AGENDA FOR PEDALS ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING AND MARCH MONTHLY MEETING:    
7.30 p.m. on 
Monday 17 March 2008
in the upper room of the Globe PH, 
Rye Hill Street / 152 London Road, 
NG2 3BQ (between London Road and Meadows Way just north of north of Trent Bridge)

AGENDA FOR AGM (including food!)

A1.  Welcome and apologies for absence

A2. Minutes of the 2007 AGM and matters arising

A3. Chairman’s Annual Report and discussion

A4. Treasurer’s Annual Report 2007-8 and discussion

A5. Election of office-holders (if required)

A6. Ideas for celebrating Pedals 30th birthday in 2009

A7. Any other AGM business.

(15-minute break)

AGENDA FOR MARCH MONTHLY MEETING

B1. Welcome, and apologies for absence

B2. Minutes of Pedals meeting of 18 February 2008 and matters arising including:-
•	Pedals display and poster revamping 
•	Pedals membership records database reconstruction
•	Notts County Council cycling commitment and Cycle Working Group meeting postponement
•	Outcome of CTC appearance at Rights of Way informal hearing: Sanday’s Lane and Adbolton Lane and implications for revised A52 crossing arrangements at the Holme House junction.

B3. Newsletter:  Spring/summer newsletter plans and content

B4. Events / meetings including:-
•	‘Sprout’ launch, The Art Organisation, Carrington Street, Sun. 30 March.
•	East Midlands Cycling Forum meeting, Chesterfield, Sat. 5 April
•	Roundhill Primary School Cycling Event, Beeston, Sat. 12 April
•	Minute taker for 21 April Pedals meeting
•	Wed 18 June: Bike To Work Day Cyclists’ Breakfast, Old Market Square
•	Thurs 19 June: Ruddington Fields Business Park Cycling Event, Ruddington Country Park
•	Great Notts. Bike Ride,  Sunday 24 June
•	Ride and Stride (Notts. Historic Churches Bike Ride), Sat. 13 Sept.

B5. Newsletter:  Spring/summer newsletter plans and content

B6. Nottingham Cycling Towns bid to Cycling England.

B7. Cycle facility and traffic matters including:-
•	St, Mary’s Gate changes – bollards etc.
•	Pilcher Gate contraflow cycle lane: proposed changes
•	King Street environmental improvement scheme
•	Proposed cycle crossing: London Road / Meadows Way
•	Replacement foot and cycle bridge, Castle Marina
•	Broad Marsh cycle lockers changes
•	NEP article (25 Feb) re illegal traffic signs – my response.
•	John Lee: City Council request for ‘quick win’ cycling ideas
•	Ring Road cycling experiences
•	Experimental Right Turn Ban – Nottingham Road / Valley Road
•	Cycle lockers at Phoenix Park NET Park and Ride site.
•	Riverside path latest improvements
•	Attenborough to Long Eaton multi-user path signing
•	Cycling in Broxtowe Report to the Broxtowe Planning and Community Select Committee meeting on 19 March
•	Gedling Colliery redevelopment and access road plans
•	Sharp Hill (West Bridgford) – Landmere Lane Rights of Way claims by Rushcliffe Cllr. Rod Jones

B8.  Miscellaneous items
•	Bicycle to Work study – meeting with Norman James of the STAR Consultancy
•	bikes on NCT buses
•	Bike theft – article by Carlton Reid

B9. Any other business

BACKGROUND NOTES!
* means feedback especially wanted please
** means help please!

A1.  Welcome and apologies

Apologies for absence from
Mara Ozolins, John Wilson, Andrew Martin

A2. Minutes of the Pedals Annual General Meeting Held 19th March  2007 at The Globe PH
Present: Hugh McClintock, Susan Young, Peter Osborne, Andrew Martin, John Bannister, David Miller, Chris Gardner, Alison Russell and Jenny Kukan.

Apologies for absence: Arthur Williams, Mara Ozolins, John Wilson, Andrew Househam and Lawrence Geary (and, retrospectively, from Roy Wilson).

Chairman’s Annual Report.  This was discussed at length, in particular, the issue of anti-social cycling behaviour. Although there is little, if anything that Pedals can do about this problem, it was stressed that Pedals must disassociate itself from such behaviour. To this end, it was decided that our autumn meetings should include discussions with representatives of the Police, City Council, Nelsons and other relevant agencies to discuss what practical initiatives can be implemented to reduce anti-social cycling behaviour. 

The problem of lack of volunteers and declining membership was also discussed and the need to reverse this, particularly through getting people to distribute handier-sized leaflets to cycle shops and libraries, etc.

On a brighter note, work is under way on the much needed upgrading of the Pedals website and there are good prospects from the closer working with Ridewise and the Greater Nottingham Transport Partnership.

Finance. Finances are currently in good shape, however, there will be less income in future from publications and postage costs will again rise soon. It was suggested by Chris Gardner that many people now regard our membership rates as absurdly low and it was therefore decided to raise rates for new members (while maintaining current rates for  existing members). The new rates will be:
•	Concessions: £7 (up from £4.50)
•	Individual: £9 (up from £6.00)
•	Family: £12 (up from £8)

Owing to the practicalities associated with standard order administration, these new rates are likely to remain unchanged for the next five years. It is intended that the new rates will come into force when Pedals’ bank account is switched to the Co-Op. This should happen in time for the Great Notts Bike Ride in June. This information will appear in the next newsletter.
 
