{"id":10177,"date":"2022-03-23T10:15:48","date_gmt":"2022-03-23T10:15:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/transform.scot\/?p=10177"},"modified":"2022-03-23T10:16:16","modified_gmt":"2022-03-23T10:16:16","slug":"monthly-member-profile-gobike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/transform.scot\/blog\/2022\/03\/23\/monthly-member-profile-gobike\/","title":{"rendered":"Monthly member profile: GoBike"},"content":{"rendered":"

GoBike campaign for better infrastructure, policy, and political support for cycling to be a safe, efficient, clean and healthy mode of active travel for everyone.<\/strong> They believe that spaces should be designed so they are readily accessible for everyone whether walking, wheeling or cycling.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Formed in Glasgow in the 1980s<\/a>\u00a0(previously known as the Glasgow Cycling Campaign), GoBike have pursued aspirational goals for the city for over three decades.<\/p>\n

A current concern for GoBike is contraflow cycling, which is when cyclists are exempt from one-way restrictions. Below, you can read an open letter that GoBike recently wrote to Glasgow City Council and Police Scotland about this issue, and the importance of disbanding with such restrictions for bike-users.<\/p>\n

Open letter to Glasgow City Council and Police Scotland<\/strong><\/p>\n

Glasgow City Council\u2019s adoption of its new Active Travel Strategy is a great step towards making the city\u2019s streets safe and inviting for vulnerable road users, and GoBike warmly welcomes it.\u00a0 Adopting the strategy can only be a starting point.<\/p>\n

For years, the way Glasgow City Council and Police Scotland have dealt with proposals for contraflow cycling has made cycling less inviting as a travel option.<\/p>\n

Contraflow cycling (exempting cycles from one-way restrictions, see endnote) is safe.<\/p>\n

GoBike urges the council and Police Scotland to study the evidence and to be transparent about how that evidence leads to the decisions made.\u00a0 Clearly, decision-makers need to do their own research.\u00a0 A good place to start is the comprehensive study<\/a> of three years\u2019 use of over 400 km of streets in central Brussels where contraflow cycling is allowed with no special infrastructure.<\/p>\n

The report is long, detailed and includes the effects of road width and parking.\u00a0 The unequivocal conclusion is this:<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the local network, where most contra-flows are found, the number of cycling accidents per km is lower on contra-flows than on other roads.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Neither the available road width nor the presence of parked vehicles on one or both sides made a difference to this conclusion.<\/p>\n

Glasgow has many areas where tangles of one-way streets make cycle journeys longer, less direct and harder work, often requiring use of alternative routes with risky turns or busier roads with more parking and bus movements.\u00a0 With the pavement parking ban coming soon calls for many more one-way residential streets are foreseeable.\u00a0 Permitting contraflow cycling in streets with low traffic speeds and volumes is the quickest, easiest, lowest cost way of opening up a web of direct routes for people cycling on short local trips.\u00a0 It can be a key tool in meeting the council (and government) aim of reducing car travel by 20%.<\/p>\n

GoBike\u2019s message to Glasgow City Council is this:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Base decisions on contraflow cycling on the evidence for its safety<\/li>\n
  2. Do not take Police Scotland \u2018concerns\u2019 as a veto.<\/li>\n
  3. Take full account of council policies and objectives which are not relevant to Police Scotland (e.g. improved public health, raised activity levels, more independence for children).<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    GoBike\u2019s message to Police Scotland is this:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Clearly state the limits of any response to proposals for contraflow cycling:<\/li>\n
    2. Is the response a structured risk assessment or just a potential hazard list?<\/li>\n
    3. Does it include the risks of alternative routing?<\/li>\n
    4. Is it compiled by someone with knowledge of cycle infrastructure?<\/li>\n
    5. Quote the evidence on which the response is based.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      Why this message now?<\/strong><\/p>\n

      For years GoBike members have pointed out the problems they experience when new one-way streets are created.\u00a0 These include the dangers of being forced onto main roads, having to make right turns in traffic, and the way such things rule out cycling with and for children.\u00a0 GoBike has repeatedly asked for exemptions when responding to TROs for new one-way streets.\u00a0 It has even been council policy<\/a>, since at least 2016.<\/p>\n

