Kids cycling to school shouldn’t be rocket science

What's easier?  Making it safe for children to cycle to school, or sending rich old men into space?

Yep, you've guessed it!

Building cycle paths shouldn't be like rocket science - drawing of boy on a bike watching a space rocket launch

Providing safe cycling infrastructure so families can cycle to school shouldn't be rocket science. The Dutch and Danes have been doing it for years so we don't even need to reinvent the wheel.

But here in our crazy country, it appears that rocket science is actually easier than building safe cycling routes.

The simple request - for all children who want to cycle to school to be able to do so safely - proves to be far beyond the capability of our leaders.

Perhaps if we wanted to send our kids to school on the moon Messers Branson, Bezos and Musk would be interested?

Astronaut cycling - it shouldn't be rocket science getting more kids onto bikes

COP26 should really be focussing everyone's minds on how to get more people out of cars (including electric ones) and onto more sustainable forms of transport, especially bicycles.

As it seems to be beyond the capabilities of our politicians and planners to actually work out what needs to be done, I thought I'd write down a few ideas.

The first list is things that could be done really quickly, if the political will and some money was available. By quickly I mean months, possibly even weeks, if the climate crisis was actually being treated as a crisis.

The second list is things that need more time and money to complete but could be completed in several years, again if there really was the political will to act.

Quick ways to get more kids cycling to school

Covid-19 has already shown how quickly things can progress when there's the political will and some funding. 

There's no reason why all of these can't be implemented in the next few months, except the lack of political will to do so.

1  Reprioritise all highways and planning authorities away from keeping motor vehicles moving to keeping people moving, with priority on active travel for local journeys under 20 minutes

2  Give several ministers responsibility for making it possible for every child who wants to cycle to school to be able to do so

3  Set up daily press briefings with lots of graphs to let everyone know how quickly progress is being made against items 1 and 2

To help them on their way, here's a few top secret, rocket science level things that these clever people could do NOW:

4  Ensure school entrances are safe by making "School Street" schemes compulsory across the country

5  Implement 20mph speed limits in all built up areas and enforce this rigorously (using the proceeds to fund other things on this list)

6  Extend the "Bike to Work" scheme to be a "Bike to School" scheme, offering ALL families access to loans and grants for cycling equipment

7  Set up a national network of family cycling libraries so families can test out / borrow the equipment needed to cycle to school with younger children

8  Build secure, covered bike sheds at all schools

9  Build bike storage facilities in residential areas so all families can securely and safely store their cycling equipment

10  Give every child an air quality monitor to carry around with them, especially on the drive to school

11  Demand car manufacturers start making cargo bikes instead

Longer term ways to get more kids cycling to school 

Long term, there's only a couple of things that need to be done. 

This isn't rocket science, and all that is needed is to reallocate some of the road building and space budgets, together with the political will to make it happen:

1  Capital budget, released immediately, for every authority to implement everything in their Local Cycling and Walking Infrastructure Plans (or regional equivalents)

This will remove the need for areas to bid against each other for small pots of funding, as currently this situation results in piecemeal infrastructure and a postcode lottery as to whether it's safe to cycle

2   Capital budget, released immediately, for every authority to upgrade all their existing cycling infrastructure to meet the LTN 1/20 standards

3  Ongoing funding provided to every authority to maintain all their new and existing cycling infrastructure to a high standard

Covid-19 has proved there is the ability to mobilise huge numbers of people, redivert effort to design and build things and deliver huge nationwide initiatives when there's a big enough of a crisis.

If saving the planet isn't a big enough crisis, I really don't know what is.

If they weren't so busy, I'd suggest we hand this over to the University of Oxford and the NHS to sort out.  My guess is they'd only need a few months!

Keep up to date with the latest Cycle Sprog articles

Sign up to receive our newsletter straight to your inbox.

How to start cycling with your kids

Fuel prices have reached record levels, and they're unlikely to drop any time soon.  Swapping to cycling for shorter local journeys is often quoted as being a quick way to save money.

But how do you do this if you've got a family????

Don't panic - Cycle Sprog is here to help!

Here's a selection of articles to get you started - and don't forget to sign up for our FREE guide to cycling to school 

Related Posts

MET kids cycle helmet review

MET Eldar MIPS youth helmet review

What's easier?  Making it safe for children to cycle to school, or sending rich old men into space? Yep, you've guessed it! Providing safe cycling infrastructure so families can cycle to school shouldn't be rocket science. The Dutch and Danes have been doing it for years so we don't even need to reinvent the wheel. But…

Read Article

Comments

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.