Office-holders: There were no nominations for election to office, so it was agreed that Hugh McClintock, Susan Young and Dave Morris should continue in their present roles as Chairman, Treasurer and Membership Secretary.

A3. Chairman’s Annual Report and discussion

PEDALS: CHAIRMAN’S ANNUAL REPORT, 2007-08

For many months now we have been rather diverted from what should be our main campaigning efforts by the need to sort out the ongoing problems with our membership records arising from the disappearance of our previous Membership Secretary and I must apologise for this. Indeed, I can well understand the view that I have been all too ready to shift the blame for all this upset and not to accept my responsibility for not preventing the situation arising in the first place or, at the very least to have nipped it in the bud when it the problem did become serious last autumn. I am very well aware that, to most people, it must seem totally unbelievable that I can seriously claim to have made an adequate determined effort to get in touch and sort this out on a face to face basis.

I must therefore take my full share of the blame for this appalling lapse in service to our members and for no doubt causing many of them to wonder what on earth had happened to Pedals and why we had become so lapse about communicating with them and trying to represent their interests. I can very well understand if they have now got the impression that we are totally inactive and ineffectual and that there is therefore no point in their continuing their membership!

I can also therefore well appreciate that, in the light of yet another such example of gross incompetence on my part you might well also now take the view that it is more than ever high time that I was replaced as Chairman by someone far more competent, diplomatic, and generally committed and effective. I have no wish to thwart this wish if that is indeed the case. This would also spare you from being bombarded with a spate of emails and long meeting agendas and the pretence that these amount to effective action, rather than just being a smokescreen to hide my lack of effectiveness and my endless contemptible excuses that “a lack of enough people” is a reasonable excuse for such ineffectiveness. I do fully realise that after many years of trotting out this lame excuse it is now wearing more than a little thin!

In complete contrast to this long record of utter incompetence on my part I must may tribute to several people who have played a much more positive and valuable role in the group in the last year. In addition to Susan Young’s continued tireless and dedicated work as Treasurer I must express great appreciation for all the work put in by Chris and Lyn Gardner as the new (joint) Membership Secretaries. They have done so much, taking over at short notice, towards reconstituting our membership records and putting the whole task on a much sounder footing, in close cooperation with Susan.

Another major turnaround in the last year has been the result of all the hard work put in by Larry Neylon in revamping and regularly updating our website. This is now much better as a campaigning and communication tool and we must encourage people to visit the site regularly and to contribute to its further improvement, updating and interactive potential.

I should also take this opportunity to pay due tribute to all the work over many years, indeed going back almost to when Pedals first started, of Lawrence Geary. Lawrence, regrettably, strongly objected to our decision at the AGM last year to raise the subscription as being “totally unjustified” and then decided that he would not be renewing his subscription after this year. However, in our regret at his decision, we should not forget his very important role in Pedals, particularly in relation to publications. 

Lawrence was responsible for editing the three editions of the Pedal Pushers’ Guide, between 1982 and 1999, and for maintaining stocks of these publications and the later two editions of the City County Forest book.  The success of each of these, and Lawrence’s very efficient stocktaking, has been very important for our finances. He has also had many other important roles in Pedals over the years, e.g. as Treasurer and later effectively as unofficial Vice-Chair, as well as our representative for several years on the Nottingham Green Partnership, responsible for installing cycle lockers in multi-storey car parks etc. We must warmly thank him for all his efforts and wish him all the best for the future.

Coming back to our present situation and the prospects for the future, there is much encouraging news to report, alongside the many detailed moans we can all come up with about particular road or cycle path layouts being far from ideal or the reports of poor driving and riding behaviour which, like sharks, are always lurking not far below the surface and ready to devour us!
Much of this better news is the result of our closer recent collaboration with Ridewise and Gary Smerdon-White in particular. Over the last year Gary has been very active in numerous ways on behalf of cyclists, using his extensive network of Ridewise and Greater Nottingham Transport Partnership contacts and knowledge to help act as a bridge between Pedals and the City Council, to raise the profile of cycling again with the City Council and to show them ways in which they can reverse their failure hitherto to achieve their Local Transport Plan target of increasing cycling.

Much of this work has been behind the scenes, e.g. on the whole area of school cycling, which Pedals has never seriously tackled, I confess. It is also very evident in the close partnership with Ridewise agreed as part of the Cycling England / Nottingham Primary Care Trust ‘Get Cycling Nottingham’ project now getting underway. 

Since last June Gary has been chairing regular meetings of the new Greater Nottingham Transport Partnership, including representation from regional levels of the CTC and Sustrans, as well as Pedals.  I am confident that the wide range of subjects discussed there will increasingly be reflected in a higher profile for cycling again in the City, whatever does or does not come of the current Cycling Town/City project bid to Cycling England and despite the disappointment last Spring of Nottingham’s bid not being among those shortlisted for the final round of the successful Sustrans Connect 2 Lottery funding bid. 

The Get Cycling Nottingham project, one of two national pilots, should help again to attract some national publicity for cycling in Nottingham, after many years when other places have been doing far more.  If, against much expected competition, the Cycling Towns bid does succeed, it may also help us to achieve our long cherished ambitions of getting projects like a local bike recycling centre and a secure ‘Bike Hub’ implemented.

My main concerns now are about the cycling commitment of the County Council, with the apparent considerable delay in replacing Ed Ducker as Cycling and Walking Officer, and their reluctance to play more than a minor part in the current project bid alongside the City Council.

