BBC Newsnight excellent reporting on cycling in Holland + #cyclesafe + #space4cycling; a few crucial points they missed.

For those that missed it, a couple of days ago BBC Newsnight did a rather excellent report on cycling in Holland. Here's a copy of it on YouTube; very well worth a watch:


However, there were a few crucial points that the programme either skimmed over, or missed entirely, and deserve far more substantial coverage.

1. Massive NHS saving potential from cycling, due to obesity etc. (~£7Bn/yr) [we're the fattest country in Western Europe]
2. Saving to individuals from cycling, due to high cost of transport in London (£,000's/yr)
3. Studies have shown that 'one mile on a bike is a $.42 economic gain to society, one mile driving is a $.20 loss.'
4. Putting in cycling lanes instead of car-parking significantly increases the amount spent in local shops, thus boosting the local economy. This has been proved in New York where there was a 49% increase in retail sales following the installation of a properly segregated cycle lane.
5. As Danny Williams writing in the Cyclists in the City blog has pointed out, humans cannot adapt the roads they are forced to use to how they want to cycle, but they can adapt how they cycle to the road that they are forced to use . It's all very well for Boris Johnson to say that the Dutch cycle culture is far less aggressive and more inclusive than London currently is. But this culture is simply a reflection of the roads that Londoners and Hollanders find themselves on. An advertisement campaign is going to have no effect on this. People cycle aggressively in London because Boris Johnson himself is forcing them to navigate four-lane gyratories (mostly TfL owned) like the one in Holborn that killed Alan Neve. Dutch people have a much more relaxed 'mentality about cycling' (to quote Boris Johnson) because they have a system of segregated cycle lanes and are not being forced to have to gamble their lives at impossibly dangerous junctions like Bow Roundabout where both Brian Dorling and Svitlana Tereschenko were killed by motor traffic in 2011.
6. Andrew Gilligan is wrong. There is plenty of road-space in London for Amsterdam-level cycling facilities. It's simply that at the moment we're choosing to use that road space for the aforementioned multi-lane killer-gyratories such as Holborn, Swiss Cottage, Elephant and Castle, Victoria (where Dr Katherine Giles was killed in 2013), Aldgate (where Philippine De Gerin-Ricard was killed in 2013), and Archway (where Dr Clive Richards was killed in 2013). Or we're choosing to use that road space on super-scary roundabouts such as Parliament Square (which Ken Livingstone was going to pedestrianise before Boris Johnson came to power in 2008 and crassly cancelled the scheme), Hyde Park Corner, Elephant and Castle, Old Street, Marble Arch, Charing Cross, and Shepherds Bush. Or we're choosing to use that road space on urban motorways like Euston Road, Park Lane, the Westway, and Vauxhall Bridge Road. Or we're choosing to use that road space on idiotic road-narrowing schemes such as Cheapside, Pall Mall and the new Aldgate and Haymarket plans. [these lists are in no way comprehensive]
7. A key part of 'Going Dutch' is having 19 mph (30 kph) limits as default. This isn't just the case in Holland. You also find 19 mph limits as default in Paris, Berlin, Zurich, Bern, Basel, Copenhagen, Tokyo, and Munich. 20 mph limits in London are currently seen as abnormal, aberrant, and sometimes abhorrent. They need to become default, as Boris Johnson's own Roads Task Force recommended. These means 20 mph becoming the standard speed-limit in London which can be lowered and adjusted as circumstances warrant (e.g. the Euston Road might be retained at 30 mph if a completely segregated Cycle Superhighway was built alongside the motor-traffic lanes). It should be intuitive to anyone with half a brain that if you lower the speed limits to 19 mph, Londoners will feel much less threatened by motor traffic close-passing them at 30 mph and adjust their cycling habits accordingly.
8. 'Presumed Liability', as proposed recently by the Lib Dems, would also be a good idea. This puts the puts the burden of proof on the insurance company of the driver in all civil claims involving a cyclist or a pedestrian. While not affecting criminal law's 'innocent until proven guilty', it would provide a financial incentive to drivers and insurance companies to reduce the appallingly high number of Brits on bikes killed or seriously maimed by motorists on our roads every year (3,222 in 2012). The UK is one of only 5 countries in the EU – along with the notably bike-friendly countries of Romania, Cyprus, Ireland and Malta –  not to have some form of this law already. Appalling.

