclery
    Member

    Also, I went to the Sustrans conference in Dundee on Wednesday and my goodness, what an excellent event. Talks from Lee Craigie, Mikael Colville-Anderson, Jon Little and Lucy Saunders.

    Lee Craigie introduced herself as the new Active Travel Commissioner and went on to talk about focusing on human connections around streets and independent travel for children - exactly where the debate needs to be.

    MCA was his usual inspirational self. It was a slightly updated version of the pretty standard Copenhagenized talk. But it's always news to a lot of people, so very worthwhile. You can find one online if you've never seen it before.

    Jon Little was fascinating. He was the lead consultant on Waltham Forest's mini-Holland scheme, since rebranded to Enjoy Waltham Forest (so as not to give fuel to the anti-bike brigade). It's incredible what's been achieved there. Google Enjoy Waltham Forest and read for yourself.

    Lucy Saunders talked about Healthy Streets. Her company has lots of interesting resource on how to score streets and what can be done with planting and so on to improve public realm and streets that are still required for traffic.

    There then followed workshops various.

    In short, lots of reasons to be optimistic across Scotland (even if the local government might not be in the right place). The level of debate and ambition in Sustrans is very high indeed, judging by the day and those I spoke to.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  4. Harts Cyclery
    Member

    @crowriver. Yes, amusing. Dundee is grim for active travel. Although there is a pedestrianised street outside the Caird Hall....

    Posted 5 years ago #
  5. Morningsider
    Member

    Well, if sexy women on bikes photo guy says so, then it must be true! (Sorry, it really irks me that this guys rides along on the coat-tails of actual urban thinkers, like Jan Gehl or even our own Cliff Hague).

    HC - I really hope you are right, but I have seen nothing over the last few years to make me think anything but glacial progress will be made in Edinburgh. Just one example - it has now taken longer to authorise the Canal-Meadows cycle link than the Queensferry Crossing (Ministers announced it would go ahead on 19 December 2007 and the Act authorising its construction received Royal Assent on 20 January 2011).

    Posted 5 years ago #
  6. Harts Cyclery
    Member

    I don't think that's fair, Morningsider. If you're talking about Cyclechic, it wasn't just women. It's was just people on bikes in normal clothes.

    And I wouldn't say he rides on the coat-tails of Gehl or Hague. His philosophy is very specifically cycling and what it does for urbanism. You may not like him and that's fine, but he's not a copy cat or charlatan. He's the real deal who works with cities across the world to actually deliver cycle infrastructure that changes the way people are travelling.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  7. LaidBack
    Member

    Mikael Colville-Andersen messing around

    @Harts Cyclery @Morningsider
    'Mikael Colville-Andersen messing around' - from his EdFoC talk in 2013.

    I am an optimist...

    Posted 5 years ago #
  8. acsimpson
    Member

    Short of knocking the tay road bridge down and starting again what where would you go with Dundee's waterfront.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  9. gembo
    Member

    With the coming of the railways the Victorians do appear to have given some thought as to how best to arrive in the centre of a town or city. On the whole. Tunnels, or deep cuttings. Though @chdot has a photo from somewhere I think in southwest England where in what looks like the 1970s a man with a flag walks in front of the train in along flat stretch as it leaves the station through a market.?

    Anyway, I digress. I always found with Dundee train station you alighted far from any centre with a very difficult series of roads to negotiate. I think this is sort of being looked at with the regeneration of the waterfront but the very tricky roads are still there.

    Dundee maybe has had the same motorways rammed through its centre (from the Tay bridge and related expressway and Kingsway etc) that happened in Glasgow but without any alternatives to crossing the very busy roads. So in Dundee a whole swathe of land next to the Tay was cut off by the road building. Whereas in Glasgow they removed neighbourhoods like cowcaddens for motorway but the underground and low level trains still allowed you to get about?

    Have they put in pedestrian flyovers to get to the V and A. I used to ask my dundonian pals if they ever used the swimming baths which were built in the cut off strip of land. They seemed tricky to get to by foot.

    If pessimistic, I have spotted on BBC News that GPs should soon be able to prescribe mountain biking at Glentress as an intervention? Study has demonstrated the benefits I shall rootle for the link

    Posted 5 years ago #
  10. chdot
    Admin

    “a man with a flag walks in front of the train”

    Suspect it was a Weymouth Harbour train.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  11. chdot
    Admin

    About 1:40

    [+] Embed the video | Video DownloadGet the Video Plugins

    Posted 5 years ago #
  12. gembo
    Member

    Yes I knew it was down that way, I think the clip relates to another parallel universe?