In addition I have been becoming more and more concerned at the cycling commitment of Rushcliffe Borough Council which, for many years, from about 1995, was easily the most pro-cycling of the District Councils. I have been trying recently to get some wider support for reactivating this commitment, at a time when, I know, there is much wider new interest from other organisations in the Borough. Getting this turned round is not helped either by the apparent loss of momentum by the County Council or by the great problems in getting commitments for cycling schemes on Trunk Roads from the Highways Agency. Their role happens to be particularly key in the things we want to see happen in Rushcliffe, e.g. across and along the Outer Ring Road (A52). This declining interest is in contrast to that of Broxtowe Borough Council who now seem to be more supportive again, I might say.

These frustrations underline for me what I reckon is the golden rule of campaigning, never ever to allow yourself to be complacent or to take for granted what appears to be strong commitment to cycling! The same is also true about the always contentious matter of just how we best organise ourselves to deal with the increasing demands upon us and best organise our monthly meetings and other business arrangements. This we need to keep constantly under review.

Correct me if I am wrong but it seems that the clear feedback I get from most people is that they have no wish for more meetings (including sub-groups) or longer meetings and indeed several people clearly think that our meetings now are too long, particularly for those needing to get up early. I can well understand this but struggle with any feasible ideas for addressing these concerns when there is so much to discuss and sort out, both in terms of our internal activities and in terms of responding to the wide range of consultation letters and emails, and requests for help, which we regularly receive. I take it for granted that people would like me to handle making our responses in a reasonably democratic manner rather than just being dictatorial, to save time,  effort and pestering (though perhaps it does not always come over that way, I can quite appreciate!)

Many of the items on the agenda are ones that have been raised in emails some weeks before and which I have already circulated, either generally or to selected people who I think would have most interest in them. This, I think, helps to get some feedback on views in advance of meetings (at least from those on email, the great majority but with a few exceptions, I realise!). I think that this does help a bit to cut down on the length of time we need to spend discussing them at meetings, as does providing some background information, and summary of the issues, arising from other forms of correspondence, and reports of various meetings, etc. 

I also include a selection of some of the comments I have received on emails circulated earlier, to remind people of what the issues were in these and the opinions of other people on them. Again, I think that this does help a bit to cut down on the time we need to spend discussing things at meetings, unless there are really important new points to add, or the views of people who have not seen the emails  or had the background information.

However, I also well know, that this still means a lot of emails and long agendas for people to handle, even if they only glance at many and concentrate on the bits in which they have most interest. This may save time at meetings but at the cost of putting more demand on peoples’ limited time in advance of meetings! 

And, even with these, and my practice at meetings of only raising things that I, or others, think we most need to discuss, it is still very difficult to get the right balance between satisfying the conflicting opinions on the one hand of people who think that we should always move on after spending 5 minutes at the most on any one item and those who think that I am rushing through and not giving enough time for proper debate to do justice to the issues which are often quite complex (e.g. the implications for cyclists of the NET extension plans)

Our recent decision to allow more time for visiting speakers also in a sense adds to this dilemma. It is good to have more time for proper discussion, by several of us, not just me or one or two others, with a range of people we want to work with and influence. However it can, I know, also put more pressure on the time for regular business, even with our recent decision to drop the practice in the spring and summer of combining mini-rides on the same evening as business meetings. 

We still need to think carefully about how to get the balance right, including leaving some meetings for catching-up, or lengthier debates, without the constraints of following on after a visiting speaker. Just how do we get the balance right, taking account of the views of different people on how meetings should be run? I would much welcome further comments on how best to resolve these dilemmas

As well as taking the opportunity at the AGM to discuss these issues again, there are several other specific things affecting our business in the year ahead which we need to discuss. These include, as an immediate priority, how best to set about filling various longstanding vacant roles, e.g.:-

•	Secretary, 
•	Publicity Officer
•	Social Secretary 

Although we have had various people like Mara Ozolins and Peter Osborne volunteering to take minutes, which is certainly very important and much appreciated, we have now been without a Secretary as such for ten years!  The post of Social Secretary has in fact never filled, although it has often been agreed that we badly need such a person!  Others may disagree, I know, but I would maintain that these continuing vacancies do limit our effectiveness.

We also need now to be thinking ahead to our 30th birthday celebrations next year, generating ideas and agreeing which people are going to take them forward. So far these have included hosting the CTC/CCN Spring Cycle Campaigners’ Conference in May 2009 and organising some version of the successful Movers and Shakers’ Project pioneered in London by the Wandsworth Group of the London Cycling Campaign, with support from Transport for London. (see http://www.lcc.org.uk/index.asp?PageID=1066 for more details)

This Project was about reaching out to a wide range of influential people in the local community, giving them cycle training where they wanted it, and taking them out on bikes to get more appreciation of what it is like to cycle on a daily basis, particularly with regard to the interactions between cyclists and other road users. There is of course scope for other ideas as well and with a view to where we might want outside support, e.g. from The Big Wheel. In such cases we will have a good opportunity to discuss this further at our June meeting with Helen Clayton. However, we do need first to have some clear ideas of our own on what we want to go for and on just who is willing to be involved in planning and organising them.

