Cycle
Training – Please Help
Right to Ride campaigners and Hampshire Cycling
have been working hard to try and persuade Hampshire County Council
to do more to promote cycle training.
Cycle training has been proven to increase the numbers of people cycling as
well as improving people’s safety on the road. In vain we have repeatedly
asked for cycle training to be advertised and actively promoted but the department
responsible for this is responsible for safety not for promoting modal shift,
also erroneously they believe that increasing cycling numbers increases cycle
casualties whereas research shows that the greater the number of cyclists the
safer it is on the road. As you can see it is an uphill job. Cycle
trainers are not employees of Hampshire Council but freelance, however they
are trained by the county to teach cycling proficiency (not the newer National
Cycle Standard). There is a shortage of cycle trainers although you would
never know it from the Hants website. Two Basingstoke county councillors
have worked hard with schools to persuade parents to allow their children
to undertake cycle training. One councillor, Jo Kelly, has even trained to
be a cycle instructor but she alone cannot meet the demand for cycle training
by Cliddesden primary school. She has asked me to advertise this to all cyclists
in the hope that some one may volunteer to be a cycle trainer.
HELP is desperately needed. More info from Heather
Rainbow and from the CTC
web site.
Cycle Parking in the Malls
Thank you everyone who wrote to protest about the lack of cycle parking provision in the proposed new refurbishment of the Malls. Thanks to all your efforts the planning application was not passed behind closed doors but had a very public airing at the Planning Control committee. This was reported in the local Gazette where cycling had a high profile. It was certainly not passed on the nod as the headline indicated.
Although the planning application was passed it was amended that Councillor Biermann chairman of the Basingstoke Bicycle Users Group is to meet with officers and survey the Malls to identify where cycle stands should be erected. We also had a lot of support from other councillors, so a campaign that was well worth it.
Heather Rainbow
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Cycle Campaigns
West Ham Leisure Park
to Basingstoke Town Centre
Cycle route consultation
19 January Brookvale Village Hall, Basingstoke :
A green route for walkers/cyclists from West Ham Leisure Park in the west to Basingstoke town centre- linking major retail, leisure and employment centres with the town centre facilities and the station- passing through a chain of open spaces which offer along the way opportunities for sport, play, quiet recreation and enjoyment of nature conservation areas.
The route could in the future be extended eastwards, to take in the river east of the town centre and on to Sherfield-on-Loddon, and westwards.
The history of the river and the Brookvale area will influence the design and there are opportunities for 'gateway features', way markers and art works along the way. Tree planting will be important as well as creative management of the river channel and the adjoining open spaces, including flood alleviation measures, to improve and extend existing areas of nature conservation value.
Much of the route already exists in some form but improvements to the infrastructure are needed- paths, lighting, crossings, seating and signage and creating new links where needed. We will be aiming to connect the route with the following (even if in places it has to be with notional links to be implemented in the future) West Ham leisure and retail complex, Grafton Way industrial estate, Milestones Museum, allotments & housing n. of Churchill Way, supermarket/ DIY stores at Thorneycroft roundabout , Basingstoke College of Technology site, the station, the Anvil and the town centre. This all ties in with a project to complete missing cycleway links across the town which transport planning are undertaking.
Drop-in consultation event is to be held onJanuary 19th in Brookvale Village Hall on Lower Brook St- it will run all day and into the evening
More information from Heather
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