Two Londoners killed in two weeks as a direct result of TfL and Boris Johnson's appalling and inhumane management of London's roads. We need dedicated safe cycle lanes and we need them before even more Londoners are killed. #space4cycling

Photo from the scene this morning where a Londoner was killed by a lorry driver while riding a bike through Holborn. Via @BezTweets

This morning another Londoner (later identified as Alan Neve) following TfL's advertising and choosing to go from A to B by bike was crushed to death under the wheels of a lorry; this time it was at Holborn, right in the heart of Central London.

TfL continue to prioritise 'traffic flow' over the safety cyclists, but don't seem to realise that the amount of congestion caused by serious collisions like these clogs up the road by far more than their inhumane 'traffic flow' policies speeds up traffic. The roads would be faster for everyone - including motor traffic - if safe, segregated cycle lanes were built.

Boris Johnson said after Philippine De Gerin-Richard was killed by a lorry driver while riding a Boris Bike at Aldgate earlier this month that instead of separating cyclists from fast-moving motor traffic (especially 20 tonne HGVs) the real way to stop the relentless killing and maiming of Londoners who choose to travel by bike was to simply get more cyclists on the streets:

"the thing that makes cycling safe in London, is when people have the confidence to do it in numbers; the more people [on bikes] you can get on the roads, the safer it's going to be for everybody."

As today's awful fatality shows, Boris Johnson was talking absolute crap.

Encouraging more cycling in London in current conditions will lead to more people like Philippine De Gerin-Ricard (who was a regular and experienced Boris Bike user) being needlessly crushed to death under the wheels of London's motor traffic. Photo via Evening Standard.

If you mix even more cyclists with deadly and irresponsibly driven motor vehicles and you simple find even more Londoners being killed by motorised traffic.

This is what we are seeing now.

Police are already investigating whether the absolutely atrocious road design of Cycle "Superhighway" 2 (on which three cyclists have been killed in the last two years) led to Philippine De Gerin-Richard being killed. This is because rather than building a segregated cycle lane at Aldgate - as is the norm in Tokyo, New York, and countless other major cities - TfL instead force cyclists and traffic to share a 'general traffic lane' which simply results in Londoners being squeezed to death under the wheels of 20 tonne lorries.

In Holborn, TfL have chosen to do exactly the same thing.

The safe (and illegal!) route for cyclists travelling from Theobald's Rd to Oxford Street is to travel down the contra-flow bus lane on Vernon Pl then Bloomsbury Way (pictured on googlemaps below). There is a 20mph limit here, little room to overtake and the buses are often slowing to stop at bus-stops, so cyclists are (by London's laughable standards) relatively safe.


View Larger Map

However, TfL and the Metropolitan Police force those choosing to travel by bike (and thus creating space for others on the tube etc.) to take a four-lane gyratory route through Holborn instead, fining those Londoners (like myself) who put safety first and actively avoid roads on which they could very well be killed.

Excellent illustration courtesy of Andy Waterman

As Andy Waterman explains about the route which TfL and Boris Johnson currently force cyclists to use:

"Going round involves dropping onto Holborn and negotiating four lanes of traffic. I've done it every day since [almost being fined for taking the safe route] and it makes even me, an experienced cyclist nervous. Motorbikes buzz you, taxis rush red lights to get through and huge trucks obliterate the view. It's hellish."

Today, another Londoner has died because not only have TfL consistently failed to build a safe cycle network through Central London, they have made it against the law to use the only relatively non-lethal route that exists.

I very much hope that TfL are prosecuted for manslaughter, both for the three Londoners killed on the Cycle "SuperHighway" 2, but also for this latest, avoidable, needless, tragic death.

In response, the London Cycling Campaign are holding a Protest Ride tomorrow (Tuesday 16 July) at 6.30pm starting at Russell Square.

If you are reading this, you really should attend.

Current plans for development of both Aldgate, Bayswater, and Haymarket include plans for virtually no segregated cycle lanes whatsoever, despite tens of millions of pounds being spent on each of these schemes and a TfL 'Cycling Vision' budget that is near £1 billion. It's a complete lie to say there isn't the money to make our roads safe for cycling. The authorities just need to stop designing them in ways that freely mix cyclists and lorries.

Unless you want to be the next Londoner to be crushed under the wheels of an HGV, you need to make it clear to the Mayoralty and local authorities that forcing cyclists to share 'general traffic lanes' with lethal and deadly motor traffic is no longer good enough.

2000 Londoners rode through Aldgate last Friday to protest at a lack of #space4cycling.
Boris Johnson's response: absolutely nothing. And another Londoner killed as a direct result of London's road design on Monday morning. Grim.