Finally, I must express my warm appreciation for the efforts of all those who have helped in any way with Pedals activities during the past year. This includes minor as well as major roles, e.g. responding to request for comments, helping to man stalls at events, helping to distribute Membership Forms, stuffing and dispatching newsletters etc, all of which are vital tasks.

Hugh McClintock, March 2008

A4. Treasurer’s Report and discussion

Susan Young to report on the past year’s accounts.

Discounts at local cycle shops
Evans Cycles never responded to my approach to them last year, referred to their HQ by the local shop. Has anyone got any suggestions please on how we might best try again and just who to contact?

Policy on advertising on Pedals website: my exchange of emails with Susan Young and Larry Neylon (28 Feb):
“Hugh
Put it on the agenda for the AGM.
As we now have Adsence adverts on the website and are unlikely to raise much any other way, we may consider using the new style site for adverts relating to cycling and cyclists.
Susan 

From: Hugh McClintock (Dell) [mailto:Hugh.McClintock@ntlworld.com]
Sent: Thu 28/02/2008 14:14
To: Susan Young
Cc: Larry Neylon
Subject: Fw: advertising on Pedals website
Susan
I sending the reply to this message just now I drew on what I think has been our established practice, because of concerns about any advertising obscuring the main content, although I don’t think we have ever categorically discussed such a policy.
 
If you think we should reconsider let me know and I will put this on our next agenda.
Hugh
 
----- Original Message ----- 
From: andrea.sackley 
To: Hugh.McClintock@ntlworld.com 
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2008 8:18 PM
Subject: advertising on Pedals website

Hello
We would be interested in information with regards to advertising our friendly bed and breakfast on your site please. It is located in the Creuse Valley in Limousin, central France. Just 15 minutes from the start of stage 6 of the Tour de France in Aigurande. The local area is renowned for its excellent cycling, fishing and painting.

We are approx. 1 hour from Limoges airport which has direct flights from East Midlands airport. Our website address is www.vue-darbre.eu if you would be interested in having a look at it.
We look forward to hearing from you in due course.
Many thanks
John and Andrea Sackley

A5 Election of Office holders

No nominations received before the meeting.

Vacancies include:-
•	Secretary
•	Publicity Secretary
•	Social Secretary

Anyone interested in taking on any of these posts please?**

A6. Ideas for celebrating Pedals 30th birthday in 2009: exchange of messages involving myself, Andrew Martin and Andre Curtis (Chair, Cycle Campaigns Network):
“Andrew,
> At our last face to face meeting in London, it was agreed that whatever
> happens with the CTC decision on conferences, CCN would continue with two
> per year.   They may be in a slightly different format.  The discussions
> with CTC centred on whether they would continue to run two with us jointly
> or whether they would have a different second conference perhaps trying to
> bring in some of their other volunteer networks.  There has been no
> conclusion to that discussion yet.   The other thing that has been 
> discussed has been the idea of regional conferences and how they fit in with the
> national ones.
>
> Nottingham would be welcome to put in bid to host the next national
> conference, we can discuss at the next board.  Not sure if we have any 
> other bidders at present.
> Regards, Andre
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Andrew [mailto:andrew@veggies.org.uk]
> Sent: 27 February 2008 12:15
> To: GDNSFORALL@blueyonder.co.uk
> Cc: Hugh McClintock (Dell)
> Subject: (Fwd) Pedals 30th birthday celebrations in 2009 and possible C
>
> Andre
>I hope this finds you well. Please can you update me on current thinking regarding the conferences? I am happy for you to contact Hugh if you so wish.
> All the best, Andrew
>
> ------- Forwarded message follows -------
> From:           "Hugh McClintock (Dell)"
> <Hugh.McClintock@ntlworld.com>
> To:             "Andrew Martin" <andrew@veggies.org.uk>
> Subject:        Pedals 30th birthday celebrations in 2009 and
> possible CCN-CTC Campaigners' Conference
> Date sent:      Sun, 24 Feb 2008 18:43:45 -0000
>
> Andrew
> I want at our next Pedals meeting (AGM) to have some discussion about
> possible ideas for celebrating Pedals 30th birthday next year including your suggestion that we (and the local CTC) host the Spring (or Autumn) Campaigners' Conference.
>
> When I happened to mention this to Andre Curtis some months ago (at the CCN-CTC
> autumn meeting in Oxford in November, I think it must have been) he said that there was some
> discussion about in future having only one national campaigners' conference and using the 
> other slot to have an enhanced regional event, to help encourage possible new campaigners' groups in areas where none now existed, e.g. Exeter.
>
> Do you know if there has been any further discussion about this and, if so, how
> it might affect, the attitude to offers from Pedals (and other local campaign groups) to host
> future events? It would be useful to know the exact position before we discuss this further.
> Hugh

Possible Movers and Shakers Project – comments of 12 March from Susie Morrow of the Wandsworth Group of the London Cycling Campaign who first developed the idea:
“Hi Hugh, 
Thanks for this - I'd love to see Movers and Shakers taken up more widely!  
For anyone who wants to know more, also worth having a look at the project 
website: www.movers-shakers.btik.com 

I think I may have mentioned in an earlier email that we're using the 
remaining M&S funds to target local councillors (and currently have two of 
the signed up). 
Best wishes, Susie”

A7. Any other AGM business.

(15-minute break – food available!)