      Yet GoBike\u2019s requests for these exemptions have almost always been refused.\u00a0 The reason given (when pushed) has been \u2018police advice\u2019 or \u2018police concerns\u2019.\u00a0 No details have been forthcoming.\u00a0 However, thanks to Freedom of Information requests an example of the Police Scotland input that led to scrapping of proposed contraflow cycling is now in the public domain.<\/p>\n

      Police \u2018concerns\u2019 that killed contraflow<\/strong><\/p>\n

      In December 2020, plans were produced for streets in Dennistoun which included allowing contraflow cycling in new one-way streets and some existing ones.\u00a0 But in the scheme finally implemented there was no contraflow cycling.\u00a0 Records of Dennistoun Community Council (example here)<\/a> show the concerted efforts made to discover the reason for the changes.\u00a0 Eventually (8 June 2021), Glasgow City Council responded with this, \u201c\u2026the contraflow cycling measures were removed in response to feedback from Police Scotland\u201d.<\/p>\n

      This feedback is now available on the What Do They Know<\/a> website as the result of an FoI request (to the council<\/strong>).\u00a0 The document shows that while the police considered the proposals diligently (including measuring road widths) the response is not in any way a risk assessment.\u00a0 It is a list of possible hazards (as perceived by the police).\u00a0 It does not consider risks of cycling on longer replacement routes.\u00a0 It ignores existing risks of cycling (including dooring) on the same streets with two-way traffic.\u00a0 It makes clear police discomfort with the lack of a painted lane (to keep cyclists safe?).<\/p>\n

      On receiving the police opinion that \u201ca road safety concern is present here\u201d the council reversed the proposals for contraflow cycling in every street.<\/p>\n

      The WhatDoTheyKnow website also carries the response to a similar FoI request<\/a> made to Police Scotland.\u00a0 Police Scotland declined to provide a copy of the same document because the request was for \u201cadvice\u201d provided to Glasgow City Council and \u201cPolice Scotland do not provide advice<\/em>\u201d.\u00a0 The response adds \u201cPolice Scotland send comments on the proposals to Glasgow City Council, however, any final decisions on removing or amending temporary traffic restrictions rest wholly with the Local Authority and not Police Scotland<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

      In response to other questions Police Scotland said that there are no standard operating procedures for the assessment of the safety of changes to road traffic arrangements connected with cycling, or for assigning the responsibility for carrying out such assessments.<\/p>\n

      Final message, for now, to Glasgow City Council<\/strong><\/p>\n

      The new Active Travel Strategy includes this, \u201cNeighbourhood streets which are one-way will allow contra-flow cycling as standard<\/em>\u201d (1.2.4).\u00a0 But the superseded Strategy for Cycling included a similar statement, to almost no effect.<\/p>\n

      The evidence is that contraflow cycling is safe, street designers at the council clearly have more specialist knowledge and experience than Police Scotland, Police Scotland are on record saying the decision is the council\u2019s \u2013 so GoBike asks for the following commitments:<\/p>\n

        \n
      1. All new \u201cneighbourhood\u201d one-way restrictions will exempt cycling.<\/li>\n
      2. The reason for any (small number of) exceptions will be evidence based and will be published.<\/li>\n
      3. A timetable will be published to exempt cycling from existing one-way restrictions on \u201cneighbourhood\u201d streets.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

        Note on contraflow cycling<\/strong><\/p>\n

        The contraflow cycling discussed here is that in quiet streets, with low speeds (20 mph or lower) and low volumes of traffic, most often in Glasgow the car-lined residential back streets.\u00a0 Obviously, heavily trafficked, fast, multi-lane streets need to (and should) have protected segregated cycleways to maximise the choice of safe direct routes for people cycling.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

        GoBike campaign for better infrastructure, policy, and political support for cycling to be a safe, efficient, clean and healthy mode of active travel for everyone. They believe that spaces should be designed so they are readily accessible for everyone whether walking, wheeling or cycling. Formed in Glasgow in the 1980s\u00a0(previously known as the Glasgow Cycling…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"_expiration-date-status":"","_expiration-date":0,"_expiration-date-type":"","_expiration-date-categories":[],"_expiration-date-options":[]},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nMonthly member profile: GoBike - Transform Scotland<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/transform.scot\/blog\/2022\/03\/23\/monthly-member-profile-gobike\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Monthly member profile: GoBike - Transform Scotland\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"GoBike campaign for better infrastructure, policy, and political support for cycling to be a safe, efficient, clean and healthy mode of active travel for everyone. 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