The Lothian Cycle Campaign

See also diary page. Other cycling events may be found on the Internet at http://www.scottishcycling.co.uk/events.

Sep 1-2 Vane Farm Countryside/Wildlife Fair Spokes & Sustrans stalls. Helpers needed. Phone Tim 554.7264.

Sep 1, 15,22 Bike Maintenance one-day courses at Edinburgh Bike Co-Op. Cost £45. www.edinburgh-bicycle.co.uk 228.1368

Sep 13 Tourism without Traffic conference, Birmingham. Normal fee £200, but some cheap places for voluntary organisation representatives. Details: 020.7582.0128.

Sep 16 Pedal for Scotland Glasgow-Edinburgh annual sponsored ride. 0131.657.4393. www.pedalforscotland.co.uk.

Sep 17-21 VELO-CITY International Cycle Conference Edinburgh & Glasgow. Papers for the conference have already been received from nearly 50 countries! Details: www.velo-city2001.org or 0141.434.1500. Volunteers/skills needed - if you can help contact imaxwell@gn.apc.org or 0131.669.6542.

Sep 20 Railway Walk Bonnyrigg-Penicuik Meet Waverley 1730 for Lothian bus 82 from N Bridge to Penicuik. 01324.625816. Note: walk, not cycle, organised by Railway Ramblers.

Sep 21 Car-Free Travel /Travel Plans Conference, London. Costly, but reduced for voluntary organisations. 020 7582 0128.

Sep 22 European Car-Free Day www.eta.co.uk 020.8946.0912. Although quite a few UK councils are participating this year, Edinburgh Council, despite earlier positive signals, will now not take part - due to opposition from Grassmarket Traders and residents (the Grassmarket was to be made car-free), and to insufficient council resources.

Also proposed earth car-free day: www.carfreeday.com. (date?).

Sep 29 Getting Speed under Control UK conference of Slower Speeds Initiative [Spokes is affiliated]. Birmingham. Fee £10. 0845.345.8459 www.slower-speeds.org.uk

Oct 7 Business Bike Challenge 2001 Sponsored 35-mile coastal ride Edinburgh to N Berwick, organised by local businesses. You choose who to support - e.g. WWF, Meningitis Research, Cheshire, Capability Scotland. Entry £9.50/£7.50. 01620.890444.

Oct 24/25 Scottish Road Safety Campaign 2-day seminar Aviemore. Includes driver behaviour, drink/drive, schools, homezones, social inclusion £110/£65. 0131.472.9200. Note: anyone attending might like to read in advance "Death on the Streets" by Robert Davis ISBN 0-948135-46-8 which gives a view challenging to much of the 'road safety industry'.

2002, 5-7 March Tackling Inequality Public Health conference, Glasgow. Several themes relevant to transport. 0870.010.1932.

There seems a reasonable chance the station will go ahead next year, funded by the Council, Edinburgh Park businesses, Railtrack and other bodies. The cycleroute is less certain without a lot of pressure. Spokes Planning Group has written about this, and Chris Hill of the Bike Workshop has been doing much lobbying both at the Council and with the Edinburgh Park businesses. These efforts will have higher chance of success if councillors are also getting letters from individual cyclists on the subject.

So if the route would be useful to you, please write urgently to your councillor. Explain why a cycleroute linking the City Centre and Edinburgh Park / Gyle is important. Ask your councillor to raise this with the City Development Department, and to let you know the outcome. If you are interested in Edinburgh Park station (and cycleroute links to it), ask about that also. Please send us a copy of your letter and any useful replies. To find your councillor's name see www.edinburgh.gov.uk or 0131.200.2000.