AGENDA FOR MARCH MONTHLY MEETING

B1. Welcome, and apologies for absence

Apologies for absence from
Mara Ozolins, John Wilson, Andrew Martin

B2. Minutes of Pedals meeting of 18 February 2008 and matters arising including:-

Present: Hugh McClintock, Peter Osborne, David Miller, Alison Russell,   Andrew Martin, Susan Young, Terry Scott, Rob Murray, Arthur Williams, Roger Codling, Chris Gardner, Dave Clark, Elizabeth Kirk and Helen Ross (Nottingham City Council).

Apologies for Absence: Mara Ozolins, John Wilson, John Bannister, Andrew Househan and  Karina Wells.

Speaker on the Get Cycling Nottingham Project. Helen Ross (Nottingham PCT) gave a Powerpoint presentation on the Get Cycling Nottingham project. Helen outlined the Cycling and Health Pilot Projects (CHIPPS) programme, the aim of which is to demonstrate how Primary Care Trusts (PCT’s) can promote cycling effectively by developing a package of measures in Nottingham to promote cycling and health. For more details see the lead article in the Winter 2008 newsletter “Get Cycling Nottingham”. The presentation was followed by a discussion during which it was suggested that Pedals could help this project by supplying “bike buddies”, advice on cycle purchase and referrals.

Finance. Susan will present the financial situation in detail at the AGM. 

Membership. No further news from Dave Morris. Membership administration problems will be discussed in more detail in March’s AGM. Several people should have back up copies of member addresses (NOT bank details).  It was also suggested that a policy should be drawn up to deal with a situation in which a Pedals officer leaves his/ her post suddenly and unexpectedly. Leftover newsletters will be left at cycle shops and stalls to help sort out the membership problems.

Newsletter. A reserve back up newsletter producer is required for if/when Derek Hankey is no longer able to continue its production. This will require some training and familiarity with software.

Data Projector. Pedals can hire this for £50 a year from Rushcliffe. So it is free for the rest of the year as we have already paid this for previous hirings.

City Council Online Highway Defect Reporting Performance. Anyone reporting a defect to this website now gets an acknowledgement number as feed back.

Rushcliffe Borough Council Cycling Commitment. There are currently two Lib Dem councillors, one Labour councillor, and two Green councillors who are sympathetic towards cycling. Pedals need to cultivate relationships with these people to reinforce new approaches Hugh was making to the Chief Executive Officer etc.

Ed Ducker. No replacement yet for Ed (former County Council Cycling Officer). This post recently suffered a substantial pay cut so is probably not much of a priority for the Council. Hugh is trying to chase this, emphasising the danger of a possible loss of momentum on cycling if the post is not filled soon.

Industrial Estate between Bradmore and Bunny. An industrial estate is appearing, Chris Gardner reported. Pedals need to find out what cycling provision there will be, to link in with the ideas for improving cycle access to and from Ruddington Fields Business Park, to be discussed at a special meeting on 10 March.

Abbey Bridge (Lenton). The new cycle lanes are OK except that they fizzle out at each end. Fortunately there is not much parking in the area.

East-West through the City Centre. It is proposed to restrict access to Broadway area using automatic bollards between 6.30pm and 6.00 am everyday. This will improve the area foe cyclists and pedestrians. Cyclists will be able to cross the centre east to west legally from Pilcher Gate to Goose Gate.

Nottingham University West Entrance Roundabout. The Woodside Road approach is very busy and can be dangerous for cyclists, as Robin Phillips recently pointed out. Some “THINK BIKE” cyclist warning signs (and clearer road markings) are required here, it was suggested.

Gedling (Burton Road) Bus Plug. Cyclists have definitely benefited from this scheme, it was agreed. A proposed new access road (to the Gedling Colliery site) in the area will reduce pressure on Shearing Hill. Hugh to write to Sakis Theodopoulos at the County Council restating our support.

Housing Projects in Rushcliffe. Many of these are appearing in the near future. Pedals need to make sure there will be adequate cycle provision for these projects.

Cycle Parking West Bridgford. Pedals should be campaigning for more secure cycle parking in West Bridgford, further to the new planned NCT bus services in the area. Could Karina survey people during her event in June?

Cattle Market Road and London Road. A cycle crossing is to be put in and traffic light filtering will be changed. This should be a big improvement for cyclists. Dave Clark is keeping an eye on this.

Pedals Display. Chris, Andrew and Hugh will be meeting soon to sort this out. (Currently held at Chris’ place). 

Olympic Cycles near the City Hospital has closed down.

Update:

Get Cycling Nottingham Project (Cycling and Health):
I met Musat Basaran, the newly appointed Project Officer, when I attended the GCN Steering Committee meeting in 28 February and invited him to come along soon to a Pedals meeting to introduce himself. I am not yet sure if he will be coming along to this meeting or a later one, as he is giving priority to making contacts in the Nottingham PCT and health circles.

Pedals display updating:
Chris, Andrew and I met on 5 March to discuss plans for this and agreed then to meet on 26 March to finish the job. Larry Neylon has managed to persuade a graphic designer friend of his, Ian Stewart, to do a revamp of the Pedals poster, first designed by John Clark (who has been quite ill recently, I gather). Many thanks to Larry and Ian for arranging this. Many thanks also to Chris and Andrew for their help with the updating which should be finished at a further meeting on 26th March, in time for use at the Art Organisation on Carrington Street on Sunday 30th (afternoon)

We badly need new membership forms printing as we are having to make do with limited supplies of the older ones, each modified with the new membership sec details. They all still have our old bank account details. How many do we need?**

Pedals membership records database reconstruction
The last but one Membership Secretary, Stuart Greenfield (2001-2003) go to hear of our plight and, with help from Howard Gill (husband of Stuart’s predecessor as Membership Secretary, Sarah Gill) has managed to recover his records from 5-6 years ago, providing more valuable records that may be of use to Chris in rebuilding of our records. Very many thanks to Stuart and Howard for this.