    On the benefits of exercise as part of an input for depression, there is a U.S. Study of 1.2 million people that demonstrates this benefit. Cycling is stated there as the second best form of exercise

    Switching to the far more modest Scottish study, Developing Mountain Biking in Scotland who are based at Glentress have taken 10 people on a six week guided two hour mountain biking programme, supplying the bikes and kit.

    Napier University have evaluated that the participants liked mountain biking.

    This pilot is obviously much more expensive than a six week supply of Prozac.

    However, I can see why it was done this way. If you are depressed just getting out the door for a brisk walk to blow away the cobwebs is quite a major hurdle. Jumping straight to mountain biking would need more support.

    The mountain biking is built into a wider intervention so that sounds promising.

    I could see other things like a weekly Granton to Crammond and back guided group ride evaluated by Edinburgh College as fitting in to this type of model. The advantage here would be less kit and more options for solo cycling outwith the group ride et cetera.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  13. davecykl
    Member

    I was in Dundee recently to visit the V&A (which is a gift shop enclosed within an interesting piece of building-shaped public art, which also contains pleasant enough, but rather expensive, cafes and restaurants, and happens to have a rather small museum attached (worth a visit, but the Museum of Scotland has nothing to worry about)), and the waterfront is a huge improvement from the utter desolation that it was in the 1990s, but sadly it is still very mediocre, and not at all cycling friendly.

    The horrid footbridges which used to be the only connection between the station and the actual city are long gone, the ring road death strip has been partly tamed with the introduction of street level traffic lights and pedestrian crossings instead (how radical), the station entrance has been rebuilt with the welcome addition of escalators and lifts, and a new proper frontage entrance within a moderately interesting looking hotel building, and there has been an attempt to restore a more traditional grid street layout along the waterfront proper.

    Unfortunately, it is only an attempt, and the opportunity to create a people friendly neighbourhood has been squandered. Instead of the old whizzway, there are now parallel four lane one-way streets in opposite directions (do they really, really, need four lanes, they didn't even allocate one lane as a bus/cycle lane, not even ASLs at traffic lights, let alone any more advanced urban design). These streets might "fit" better within the new district gradually being built around them, but, on our visit, although there are now wide pavements/plazas alongside the new road it is really not at all clear whether or not cycling is permitted on them (although I think almost everyone would more naturally do so than risk the monster new roads), and there was certainly no cycle route signposting to offer any directions to any nearby destinations at all.

    And, sadly, at the V&A, cycle parking was hidden away (and only findable if you were actually taking a wander outside around the building to look at it from all angles) at the far side (nearest the Tay Road Bridge), in a carefully secluded spot with few passers-by, just right to allow bike thieves to operate unobserved, rather than in the surely mind-glowingly obvious location right beside the walkway to the main entrance or next to the Discovery dock, where it would be highly visible, make it clear that visitors coming by bike are welcome, and have high levels of overlook by passing foot traffic, making it harder for bike thieves.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  14. crowriver
    Member

    What a great wee film. I like the way they just unceremoniously bounced or towed miscreant parked vehicles out of the way. They might need a squad like that once trams start running down Leith Walk...

    @gembo, they used to have covered pedestrian walkways to both the station and the old Olympia swimming pool (now the site of the V&A). All that segregated infrastructure is gone (not a complete loss as they used to smell of pee), and as a pedestrian or cyclist you face staggered traffic light crossings, with extended waiting on barrier ringed islands in the middle of four or five lanes of fast moving vehicles. One of the reasons why I've not set foot in the V&A Dundee yet...

    Posted 5 years ago #
  15. Morningsider
    Member

    A train trundling down the street rather closer to home.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  16. Stickman
    Member

    I’m sure that Daisy and her team will come up with radical and inspiring plans. However a small section of cycle lane at Roseburn has been delayed for years because of the actions of one man and a few shopkeepers. That will be nothing compared to the fight that will be made against the city centre plans. I don’t think the council coalition has enough political strength or unity to face that down. I really hope I’m wrong.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  17. Greenroofer
    Member

    When I was little, Weymouth was our local ferry port for trips to France. I remember travelling in the car right behind the train as it drove down the road, and seeing the last coach, with all its buffers and pipework looming above us. Trains are much bigger than cars, particularly when you're 10.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  18. gembo
    Member

    Daisy gives me a nod most days now and I have recently been dragooned into being an Active Travel Champion.

