Cycling London’s Bicycle Super Highways

Since the debut of the first large Bike Superhighway routes in London two years ago, the results are impressive. The number of bicyclists entering Central London is approaching the number of cars. At rush hour 70% of all transportation over Blackfriars Bridge is bicycles. And the current administration has budgeted $169 million pounds per year towards continuing to build out their bike network and superhighways, according to Will Norman, London Mayor Sadiq Khan’s Walking & Cycling Commissioner.

There are some drawbacks and criticisms. The lanes, although impressively wide, already can’t contain the numbers of rush hour cyclists. The speeds of riders can be brisk, which can be troublesome to pedestrians and discourage new cyclists from trying the commute. And bike advocates say the network implementation needs to be sped up and connected more strongly so that “the brave” aren’t the only ones out there.

But the visuals of cyclists being posted in clips on Youtube and Twitter showing the riders streaming over the routes is breathtaking. I was there in 2015 and I thought then London had a healthy dose of bikes. So Streetfilms decided to take a quick look while in London on a Friday in June. We talked to some people on the government side, the advocacy & research groups and most importantly the riders themselves to get their take.

Will Norman: There are over 730
thousand daily journeys made by bike in London over the years since 2000 we’ve
seen one hundred and fifty three percent increase in cycling across all of London
but in central London the story is even better we’ve seen a 253 percent increase since 2000 and that is a direct result of the
investment in the cycle infrastructure that we’ve been putting in around the
city Ruth: So I’ve been cycling for about 7 years in London and definitely the infra has gotten better. Chris: The new routes proven hugely successful in terms of of increasing the number of riders and
we are starting to see a change in the type of riders getting more women more
children older residents on bikes. Paul: I use it for about half mile each day at the
end of my commute and it just makes it easier easier to share the space. Iian: So these major cycling facilities are
now in there working they’ve made a really huge change in London and they
play there a huge change in the city of London. Will: We have 40 miles of cycle superhighway rolled out at the moment we’re also
building a quietway network that’s as though the smaller routes on some of the
residential streets and back routes allowing people to get around the city
as part of their daily journeys. Ian: So as you can see behind me is a considerable
difference physically there’s a big Lane being created four meters wide for
cyclists to go in both directions and there are facilities there and curves
and islands and things to actually make sure there’s physical segregation that
also provides occasional space for people who are crossing on foot to wait
on. Will: This is Blackfriars Bridge in the center of London
you can see how protected the cyclists are away from the general traffic on
this route alone at the busiest time of day cyclists account for 70 percent
of all the journeys go across this bridge compared with before this cycle
lane was here we’ve seen a 55 percent increase in the number of cyclists using
this bridge on a daily basis Ian: The London Road network is very
difficult to understand so I think the biggest benefit for me of the cycle
superhighways is that it gives you a point-to-point route network so I know
if I want to get from the centre of the city out to the northwest I can get on a
superhighway and it’s going to take me exactly radially where I want to go. Esther: London has many quiet streets that they
are actually known 20 mile per hour or 30 kilometres per hour streets when you
use that Street you know it’s a quiet street from a residential there’s not
much traffic so you can actually make your way through the city most of the
times by using loq speed streets. Ian: I started to notice about ten years ago
that London was investing in quieter routes through neighborhoods throughout
London and they would take streets that were formally through streets and they
would block them off except for a look at a narrow passage for a bicycle and
then they use that space for a small garden – maybe a benches or something like
that – but what it did is it made the streets so peaceful that bicycling
through those neighborhoods was really a joy. Paul: What you seen actually happen
organically already who is counterflow cycle lanes have actually made things
accessible where people doing things illegally they’ve now become part of the
system and the planning and the observations of the planners have made has
actually improved things. Ruth: On the superhighways you tend to have to
stay in inflow and yeah go at the speed the pace favoring us going at David: Those big, big bike lanes are really intense I mean people are biking fast they know where
they’re going, there’s an intensity on some of those things it’s like people
are trying to get to work this is not a leisurely thing. Ian: Cyclists tend to ride
pretty fast on them and I can see that especially for an urban rider that’s not highly
experienced that that might be a bit of a challenge. Iain: There’s still a
predominance of males riding and people would drop handlebar bikes people who
want to cycle very quickly but ultimately here in the city we’re
looking for something where actually everybody slows down a good speed for
vehicles and cycles to go is about 10 miles an hour because the differential
between them and someone who’d walking on at 3 miles an hour and the pedestrian
is actually more easy to kind of understand and deal with try and bring
that civility and that calmness into people’s journeys. Chris: Our road system actively excludes
certain groups from taking part in active travel we see fewer women fewer
old residents and an almost no children whatsoever able to cycle on our streets
and we think this is an issue of social justice it’s an issue of active travel
and councils need to say look in fact to travel is importance of a health
strategy for a capital then how do we make sure it’s available to everybody
not just the brave. Ruth: When you have a bike lane and then it shifts to going in with the rest of the traffic you have to be quite careful and I think that’s when perhaps
older people with children don’t feel comfortable. Will: We need to make
sure that cyclists really reflect the diversity of London’s communities at the
moment sadly they don’t, and what we’re doing is we’re working with schools last
year we trained over 40,000 children to cycle around the around London. We do the
same thing with adults twenty thousand two adults were trained that they can cycle
confidently and are familiar with London’s infrastructure. We’re working with
community groups across the city. Esther: There has been some research in London
in relation to the bike sharing schemes that they actually help to normalizing
psyches because is a way of cycling that is quite unpredictable there are trips
that sometimes are unplanned so you might be dressing your normal clothing
no helmet and you just grab a bike because that’s the most convenient way
of doing a trip that you had in London David: I rented one of the city bikes
there and I was really cheap I think I was like two, two pounds for 24 hours and
I felt like the bike was a way to like connect with other bikers. Will: We’ve got record numbers of people hiring our Santander cycles last year over 10.6 million people use this as a way of exploring our great city. Will: What we’re aiming for in our mayor’s
transport strategy the work that we’re doing in London is to radically change
the way people move around the city so shifted from 64% of people using bikes
walking and public transport to 80% that’s getting people out to their cars
and using safer more healthier and more sustainable modes of transport to get
around the city. Iain: We’ve had far fewer vehicles during the day when most people around we’ve seen really big improvements in air quality at certain
locations that’s really good. People having to change how they do things so
we’re working really hard with businesses and delivery companies to
ensure that all deliveries happen at night. Chris: We’d like to see the mayor move
faster now on getting the routes rolled out, the superhighways need to be rebranded
as either bike boulevards or neighborhood greenways and we also now
need to see them across the city. Iain: Certainly many of the organizations and
the opinion formers in places like the City of London are now calling for
fantastic streets with far fewer vehicles wonderful for people
many of matching this up as “healthy streets” the Mayor of London is it’s a
great term. Will: We’re doubling the investment of the previous
administration investing on average about one hundred sixty nine million
pounds per year in cycle infrastructure now that brings London up to the levels
of infrastructure investment that we see in Copenhagen in Amsterdam really
putting forth in London as a global big global city will be at the forefront of
social infrastructure going forward. Paul: I know we we hold up the mini Holland and
the Copenhagen models as ways of doing things but let’s be honest they’ve been
doing it for over 50 years it takes time.