Thanks also to Lawrence Geary who has given me and Chris details of addresses in Ladybay to which he used to deliver newsletters by hand, but not for the last two issues of the newsletter.

Notts CC cycling commitment: replacement Cycling Officer and new date for cancelled Jan Cycle Working Group meeting – my exchange of emails with Gary Wood (who was Line Manager for Gary Wood:
“Gary 
What is the current position please re getting a replacement for Ed Ducker as Cycling and Walking Officer for the County Council? 
  
It would be helpful if you could give me some indication please of how far the process has got and the likely future timescale, as Pedals is becoming concerned at the possible loss of momentum in County Council cycling work. 
  
On a related point we would also be glad to know please if a new date has yet been fixed for the recently cancelled Highways South Cycle Working Group? We think that these regular meetings are very important for exchanging views and reviewing progress on a range of cycling matters and are again concerned that too long a gap since the last one will soon have an increasingly serious effect on the continuation of the County Council's cycling work. 
Hugh”

…Gary Wood’s response of 21 Feb:
““Dear Hugh 
I cannot give you an exact timescale for replacement of the Cycling and Walking officer at the present moment. 

I can say that we are working to get someone in post as quickly as possible. As you are probably aware there have been some issues regarding the proposed pay with this post following National Job Evaluation and I am working to achieve a level of pay for the post so that we get suitable candidates when advertised. 

We are currently working through the necessary internal procedures to be able to advertise the post shortly. It is important we get the right calibre of staff to take cycling and walking forward and keep it firmly on the overall agenda. 

I note Pedals concern about possible loss of momentum - although I am not sure of any evidence for this and certainly not aware of anything that has been delayed or cancelled other than the cycle working group. 

No new date for the South Working Group as yet. If no appointment is made in the next 6 weeks then we will look to restart without the new cycling officer present 

Any specific concerns you have from your membership or yourself please feel free to pass to me. 
Happy to discuss 
Regards, Gary 
Gary Wood
Service Manager Policies and Standards
Communities Department
Nottinghamshire County Council
T 0115 9774575

…and my response to him:
“Gary
Thanks for your prompt reply.
 
The Cycle Working Group meetings provide a very useful regular opportunity to review progress on a range of schemes, to make comments on recent and proposed changes etc, and to assess how far more coordination between different organisations, including Pedals, the District Councils and Highways Agency, etc. to help progress things.
 
During the last year Pedals produced a series of consolidated 'wish lists', at the request of Paul Hillier and Ed Ducker, and these included Gedling, Rushcliffe and the vicinity of the Ruddington Fields Business Park. Although we are glad to learn that a special meeting to consider the latter of these, coordinated by Claire Fleming, is still going ahead, on 10 March, we are concerned that there appears to have been little follow up on the others, and this reflects our more general concern at the possible slowing down of momentum on cycling work at a time when we are very conscious of wider growing interest in  cycling, e.g. in the Rushcliffe area, from parish councils and other local groups we have been in touch with in Tollerton, Keyworth, etc. and from major employers or groups of employers, including BGS Keyworth as well as Ruddington Fields Business Park. 
 
It is also very important in progressing ideas to meet these concerns that we step up efforts to get commitment from the Highways Agency, given the particular importance of improving cycle access along and across the Ring Road (A52T), between Clifton Bridge and Tollerton etc. AMScott used to attend the CWG meetings but have not done so far a couple of years, as far as I recall, and this apparent neglect of cycling needs also to tackled as a matter of priority, with the County Council and Rushcliffe and other District Councils.
Hugh”

…and comments from Paul Hillier, Notts CC, 21 Feb:
“Hugh,
just to follow up on Gary's comments, the wishlists produced for each of the districts remain "live" and important documents. Having undertaken the exercises, all that remains is to work these wish lists into the ITM programme of works. However, the budgets we have available don't allow us to undertake all of these schemes as soon as we'd like.
 
Any delay in taking them forward is purely due to the financial constraints we have placed upon us, and is in no way affected by the current vacancy.
 
I hope this helps to reassure you.
Regards, Paul Hillier
Local Transport Plan Officer (Greater Nottingham)
Nottinghamshire County Council
Tel: 0115 977 4866  Fax: 0115 977 4054

junction of the A52T (Holme House) and Sanday's Lane: action following Inspector's decision on modification orders: my message of 2 March to Jeremy Dixon of AMScott (Managing Agents for the Highways Agency – Area 7)
Jeremy
Now that the Inspector's Report (ref. FPS/L3055/7/36) on the recent public inquiry into the Modification Orders for Sanday's Lane and Holme Lane (Holme Pierrepont) has been published (decision date: 26 Feb 2008) and that the Order (subject to modifications that require advertising) are to be confirmed, Pedals would like to suggest that the need to develop and maintain a clear safe and coherent link across the A52T at the Holme House junction between Sanday's Lane and the shared path between Stragglethorpe and Cotgrave is fully considered in the changes at this junction that, we understand, will now need to be made in the light of the Inspector's decision about the adjoining rights of way.
 
