If the Second World War hadn’t intervened, Britain might now have a dense network of Dutch-style segregated bike paths. Or, at least, such a segregated network was the ardent desire of motoring organisations, leading police officers, the Ministry of Transport, […]
Continue ReadingAutomobiles existed in the 1890s but they were crude, dirty, expensive, hard to drive, and prone to mechanical breakdowns. The transportation revolution of the age was the bicycle. Eleven years after the introduction of JK Starley’s Rover Safety bicycle and […]
Continue ReadingIt’s ironic, but the law that states cyclists shouldn’t ride on pavements is the same law that could be used to prevent motorists from parking on pavements. Which is the greater social ill? If you believe vitriolic letters in local […]
Continue ReadingWe tend to think of roads in the pre-motoring age as meandering rural backwaters. In some ways they were (and it was cycling organisations who first organised for improvements to roads) but these changing conduits were also conduits for change, […]
Continue ReadingThe Coalition Government’s “localism agenda” sounds like democracy in action: local decisions being made by local people. But, for roads other than motorways, it could spell disaster, with a steady decline in spending on non-strategic highways, which are the great […]
Continue ReadingOver on iPayRoadTax.com I dig down into the views of Richard Wellings, the Head of Transport at the libertarian think-tank the Institute of Economic Affairs. Dr Wellings – his PhD is in transport and environmental policy – had tweeted his […]
Continue ReadingHovis, the bread company, is making good use of its brand ambassador and Olympic gold medallist, Victoria Pendleton. She’s been working with Hovis since 2010 and is now fronting a campaign to get more people on bikes via a series […]
Continue ReadingThe micro-infrastructure, that is. Britain’s bike paths are famously comically bad, but English aggregates – the little stones enrobed in asphalt – are in demand across the world. Specifically, some little stones from a quarry in deepest Northumberland. They’re naturally […]
Continue ReadingMany modern motorists glibly profess their hatred for cyclists. The automobilists of the early 1900s had no such issues with cyclists. This was because many were cyclists too, or had been cyclists before taking up motoring. The first motorcar racers, […]
Continue ReadingIn 100 days from today the cycling road race of the London Olympics could see Mark Cavendish win gold for Britain. At the London Olympics of 1948 the Mark Cavendish of his day bagged silver medals on the track, but […]
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