🚲 A new easy way to cycle from Enfield to Tottenham

You can cycle from Enfield in north London to Tottenham, entirely on quiet streets and protected cycle lanes.

The route is 7.1km long (4.4 miles) and makes use of Cycleway 20, Cycleway 21, Cycleway 1, as well as the new Bull Lane bus gate and protected lane.

If you find this video useful or you just enjoy watching it please remember to subscribe to the channel and hit the bell icon so you’re alerted to new videos, as I try to post new ones like it every week.

And if you like what the channel is doing, you can also contribute to the London Cycle Routes Patreon below. It really helps keep the channel going:

http://patreon.com/londoncycleroutes

You can see a digital map of the route and download a GPS/GPX file to use on whatever device or app you want here:

https://www.komoot.com/tour/1409697219?ref=wtd&share_token=app0mSH4HtytKRat6HGCFgEc0werl7N9vFHJ3lttm9ofuPLTdL

And you can find a viewer-created and maintained map of all the London Cycle Routes videos here:

https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/viewer?mid=1h9Hxm57fPvZmcuSXajM_Wu0G0s6f_bs&ll=51.505213496092054%2C-0.1285238120117249&z=12

I also highly recommend the Safe Cycle London map for route planning, which is compiled by @SafeCycleLDN on twitter:

https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1XlpvN9R-Wg7qZHyezO8y-eVlftr4e0WX&hl=en&ll=51.516975804561284%2C-0.21828576419061996&z=11

Hello and welcome back to London cycle routes today I’ll be showing you how to cycle from Enfield in North London to Tottenham this ride takes about 25 minutes and you can do the whole thing on quiet streets and protected cycle Lanes by public transport the same Journey also takes around 25 minutes so

Cycling is a competitive option if you find this video useful or you just enjoy watching it then please don’t forget to subscribe to the channel as I try to post new videos just like it every week I’d also like to say a huge thank you to everyone who supports the

Channel on patreon if you’d like to contribute as well you can find a link in the description below the video all right let’s get going so we’re starting on London Road on the edge of Enfield town center and we’re going to head straight straight South down Cycle Way 20 the first

Section of our route today is entirely on protected cycle Lanes running down a main road later on we’ll turn off down some quiet back streets which will get us into Central Tottenham without having to deal with any traffic at all the lanes that we’re currently in are a mix

Of curb segregated Lanes like the ones we were on at the beginning and also lighter wand segregated Lanes like the ones that are on now although these don’t look very heavily protected they’re nice wide lanes and that little extra barrier of the one does make them feel incredibly safe and comfortable as

You’re cycling along I don’t think anyone should have any problem on either type of segregation they do both do a really good job in my view the bus stops like this one here have also been done reasonably well that design is called a bus border and it means that you don’t

Have to overtake buses when they’re at the stop as you’re cycling through the waiting area what it does mean though is that if there are people waiting to board the bus or boarding it you do need to give way and just be courteous to them as they get on the bus where space

Allows the designers of the lane have also done the bus stops like this where the cycle track goes behind the stop in my view that’s a lot better is it prevents conflicts between pedestrians and people on bikes but it does require a lot more space and so because this

Isn’t the widest Road the first design has been used in a lot more locations I don’t think that’s really a problem and that design has been used in countries like Denmark for a really long time and also in London itself on streets like Royal College Street and Camden without

Serious problems it does just require you when you’re riding a bike though to just be a little bit careful and kind to pedestrians who are waiting at the stop just coming up ahead here you can see a bus stop bypass working exactly as intended with loads of people getting on

And off the bus with absolutely no drama crucially we didn’t have to overtake the stop bus and swing out into the road making our journey a lot more comfortable and safe now we had a few options of where to go here and instead of heading straight we bared left onto

Church Street just a quick note for people doing this route in the opposite direction this little stretch of cycle track that we’re on there is actually two way so you would use that in the opposite direction as well it’s actually missing a center line which would make

It a lot clearer if anyone from Enfield council is watching then do see if you can paint a center line on that as I think it would be a cheap way to make the whole thing a bit more legible there’s a short section on Little Berry Street here and you’ll notice that this

Road is actually one way in the opposite direction I think you’re meant to cycle on the shared pavement as there are signs indicating that you should do so we then turn onto this shared path which runs alongside Salmon’s Brook the the path is quite nicely surfaced and as you

Can see there are regular street lights along here so it shouldn’t be too much of a problem to come down here even at night the main Hazard that I would point out though is unfortunately the really really high level of leaf mulch which you can see on the ground which can make

It quite slippery especially at this time of year I shot this in December in the winter given the street lighting along here and the relatively wide path I personally wouldn’t have a problem cycling down here at night but I know that different people do have different standards for this kind of thing and

Some people don’t like isolated paths like that so do consider that before you go down here at night or if you plan on doing it a commute home maybe from the office in the winter when it could be dark after work you then use this two stage tuen Crossing which is fair enough

For getting you across the Great Cambridge Road and you rejoin the path alongside Salmon’s Brook again remember remember that these paths are shared with pedestrians so if you do come across anyone walking make sure you don’t go too quickly and give them plenty of space one thing that would

Improve the feel of this path would be to get rid of that fence along those playing fields on the left hand side you can see there’s already many gaps in the fence there so it’s not like it’s keeping anybody out who wants to get in and it would really make the whole thing

Feel a little bit less claustrophobic as in the previous section of the Salmon’s Brook Path there is also an issue with the path being narrowed by vegetation and fallen leaves as you can see here the path is probably quite a lot wider than it looks at the moment but that’s because it’s

Overgrown I just thought I’d remind everyone that if you want to download a map of this route then you can find a link to it in the description below the video on YouTube I upload maps of all my videos and I make them available on Kut

