Issue 109 / September 2020

on onboard computers. Those 60s urban planners could (just
about) be forgiven for reading the signs as they did – cars were
small, there was ignorance about fossil fuels, and the post-war
project was utopian, in an individualist way. It wasn’t so long
after, as that project began to sour, that it was plausible for the
Prime Minister to have claimed that anyone over the age of 26
riding a bus was a failure (some people need to sit at the front of
the top deck more). That forecasting created a negative feedback
loop which is still going.
To be clear: this is not a crusade
against all motor vehicles. Buses are
vital, particularly for those with need
of greater mobility and accessibility.
In a city with a strong music scene
and – yeuch, sorry to use this term –
nocturnal economy, there still needs
to be access for motor vehicles to
load bands in and out, for vans to
stock restaurants on Bold Street. But
it should be equally safe for couriers
and Deliveroo riders to navigate.
Influential research conducted
by New York City Department of
Transport found that independent
businesses fared better in districts
with segregated cycle lanes. That
might be a single piece of data but it
opens up a rabbit hole about how cycling can be our means to an
end too – the end being getting politicians to listen in terms they
understand. And bikes are cool. They will never suffer the stigma
other modes of transport have.
On the face of it, competitive cycling’s had a positive
influence on your average rider in the 2010s. Moves to ‘clean up’
doping, a string of British Tour de France winners, and 2014’s
Grand Départ in Yorkshire have almost certainly contributed to
the increase of urban cycling, and not just at rush hour. But the
“It’s not about
picking a far-off
date by which to lay
more red tarmac;
it’s about prioritising
the cyclist from
here on in”
available data isn’t always so useful. Lists of ‘best and worst
cities for cycling’ tend to draw on numbers of cyclists and
Strava, and though that’s often shared with local authorities,
it isn’t always easy to find out who cycles, why, and where to
and from. Though we’ve all heard horror stories illustrated by
footage of road rage and driving that, merely sloppy to the driver,
is potentially lethal to the cyclist, it isn’t easy to track down
quantified data about the cyclist’s experience and how safe they
feel on the road.
There is hard data about cycling
fatalities. Liverpool came bottom
in a Walk And Cycle Merseyside
(WACM) table of metropolitan
boroughs, with 42 deaths per
100,000 of the population (the UK
average is 29/100,000) between
2014 and 2018, and Sefton sits
only a few places higher. Focusing
on fatalities and injuries among
child cyclists, the North West
fares little better, with St. Helens,
Liverpool, Sefton and Wirral in the
bottom 10. But it’s hard to parse
the data (not every local authority
is a metropolitan borough) and put
it in context – higher numbers of
cyclists may imply a greater risk of
injury, but most cycle lanes in Liverpool so far have been painted
on, rather than segregated from other traffic. Cyclists can only
protect themselves so much. Here’s the rub: should building
bike-friendly infrastructure encourage and determine future use,
or reflect and improve the current cycling experience?
Syd Barrett’s Bike occupies the God tier of bike songs. It’s
a very good song but it’s not really about bikes, a bit like many
cycling initiatives at local government level. Similar language
appears over and over in plans for improved conditions for
cyclists. Pretty utopian, drenched in colourful graphics, with a
sense that the only thing stopping better cycling was the lack
of a plan. But cycling’s already simple enough. You strap on
your helmet, check your lights, and you’re off. But the language
of the focus group, the cabinet meeting, or the optimistic
item on North West Tonight doesn’t adequately describe the
cyclist’s experience. It doesn’t describe the near miss with the
cement mixer, the prayer that the dotted line will be enough of
a barrier, the polka-dot jersey waiting at the top of Rice Lane
or Smithdown when there’s a bus up your arse. There’s a gap
between vision and reality, between policy and people, that
could be closed if more cyclists were involved in the process. It’s
not about picking a far-off date by which to lay more red tarmac;
it’s about prioritising the cyclist from here on in. One of the best
things about cycling is the freedom – faster than running, with
the wind in your hair, it’s as close to flying as you’re gonna get.
Every now and then, ‘before and after bikes’ photos of
Amsterdam surface on Twitter’s online trash vortex. The narrow
streets familiar from centuries of Dutch painting and stag dos,
photographed in the 70s, could be present-day Walton, with
cars parked bumper-to-bumper on either side leaving just
enough room for a third to crawl through. It seems astonishing
that such a car-centric European capital could eventually
prioritise the sole, the pedal and half as many wheels. The grass
isn’t greener on the other side of the fence – it took 20 years for
those changes to take place, but they are proof that there’s no
need to accept how things are now. Those holding the purse
strings can’t just clap their hands together and say “job done”,
whistling off to the next planning application for more student
accommodation. Climate change is already happening, cultural
change is necessary, and those making the decisions must be
persuaded to de-incentivise the car. !
Words: Stuart Miles O’Hara / @ohasm1
Illustration: John O’Loughlin / jolworkshop.co.uk
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