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Stop Press: Due to holidays, judging will not be until early October. We have therefore extended the closing date for entries to Sunday 21 September. [Please repost our bsky post about the extension]. For our 2025 summer competition we’d like to hear about your favourite local bike ride, in Edinburgh and/or the Lothians. It may be a leisure ride, or your daily commute or perhaps the school ‘run’ with your kids. Continue reading #SpokesComp 2025 : My Favourite Bike RideToday, 4 September, the TRO Subcommittee finally approved making permanent the Experimental Traffic Orders (ETROs) which enable the main-road Travelling Safely routes in the East, North and West of the city. Orders for the South will come to the Committee at a later date. A rolling programme, for which funding is allocated, will gradually upgrade the existing bollarding infrastructure to more permanent materials and to incorporate useful improvements. Continue reading Edinburgh Bike Network saved!The 12-week consultation on the new tramline has begun, ending 17 November. This article is intended purely to summarise facts hoped to be relevant to our members from the hugely extensive consultation materials. Continue reading Tram, Granton to BioquarterCargobikes are seen more and more in Edinburgh, and the potential is massive, as in many European cities and elsewhere around the world. Our public meeting on 2 September will feature the 90-minute documentary film MOTHERLOAD – a mother’s experience of how cargo bikes can be an antidote to the increasing isolation, disconnection, and planetary impact of life in C21. The meeting will then hear from local organisations in the forefront of cargobike development in Edinburgh Continue reading Cargobikes in Edinburgh: #SpokesMtgThe new, fully revised Spokes West Lothian map is expected in the next 4 weeks, and will retail at £7.50. However, we still have a few hundred left of the existing version (pictured). We’d rather these were used rather than pulped, so a very special offer… Continue reading Spokes West Lothian map – offer!Led by Edi.Bike and Spokes, Edinburgh active travel groups have combined to urge councillors to approve the traffic orders which make permanent the legal framework for the ‘Travelling Safely’ segregated bike lanes on main roads in the city. Without urgent approval, the first of the orders, covering the East of the city, will fall – and these routes, used by commuters, school pupils and leisure cyclists, will be removed. Continue reading Edinburgh groups unite to save Bike NetworkPrinces Street, Scotland’s internationally renowned premier street, is unique, but has suffered in recent years. The opportunity to transform it, now under Council consideration, must not be squandered. New drawings by Richard Murphy architects suggest an imaginative way forward, catering for tram, bus, cycling and large numbers of pedestrians, whilst reducing vehicle dominance. This is the type of approach that the Council should be developing, rather than its current proposals – which its own report admits could be ‘more aspirational’ !  The 12th edition of the Spokes Edinburgh Map is here! It shows all known new development that has taken place over the last four years, since our 2021 map, in terms of paths, tram, significant housing developments, and more.  Our regular May traffic count, at Lothian Road and Forrest Road, found bikes forming the highest proportion of all vehicles so far post-pandemic. The 8-9am increase to 16.7%, from 16.3% in 2024, was marginal, with both car and bike numbers rising somewhat. However, at lunchtime (12.30-13.30) the bike percentage was up from 10.2% to 11.1%, with car numbers falling – indeed, for the first time ever there were fewer private cars than the bus/taxi/van total, our ‘commercial’ category. At Forrest Road northbound, bikes formed a remarkable 26.9% of all vehicles between 8 and 9a.m. – our highest post-covid figure so far at any count point. Continue reading Spokes Traffic Count May 2025: new post-pandemic bike % record!The Scottish Government’s 25/26 PfG has one big and welcome surprise on sustainable transport – peak rail fares will be permanently abolished from 1st September. Apart from that, funding for active travel is no longer transparent, the PfG confirms that the 20% traffic reduction commitment no longer exists, and trunk road expansion continues. Continue reading Programme for Government 25/26 – retreat on active travel, bus and traffic reduction |
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