Which is a website where you can just download them for free you can either use them in the app or you can just download the GPS GPX file which should work on whatever app or device that you want to use it is a standard format there are some sections of this route

With a lot of twists and turns away from the main road so that map could come in handy for those bits the section that we’re currently on however is actually cycleway 21 and it has been since we left Cycle Way 20 so if you need to remember which way to go through this

Section just follow the c21 signs you can see it written on the floor just there c21 saying that however we’re actually about to break with the rout of c21 you see it says there to turn off left well we’re going to keep going straight down dunam Road just here coming up in a

Second is probably the weakest bit of the route although dun road is relatively quiet Park Road and sweep bra walk which we’ll be going on in a second are often used as shortcuts by drivers avoiding the main roads this means you can expect a little bit of traffic on

Them the reason I’m routing us down here is a bit of a compromise really we could have stayed on Cycle Way 20 and then gone on protected Lanes down the main road but then we would have had to double back on ourselves to get back to Tottenham so we’re saving a few minutes

Here and taking a slightly more direct route this is Park Road here which I was warning about and as you can see there are some cars although they’re not moving super quickly and it’s not like you’re in heavy traffic there’s just a few cars the same is also true for this

Street here sweet Brier walk which is a really nice name I think but unfortunately it’s not so sweet when it comes to traffic as there are one or two vehicles using it as you can see I really think that these streets around here would be a great candidate for a

Low traffic neighborhood if Enfield Council are looking for somewhere to introduce them these are residential streets and they shouldn’t be used as cut throughs for motorists avoiding the massive highways that bound this area on all four sides there isn’t any reason for through traffic to be on these

Streets at all and removing it would make cycling around here significantly easier now I think you’re actually meant to cycle on the shared pavement here and use the crossing but I’ve just gone on the road briefly aim for the blue Shar space sign on your right just here and

We’re going into this estate to help you nav through this section we’re going to be following the signpost for cycleway one which is abbreviated as C1 one thing that I quite like about this estate is that the street we’re about to go on here is called Dickens Lane and it

Connects three little streets which are all named after Dickens novels there’s pck Muse dor Muse which we were just on and Copperfield Muse as well the flats look decent enough it’s just a shame that so much of the land area is used for car parking I actually checked the 2021 census and

Believe it or not a majority of households on that estate actually don’t own a car you wouldn’t think that passing through there as they really do dominate the environment there obviously every estate has different needs but it would be really cool to see some of that public space reclaimed for somewhere

Where kids could play and people could just hang out now this section of the route that we’re heading on now is part of a new scheme introduced by Enfield Council in the last few months or so it really feels a Missing Link in this area firstly with this two-way protected

Cycle track and then with a crossing over the road here which you’re allowed to cycle over it’s a parallel Crossing then it puts you onto this street bull Lane with mixed results bull Lane used to be a really really busy street with quite fast thundering traffic what the

Council has done is they’ve installed a bus gate further up which in theory should remove all three TR traffic from here except for local buses there’s a slight complication though the first is that there’s a light industrial estate here which attracts a lot of traffic including that speeding 4×4 with a

Personalized number plate which overtook us the bus Gate’s here and we’re just passing through it the second issue is that I’m pretty sure that compliance with the bus gate is relatively low I’ve cycled through there a few times and every time I’ve been there I’ve seen people driving through the bus gate I

Don’t think this has helped by the signs that Enfield has chosen for the bus gate it’s got these blue signs with a picture of a bus and a picture of a bike on them that sign if you know your road signs means that only buses and bikes can pass

Through here however a lot of motorists frankly don’t understand less common road signs and I think it would have been better to use the no motor vehicle sign with except buses written underneath which I think these days is more well recognized it’s the red one you tend to see in most low trffic

Neighborhoods including where they use bus Gates and given those are becoming much more common around London I think drivers are probably more likely to recognize them than they are the blue sign that’s been used obviously they should understand all the road signs to be allowed on the road but in practice

That doesn’t actually happen I don’t want to slam the bull Lane bus gate too hard cuz it has really reduced traffic there and that is now a safe cycle route certainly and I’m very happy to direct people that way but at the same time I want to be realistic about the traffic

Levels that you can expect down there just a reminder that if you enjoy the channel make sure you hit subscribe just so you get notified for future videos I try and post new ones every week and if you really like what we’re doing you could always contribute on the patreon

As well there’s a link below thanks to all of those of you who do that already it really is appreciated and it helps keep the channel going and helps keep me churning out videos pretty much every week if you know Tottenham you’ll know that that is Tottenham hotspace Stadium

Dead ahead of us and you’ll know that it sits on the high road which is our final destination so we’ve made it all the way from Enfield up to Tottenham I think that route is pretty good the new scheme on bull Lane despite the flaws that we

Just talked about does create a nice new safe link between Enfield and Tottenham which was missing before I did do that compromis route where I came down dun on road and Park Road and sweep R walk if that’s a problem for you you can keep following Cycle Way 21 until you join

The main road then turn right down Cycle Way 1 and you’ll eventually find yourself on our route again the only thing that does is it does double back a little bit and it would add a few minutes to the route but it will keep you off that stretch where there is a

Little bit of rat running traffic around the park hopefully in the long longer term Enfield will put in a low traffic neighborhood around sweetb walk and Park Road and dun Road and also I’d expect that haringay will hopefully build protected cycle Lanes from Tottenham high road all the way up to join

Cycleway 1 that will be at least a few years off but it is in Haring Gay’s cycle and walking action plan which they published last year so fingers cross that we see something like that in the future and we have to do a lot less weaving around the bank streets to get

Between these places make sure you hit subscribe like the video and leave me a comment let me know what you think thanks very much guys and I’ll see you again next time