Designed for Cycling

Cherry Allan's picture

Cycle-friendly design and planning: Overview

CTC's vision is to see people of all ages, backgrounds and abilities feeling able to cycle safely and confidently for all types of journey. Designing - or re-designing - neighbourhoods, town centres and road networks to cater properly for them is essential...
Cycle lane
Headline Messages: 
  • CTC’s vision is to see a massive step-change in cycle use, so that people of all ages, backgrounds and abilities feel able to cycle safely and confidently for all types of journey.
  • Our neighbourhoods, town centres and road networks should be fundamentally redesigned to be ‘people-friendly’, with cycling not only contributing to a reduction in car dependence, but also benefiting from it. Through-traffic should be channelled onto a limited network of main roads – which should have dedicated cycle provision on or alongside them – while traffic volumes and speeds are kept low on other streets or lanes. Dedicated cycle routes and cycle-friendly access restrictions (e.g. limiting motorised access to town-centres or rat-runs) can encourage people to choose cycling over motorised travel for day-to-day journeys.
  • The cycle network should include the whole road network, supplemented by high-quality cycle routes away from the road network, e.g. through parks and open spaces, or along canals, waterfronts and disused rail corridors. Dedicated cycle provision should be safe and feel safe, showing that society positively values those who choose to cycle, and avoiding any impression that they are a ‘nuisance’ to be ‘kept out of the way of the traffic.’
  • In general, CTC advocates:
    • 20 mph limits for most built-up streets (including villages), and the widespread adoption of 40 mph or lower limits for rural lanes;
    • Some form of dedicated space on busier urban roads, particularly where higher speed limits are retained; and
    • Parallel off-road facilities for dual carriageways and inter-urban roads.
  • However, decisions on appropriate solutions will also need to reflect local factors, such as junctions and junction layouts, and demand for parking or loading.
  • In most places, the main priority for significant capital spending in the years ahead will be to redesign larger junctions to be cycle-friendly, or to open up links for cyclists across (or avoiding) major barriers to safe and convenient cycle travel. Opportunities should also be sought to maximise the funding for cycling improvements through the planning system and road maintenance budgets.
CTC View (formal statement of CTC's policy): 

General principles:

  • An overall aim of transport planning should be to increase cycling as part of a strategy to halt and reverse the growth of motor traffic. This could be achieved through pricing mechanisms (e.g. fuel duty, road user charging, and tax incentives for cycling), the availability or cost of parking, or by regulations and physical road closures to limit motor vehicle access whilst maintaining access for cyclists.
  • The road network and cycle facilities should be designed and maintained to a high standard, free of potholes, debris and obstructions.

Urban streets and rural lanes:

  • 20 mph limits should be the norm for most streets in built-up areas, with exceptions to be identified by local authorities in consultation with local communities.
  • Speed limits of 40 mph or lower should be the norm for rural single carriageways, with 20 mph the norm in villages.
  • On both residential streets and rural lanes, low traffic speeds should preferably be achieved through quality design, to make the street or lane feel like it is primarily for people not motor vehicles. Cruder forms of traffic calming, such as road humps and narrowings, are a less good option, as they can be unpleasant and unsafe for cyclists, and are generally unpopular.
  • On busier urban roads, some form of dedicated space for cyclists should be provided. Alternatively, this may include use of decent width bus lanes or on carriageway cycle lanes, preferably with coloured surfacing. It may also include cycle lanes created from carriageway space involving physical segregation both from motor vehicles and pedestrians, where the relevant highway authority has the will to do this to a high standard. Where there is insufficient space for such provision, the aim must be to reduce traffic volumes and/or speeds, so that cyclists can share the road safely with the other traffic using it.

Dual carriageways, inter-urban main roads and major junctions:

  • On dual carriageways and inter-urban main roads, the form of cycle provision normally preferred should be a physically segregated cycle track parallel to the road, with provision made for cyclists to pass under, over, around or through major junctions.
  • High speed or multi-lane junctions should either have signalised crossing points, ‘early advance’ cyclists’ traffic lights, and/or safe and convenient bypass routes, bridges or underpasses, so that cyclists can get round or through the junction safely and conveniently in all directions.
  • Bridges and tunnels designed to high standards should be provided at appropriate locations to enable cyclists and other non-motorised users to cross major roads where potential links on minor roads or off-road rights of way are currently severed.

Off-road cycle facilities:

  • Traffic-free routes should be provided away from roads, e.g. using parks and open spaces, canal and riversides. These should form direct and convenient connections to the wider road network and to key destinations, and should have good riding surfaces.
  • Traffic-free routes away from roads should add to, not substitute for, the creation of safe, convenient and pleasant cycling conditions on or adjacent to the road network, so that cyclists have easy access to the full range of destinations that other road users can get to.

Other cycling infrastructure:

  • Cycle signing should be provided to help people find suitable routes.
  • Sensibly-designed cycle parking should be provided at key destinations to meet the needs of both short-stay visitors and longer-stay users e.g. at schools, workplaces and rail stations which will generally require more secure, sheltered provision. Levels of cycle parking provision should reflect anticipated increases in demand.

Maintenance and funding sources:

  • Roads and off-road routes used by cyclists should be surfaced and maintained to a high standard. The needs of cyclists should be reflected in highway authorities’ procedures for reporting, inspecting and repairing defects, and in the management of street works, winter maintenance, debris/vegetation clearance and lighting policies.
  • The costings of off-road cycle facilities should include provision for their maintenance.
  • Opportunities should be sought to maximise the funding available for improved cycling provision from new developments and highway maintenance budgets.