We also would urge the importance, as part of this, of ensuring that adequate and coherent cycle direction signs are installed to make clear the existence of the new legal right of way, to complement the existing signs on the various cycle facilities at and near this junction.
best wishes
Hugh

B3. Finance (including policy on commercial advertising on the Pedals website)

comments from Larry Neylon re Pedalite advertising and possible Evans Cycles discounts for Pedals members:
“----- Original Message ----- 
From: Larry Neylon 
To: 'Hugh McClintock (Dell)' ; 'Susan Young' 
Cc: 'Andrew Martin' ; 'Karina Wells' 
Sent: Thursday, February 28, 2008 8:50 PM
Subject: RE: Pedalite Products: Discount for staff - and Pedals members?

Hi all,
Sorry I’ve not replied to anything.  I’ve had a mad week with work.  I don’t think they comprehend the fact that I’ve also got a 10 week old baby at home.

My feelings on the Pedalite issue is to take some wider soundings.  As per your mails today, we don’t want Pedals to become a shop-front, but if there are a few members interested then I’d go for it.  Not convinced by the flashing pedals myself.

I’d follow up on the Evans thing as general cycle shop discounts would be useful to all members I’d imagine.  There’s an Admin number for head office on their website, which might be a good start.  Be aware that I did read in the Guardian business bit that Halfords were sniffing round Evans, and I’m not sure about being linked with them, even though I did get my bike from them (It was dead cheap – honest).
Cheers, Larry.

From: Hugh McClintock (Dell) [mailto:Hugh.McClintock@ntlworld.com] 
Sent: 21 February 2008 12:43
To: Susan Young; Larry Neylon
Cc: Andrew Martin; Karina Wells
Subject: Fw: Pedalite Products: Discount for staff - and Pedals members?

Susan
Larry
Karina Wells rang me this morning to say that, following this email, she has been in touch with Pedalite to arrange a display at the West Bridgford Summer Gathering she is organising on Saturday 8 June. She mentioned to them that she is involved in Pedals and they said that they would be happy to arrange a 10% discount for Pedals members if we included information on our website.
 
Do you think we should take this up and then publicise it to members in the next newsletter etc.?
Hugh
 
PS. At last June's Cycle to Work Day I got talking to one of the mechanics on duty at the Evans Cycles stand who said that he was a Pedals member and who asked if we wanted to arrange discounts for Pedals members at their shop. When I said yes, he suggested I contact the Manager to discuss this. I called in to see him a few days later and he said I should contact their HQ in Gravesend or somewhere around there but never heard any more. I wonder if we should try again to revive this approach but would need a definite name to approach to have any hope of being more successful next time!

B4. Forthcoming meetings / events

Sprout Launch, Sunday 30 March (2-6 p.m), The Art Organisation, Carrington Street – invitation to Pedals from Aran Eales, The Partnership Council

“Dear Pedals,
    Hopefully by now you will have heard of SPROUT, the new environmental
initiative run by the Partnership Council in Nottingham. The aim of the
scheme is to encourage and support young people (aged 16- 25) in running
their own environmental projects. We will also be organising a range of
events with an environmental focus for young people to get involved with
as volunteers.

    The scheme is being run by The Partnership Council, a charity based in
Hyson Green with ten years experience of working with the local community -
for more information please visit www.partnershipcouncil.co.uk
http://www.partnershipcouncil.co.uk/. This programme is being funded by
vinvolved, the national youth volunteering programme with some events and
work having been sponsored by Neighbourhood Development Company (NDC). We
have secured funding for three years guaranteeing that the scheme will run
until March 2011.

     The type of environmental projects SPROUT will be supporting is very
broad: The Volunteering projects could range from practical projects -
converting derelict spaces into community gardens to campaigns in raising
awareness about climate change or art workshops using recycled materials.
SPROUT will help to make the projects happen by providing support, advice,
resources and small funds for project related costs, and help volunteers
continue their development post-SPROUT.

    To launch SPROUT in full, we'll be running a day long event on the
30th of March at the Art Organisation, on Station Street, from  2-6pm. 
The aim is to get young people along and show them what environmental
organisations and projects are active in Nottingham, tell them about
Sprout, and encourage them to take on an environmental project that
involves volunteers.  

    So far, the day will include a bike fixing workshop, advice on energy
efficiency in the home, hanging basket planting, and a variety of other
stalls/workshops of an environmental theme.  We were hoping to have a
stall promoting cycle useage in the city, as well as bike fixing workshop,
and wondered whether you or anyone from your organisation would be
interested in holding a stall?  It could range from handing out leaflets
with information about the benefits of cycling to information about what
your organisation does.  

    The event would be a great chance for you to raise awareness of your
organisation, as well as informing people about the benefits of cycling.

     If you're interested in holding a stall, or if you know of anyone
that may be interested in what Sprout has to offer, please get in touch
with us here at the Partnership Council.

   All the best, The Sprout Team (Aran Eales, Rachel Wicks, Matt Whitney)
The Partnership Council,
47 Gregory Boulevard,
Hyson Green,
NOTTINGHAM.
NG7 5JA
Rachel@partnershipcouncil.co.uk 
0115 9708200

PS. (28 Feb). Dave Clark has said he will be able to help with this. Who else can help please?**
PPS. I recently meet Aran Beale from the Art Organisation who told me that there are several other keen cyclists as well as him who are involved there. They have discussed starting a Paris-type Velib public bike hire scheme, to be based there. I told him about the proposed Secure Bike Compound across the Road in the old Milk Dock area of the Station and thought that the two ideas could perhaps be linked.

