Joint Local Transport Plan
Pressure to get things done often comes from various sources. These are some successes for things we've been aiming for:
- Cycling Officer
Before 2006, some campaigners advocated the appointment of a cycling officer, while others pointed to other authorities where the cycling officer was ineffective but his or her presence gave highways and transport officers an excuse to ignore cycle transport.
Then in January 2006 North Somerset appointed Jonathan Gall as its first Cycling Officer, as one of the sustainable transport team headed by Ruth Sanders. We were lucky. Jonathan is a genuine utility cyclist who rides between Clevedon and Weston-super-Mare each work day, while on Sundays he might be seen out with Clevedon and District Road Club. He has a reputation for getting things done, and is committed to the job. One of Jonathan’s first actions was to create the Cycle Forum.
- Cycle Forum
At first North Somerset refused to contemplate having a Cycle Forum, but campaigners continued to press, and in 2006 the first act of the newly appointed Cycling Officer was to set up the Cycle Forum. http://www.n-somerset.gov.uk/Transport/Travel/Cycling/cycleforum.htm. Anyone can join the Forum. It is a means of putting the cyclist’s viewpoint to the Council. Its success depends on the attendance of campaigners, so do come along if you can. For the next meeting date and venue see the forum website noted above.
- Joint Local Transport Plan (JLTP) 2006-2011
The production of the local transport plan involved much consultation, and campaigners from Bristol, Bath, South Gloucestershire and North Somerset took part in this. Alliances were struck with interest groups including Friends of the Earth, Campaign for Protection of Rural England and Transport 2000.
CTC Right-to-Ride Network representatives Steve Kinsella, Richard Burton, and Stuart Andrews prepared a full response to the consultation after seeking views of campaigners and attending a number of meetings with transport planners, along with Terry Miller, David Neale and other campaigners from North Somerset. The final Plan contains many things campaigners wanted; cycle review of all main roads, road maintenance prioritised near the kerb, cycle promotion, prioritisation of cycling over all other transport except pedestrians, and recognition of effect of motor vehicle speed are just some of the good things. On the minus side, regrettably our central aim of 20mph limits is barely mentioned.
The plan is aspirational and does not have implementation details. (See Cycling support document to the Plan) It is now vitally important that we keep pressing for these objectives to be realised on the ground.
- Wessex Trains This 2004 campaign successfully showed the local rail company (now First Great Western) that cyclists are a loyal customer base and they adopted a more inclusive policy to bikes on trains
- HGVs and cycles Prompted by a CPRE campaign to keep lorries off the Mendip Hills.
- Advanced stop lines at Portishead Cabstand junction. The council refused to include ASLs in this 2004 scheme (contravening their own policy) but in late 2006 they started creating ASLs at existing junctions, such as the A370 at Backwell.