• Cycle training for adults is to be launched soon in Edinburgh. Details: CathyScott@scottishcycling.co.uk 0131.662.4461
• Glasgow Cycle Map - second edition just published, showing many new routes and quiet streets. £4.95 (post free) from Go-Bike, PO Box 15175 Glasgow G4 9LP. Cheques to 'Go-Bike'.
• Highland Cycle Campaign newsletter and web site. Sorry, I've just lost address/phone! email r.humphry@ed.sac.ac.uk
• Vital Signs 2001 Statistics/commentary on world environment trends - global warming, obesity, transport, etc. In developed countries use of cars (now 532million worldwide) has led to less active lifestyles, a major cause of obesity, and harm to the environment". ISBN 0-393-32176-2 www.worldwatch.org
• Learn to Let Go - long-awaited travel awareness campaign from the Scottish Executive. Details: www.learntoletgo.org.uk or www.scotland.gov.uk/library3/transport/ltlg-00.asp
• Bikes by Bus government Cycle-Challenge funded Stagecoach Dumfries-Edinburgh internal bike racks. 01387.253496 for leaflet. Also CTC booklet "Bus & Coach services that carry cycles 2001". Free?? 01483.417217. Also at www.ctc.org.uk.
• The Fencemaster A really original website. The fencemaster bikes to work each day, and one day found a sign stating that bikes chained to his usual fence would be removed. He protested by chaining to it objects that are not bicycles - and so started the story! www.whatshouldiputonthefence.com
• Striding Out - West Lothian Safe Routes to School June newsletter. Free from 01506.775292 Alastair Short.
• Sustrans Safe Routes to School newsletter Spring 2001. Free from 0117.929.0888 [give donation if possible]. Details of over 100 government-funded 'travel coordinators' in England - no equivalent Scottish scheme yet announced - why not??? Also, a school where space for 52 bikes replaced 3 car spaces!
• Rural Transport - An Overview of Key Issues Fascinating report for the Commission for Integrated Transport, suggesting that far from all rural journeys are highly car-dependent. Also facts on the dangers of rural roads. Online at www.cfit.gov.uk

• Historic Scotland, who run Holyrood Park, are consulting on the long-promised cycleroute at Queen's Drive, the main road through the Park. The plans have not yet been discussed by Spokes Planning Group. The proposal is a whin-dust path on the inner (park) side of the road, segregated from the pavement (the wording is not entirely clear). The section nearest the new Parliament has been built, and that section (only) is tarmac.

Some issues which members have raised in the past are whether whin is a suitable surface, and whether motorists will be frustrated by those cyclists who remain on the road - more are likely to remain on the road if the path is whin dust (similar to the Water of Leith path out to Currie/Balerno). Or perhaps there should be a whin path for slower and recreational cyclists, together with stricter speed limits on the road itself.
Comments should be sent to Royal Parks Visitor Manager, Holyrood Lodge Info Centre, 140 Holyrood Road, EH8 8AZ. Presumably the plans can be inspected there, though this is not stated. Closing date for comments is 14 September. Please copy your letter to us, preferably by 4 Sept for our next Planning Group [Sandy Scotland 551.2663].
• The government is consulting on Transport and Social Exclusion - 'the nature of transport barriers to accessing work, learning, healthcare and other key services and activities'. Closing date for comments is 26.10.2001. Consultation details: www.socialexclusionunit.gov.uk/2001/Transport/transport.htm If interested, please make your own personal submission, hopefully covering the role of cycling. Spokes also hopes to comment, so please let us have your ideas. Post to Spokes as soon as possible.
• The government is consulting on sustainability indicators for waste, energy and travel for Scotland i.e. measurements to judge the success or otherwise of government sustainable development policies. For example, the proportion of journeys to work, shops, etc made by what transport modes. The short consultation paper Checking for Change is available from 0131.244.0395 (Mark Stirling). It should be read together with the longer Sustainability Indicators for waste, energy and travel for Scotland, costing £5 from the Stationary Office, 71 Lothian Road. Both documents are available online at www.sustainable.scotland.gov.uk. Comments by 28.9.2001.
• Scottish consultation for the 2002 South Africa world summit on Sustainable Development. Topics include 'Is there an alternative to the car?' Online only: www.futurescotland.com.
• The Scottish Executive is drawing up its 10-15 year Transport Delivery Plan for Scotland. There is no public consultation - there having been many consultations on transport in the last few years, but if you have strong views on what it should contain, please write very soon to your MSP. Ask them to raise your points with the Transport Minister. For details of your MSP phone 0845.278.1999. As well as cycling and safer streets issues you might comment on the contrast between the government's road plans (including the massive M74 Glasgow urban motorway proposals) and the continuing obstacles for almost every rail project - e.g. doubt now thrown by Railtrack over the Stirling-Alloa re-opening project, for which the government had already allocated Public Transport Funding..