Ensuring high and consistent quality:

  • Planners and engineers should be given professional training in the principles of cycle-friendly planning and design.
  • The highway network and alterations to it should be subjected to a cycle audit and review process.
     
Download full campaigns briefing: 
Publication Date: 
October 2012
Chris Peck's picture

Cycling in Vienna: lessons from Velo-city 2013

Chris Peck spent a week in Vienna at Velo-City, the biggest international conference on cycle planning and promotion, alongside 1,400 other delegates from dozens of countries. Here are his first impressions of the city and its plans for cycling.
Vienna's huge central Ringstrasse has space for all modes of transport

As a city, Vienna is pretty good for cycling – indeed, anyone used to cycling in British cities would find it far superior to virtually any here.

Unfortunately for Vienna, though, it also possesses a road and public transport network that are superb, uncongested and – in the case of the latter – astonishingly cheap: the Viennese pay just 365 Euros a year for a season ticket which gives them access to six underground (U-bahn) lines covering the whole city, surface trains (S-bahn) to the outer suburbs, Europe’s biggest tram network and of course buses.

Roger Geffen's picture

CTC tells Osborne maintaining roads is better than building them

Cycling charity joins call for Chancellor to focus on maintaining existing roads rather than building new ones in his forthcoming Spending Review.
Pothole: Photo by tejvanphotos (Creative Commons licence)

CTC, the national cycling charity has joined other transport groups in calling on the Chancellor George Osborne to spend on maintaining existing roads rather than on expensive and damaging new roads schemes.

Chris Peck's picture

Small town cycling: where Britain falls far behind

Whereas cycling is slowly increasing in London and other cities, it is continuing to fall - fast - in places where historically it was much higher, such as the towns and villages of eastern England. On a recent trip to Italy I saw how the bike can still be the default mode of transport
Everyday cycling in Binasco, a small town near Milan

Italy is not a place we normally look to for lessons on cycling, but perhaps we should.

On a recent trip, I visited a small town on the outskirts of Milan, in the vast, flat and densely populated landscape of the Po valley.

With a population of around 7,000, the town of Binasco bears only slender resemblance to similar sized British towns. Much of the population is housed in modern apartments near a town centre, which still retains the old network of narrow streets around a castle.

Chris Peck's picture

Dutch-style roundabouts and low-level signals tested

Low level signals and continental-style roundabouts with cycle priority are the standard design in the Netherlands. But in this country they are considered so radical and innovative by the Government that special trials are being carried out on TRL's track in Crowthorne, Berkshire
Dutch priority over side-roads - like this - is being trialled in Britain

Mini-traffic lights, simple yield markings, zebra crossings without archaic orange Belisha beacons and zig zag markings...

Chris Peck's picture

Cycle safety at 78 junctions to be improved thanks to £18m in grants

Government funding of £18m, announced last summer, will go to local authorities across England to improve cycle safety at junctions.
A hostile road in Leicester which will be transformed

The funding includes several hugely impressive and radical schemes, including the partial removal of a gyratory in Leicester and the construction of a £2m cycle bridge in Bury St Edmunds.

CTC was represented on the panel of experts alongside British Cycling, CPRE and Sustrans, which recommended the shortlist of schemes to be funded. 

Chris Peck's picture

Roadworks - a test of priorities

When road or building work requires space to be removed from the carriageway, who gives up the space? In Britain, roadworks often occupy cycle facilities, with no provision of alternatives.
Space for bikes and pedestrians is temporarily reallocated in Denmark

In other countries cyclists often get a better deal.

This photo, from the centre of Copenhagen, shows that when building work requires space to be taken away from the pavement and cycle track, a temporary facility is constructed on the road.

Admittedly, the provision is narrow and well below the width of the cycle facility that had been replaced, but cyclists at least have been considered.

Chris Peck's picture

New law for better cycle paths in Wales

The Welsh Government has proposed a new law placing a duty on local authorities to map the walking and cycling routes in their area and make a plan and budget to improve them. Wales is being touted as the first country for such law to be introduced.
The NCN8 near Caernarfon alongside a major road

The Welsh Government's proposals have been brought before the Welsh Assembly as the Active Travel Bill Wales 2013, following a consultation in 2012. 

It's a highly ambitious set of proposals which will force local authorities to identify, map out and improve the walking and cycling networks in their area.

Chris Peck's picture

Roads to ruin: the problem of potholes

CTC Campaigns and Policy Coordinator Chris Peck explains why UK roads are so bad
Potholes aren't usually quite as large as this one

Occasionally when cycling in France you will come across a road sign that says, “Chausée déformée”, followed by a section of road that is perhaps a bit on the bumpy side or contains the occasional pothole. I’ve always found this sign hilarious. If the standards used in France were adopted in Britain there would be many roads where this sign would have to be erected every few hundred metres over their entire length.

Chris Peck's picture

Oxfordshire spends just 0.2% of transport budget on cycling

Local cycle campaign group for West Oxfordshire, BikeSafe, has slammed Oxfordshire County Council for its lamentable lack of funding for cycling.
BikeSafe have campaigned for a cycle path alongside a busy B-road for years

Over the last three years, Oxfordshire spent just £500,000 on cycling measures out of a transport budget of £230m - only 0.2% of the total.

The discovery was made by campaign group BikeSafe, thanks to a Freedom of Information Act request.

The group had previously been told that there were insufficient funds to build a path alongside the busy B4044 from Eynsham to Botley, on the outskirts of Oxford, for which it has been campaigning for years.

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