    There will now be 12 of us. I think my first proposal is going to be to expand this to anyone else I can find. I would think of the six regular cyclists in my own staff team we can get a few more.

    My thinking here is that just cycling isn't enough. To combat council employees not just driving but using regs incorrectly to stop proper signs going in etc all cyclists need to be activists. Then there will be more cycling activists than drivers who will block cycling schemes on very selfish grounds as well as work related grounds.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  19. Frenchy
    Member

    Daisy gives me a nod most days now and I have recently been dragooned into being an Active Travel Champion.

    Congratulations. Is this in lieu of any councillors willing/able to do the job?

    Posted 5 years ago #
  20. gembo
    Member

    @frenchy, no being active travel champion is more internal. Different from a councillor being an actual Champion of Cycling, no one appears that keen on this job?

    Posted 5 years ago #
  21. crowriver
    Member

    "Different from a councillor being an actual Champion of Cycling, no one appears that keen on this job?"

    A poisoned chalice, so not surprising.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  22. chdot
    Admin

  23. PS
    Member

    Street running railways

    Some of the German ones are very pretty.

    I like the positive vibes, and in government I do sense more of a feeling of needing to build what we want the future to be rather than what flawed transport models say we should build, but it will need all the help it can get when it meets the hostility of the usual vocal minority.

    The Edinburgh City Vision 2050 seems to be one of the Council's main ways of demonstrating popular support for de-vehicularising; however, I've heard some Councillors say that it hasn't reached enough people to reliably do that yet so I'd suggest everyone piles onto it with positive thoughts about a liveable, walkable and cyclable city.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  24. chdot
    Admin

    “demonstrating popular support for de-vehicularising”

    Which is part of the problem.

    “I've heard some Councillors say that it hasn't reached enough people to reliably do that yet”

    And what are they doing to encourage/persuade more people?

    “I'd suggest everyone piles onto it with positive thoughts about a liveable, walkable and cyclable city”

    Generally I think CCEers, Spokes types, hard core Living Streeters and, above all, those with any involvement with PoP (even just turning up for an hour one year) have done rather a lot.

    Time for SG to make it easier for council’s to do more, for CEC to do much more - both the politicians and officials.

    Importing one person from Sustrans to (try very hard to) somehow ‘encourage’ a whole new mindset might seem like buck passing of the highest order.

    (Other opinions are available.)

    Posted 5 years ago #
  25. PS
    Member

    Yep.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  26. gkgk
    Member

    "a car parking ban likely in and around George Street" ..mentions an Edinburgh councillor in his opinion piece in EN last Thursday. Maybe part of the upcoming Feb good news.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  27. sallyhinch
    Member

    Here's the breakdown of the Scottish Government's active travel budget spending.

    https://www.transport.gov.scot/media/43939/active-travel-budget-allocation-2018-2019.pdf

    I'll leave it to the rest of you to discuss if this is grounds for optimism or not. I'd say it depends on whether you're comparing Scotland with the rest of the UK, or the rest of Europe

    Posted 5 years ago #
  28. Morningsider
    Member

    Harts - this tweet might change your mind about MCA:

    Warning - non-CCE language used.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  29. Harts Cyclery
    Member

    @morningsider haha. I know all about his rather unhinged views on ebikes. I spoke to him about it in Dundee last week over a coffee. I said I thought they were a valuable addition to urban mobility. We had a laugh about his intemperate tweets on the subject.

    I even had a beer with him after the event where we had a laugh on other things. It's possible to think that people broadly do good, and whose opinions, in general, you agree with, without agreeing with everything single thing they say/do/think.

    He thinks they're an undemocratic nuisance to the democratisation of urban spaces because of their cost and anti-social speed. I think he's wrong. Howbowdat?

    Posted 5 years ago #
  30. chdot
    Admin

    Yes.

    There are times when he comes across as a misguided attention seeker.

    https://twitter.com/magnatom/status/1090295179041558528

    Posted 5 years ago #

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