With the general election won convincingly by Labour, it is worth remembering and quoting suitable points from the Labour manifestos. Interestingly, their UK manifesto had nothing on cycle-use targets, whereas the separate Scottish Labour manifesto (for the UK election) stated "We will continue our efforts to double cycle use between 1996 and 2002 and to double it again by 2012". Sadly, there is also a promise of increased spending on trunk roads - a contrast with Labour's policies at the Scottish Parliament elections which had nothing about building new roads! The environment section re-states Labour's commitment to cut emissions of CO₂ by 20% by 2010. It points out that the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution seeks 60% cuts by 2050.
 

[This article is reprinted by kind permission of Transport 2000 from Platform, July 2001. 020.7613.0743. The report Beeching in Reverse costs £10 from TRAINs at 01484.549.737. If you support the call for government and the SRA to actively promote rail development, please write to your MP and MSP and ask them if they will implement the proposals of the report].

"At Silloth in Cumbria in September 1964 a crowd of 9000 protested as the last train left the station before closure, angry scenes that were to be repeated across Britain as communities lost their rail connection. Hardship, isolation and traffic congestion were to follow. This was the 1960s - the Beeching era - when the road lobby reigned supreme and protests were largely swept aside as much of the network outside the largest conurbations was decimated. Major centres like Mansfield and Caernarfon were left stranded, while in some eases whole regions (like the Scottish Borders) were left without a station and key links - particularly cross-country connections - were severed.

The Beeching cuts have neither been forgiven nor forgotten by many, particularly in peripheral regions like north Devon and Cornwall and the Scottish Borders. But as the inferno of destruction blew itself out in the early 70s, there has been a move to begin to repair the worst of the damage. Alliances between British Rail and local authorities began to put stations and tracks back, usually with outstanding success. The process was painfully slow and limited in scope but the results were very encouraging. Time and time again initial forecasts of passenger numbers have been exceeded in months rather than years and putting towns back on the rail map has also helped their civic revival.

The bureaucracy and high costs that rail privatisation involved put most reopening schemes on the back burner but with the Ten Year Plan the momentum has picked up a little, with SRA-backing for schemes like the Vale of Glamorgan reopening in south Wales. However, despite their cost effectiveness (often using existing trackbeds) and their huge practical and symbolic benefits, line and station openings are still not seen as a policy goal by Government, industry or the SRA.

A new report - Beeching in Reverse - argues that it's time to pick up the pace, and time for a national programme of line and station openings to be actively promoted by the Government and the SRA. The report (largely funded by the Rail Passengers Council, co-ordinated by Platform, produced by Paul Salveson of the TRAINs consultancy and supported by Railfuture) is a snappy, high quality 'glossy' aimed at politicians, journalists and the industry. It argues that reopenings deserve more priority because of the benefits they bring. They can help stimulate regeneration, act as the 'spine' for wider, revamped public transport networks and take traffic off the roads. They are good value (because they often reclaim largely intact but disused infrastructure) and they have huge local and regional impact. At a time when the public are largely sceptical about rail industry and Government talk of a rail revival, they provide the public with a powerful symbol of an industry that is growing and ambitious.

The report profiles a number of successful recent reopenings as well providing a guide to the range of schemes that are still on the starting blocks. It also contains an appendix listing the leading 'runners and riders' by region. It concludes that new schemes should be based on partnership with local and regional agencies working with national bodies, particularly the SRA, which should set up a specialist unit for progressing new railways and line reopenings. The SRA's role should move decisively from being 'gatekeeper' to promoter of railway development.

Beeching in Reverse will be widely circulated throughout the industry, Government and the media and will be backed up with regional launches. The report will form the basis of a concerted effort by Platform, Railfuture and the Rail Passengers Council to make a national programme of line and station openings a key component of future plans for the national network."