PPS.  Copy of my message of 9 March to Gary Smerdon-White about this:
“I met Aran Eale from the Art Organisation on Station Street at yesterday's Transition Nottingham meeting to discuss the impact of the 'peak oil' debate on future transport and he mentioned that he and several other people who work there are very keen cyclists. (Pedals has already agreed to have a display at the event they are holding there on 30 March, as mentioned in the message below).
 
He also told me that they have discussed the idea of starting a public bike hire scheme (along the lines of the Paris Velib scheme which of course London is now to introduce a version of by 2010). I mentioned that such a scheme, even on just a small scale (initially at least!) could very well complement the proposed Secure Bike Compound just across the road in the old Milk Dock area at the Station.
 
I also told him about the Cycling Town bid and have now sent him details. He was also very interested in this and also in other ideas we have been discussing such as the Bike Hub and local bike recycling scheme as well as the Get Cycling Nottingham project
 
Lots of scope for taking this further, I think!
Hugh

Cycle Event, Roundhill School, Beeston, 12 April; messages from Adrian Pugh (29 Jan and 3 March:
“Hugh,
I wonder if you can help.

We are organising a year of cycling at my children’s school, Round Hill Junior, in Beeston. There are two main events:

A group of parents will ride to Paris (we are paying for ourselves and raising sponsorship)
The children (some 500 of them!) will be asked to ride the equivalent distance on April 12th.

It is the second event we wondered if Pedals had any ideas about. Most of the children’s riding will be around the school playing fields and so it should be a big carnival kind of day. We have some parents ready to do some bike maintenance and refurbishment (for resale) but we wondered if we could get any more stalls/attractions on the theme of encouraging cycling. Any thoughts or contacts?
Adrian

PS. (3 March): 
“Hugh
Was there any news from the Pedals meeting about a presence at The Round Hill School cycling day? The event is growing apace and we would like to make space for you.
Adrian

Minute taker for 21 April Pedals meeting
Peter Osborn will be away for the next meeting so can someone else please volunteer to take the minutes then?**

East Midlands Cycling Forum meeting, Chesterfield, Sat. 5 May (11.00-5 p.m.)
I have already emailed details of this event. Who is interested in going please?**

Bike to Work Day Cyclists’ Breakfast, Old Market Square, Wed 18 June:
I gather that the date for this is now fixed. Again there will be scope for a Pedals stall.

Ruddington Fields Business Park cycling promotion event, Ruddington Country Park,  Thursday 19 June:
The date was fixed at the special meeting on cycling of the Ruddington Fields Transport Group on 10 March. Who please can help man a Pedals display?**

Great Notts. Bike Ride, Sunday 24 June
Melanie Berry of Perfect Motion, who are managing the event this year, tells me that they plan a Press Launch on 2 April.

2008 Historic Churches Bike Ride – message of 14 ~Feb from Mike Elliott, Notts. Organiser

Dear Hugh
The 2008 Ride and Stride will take place on September 13, 2008 (Saturday) and will be between the hours of 10am and 6pm. 

We are shortly going to send out the invitation letters to Churches and Chapels in Nottinghamshire and all the publicity and materials will be available in early July when we know how many buildings will be on the list of Participating Churches.

I trust that you will be able to raise a good team of cyclists to take part in 2008 and any information you need and assistance would always be available to you from us, just let me know please if there is anything we can do to help. 

We are always looking for people to take part and help the raising of funds and your help is very much appreciated. I will send you an invitation letter when they all go out so that you have a copy of what we ask from churches to do.

Thank you for your continuing interest in the event.
Kind regards, Mike

B5. Newsletter:  Spring/summer newsletter plans and content

I shall need contributions please by Monday 21 April at the latest.**

B6. New round of Cycling England Cycling Demonstration Towns - appeal for ideas for Nottingham bid – responses to my email of 27 Feb:

Cycling England has now given more information (see link below) of what they want to see in the next round of the Cycling Demonstration Town / Cycling Town projects (and one 'Cycling City') following on from the successful first round implemented over the last 3 years in various places including Derby, Bedford, Aylesbury, Brighton, Exeter and Lancaster.

Nottingham City Council (as well as Leicester and Derby, again) is intending to put in a bid for one of these (as mentioned briefly in yesterday's NEP) before the deadline of 31 March. We will be discussing this at the next meeting of the Greater Nottm Cycling Development Group, chaired by Gary Smerdon-White, on Thursday 13 March, and both Gary and I would welcome suggestions before then (and preferably before Thursday 6 March) as to what should be included and in line with the criteria laid down by Cycling England. As well as having very broad political and partner support (including from the PCT and local campaign group and businesses, etc.) this 
includes having a particular focus, e.g. on promoting cycling to certain (social and/or ethnic) groups, or in certain (more deprived) areas, or perhaps along a particular cycling 

Rather disappointingly I understand that Notts County Council have decided not to be involved in this bid. This is a great pity but perhaps not surprising in view of their current lack of a cycling officer in post, since the departure before Christmas of Ed Ducker. This does rather aggravate my concerns about the possible loss of cycling momentum with the County Council if this post is not filled soon, as I mentioned at the last Pedals meeting.

There will also be an opportunity to discuss this bid at the next Pedals meeting, on Monday 19th March.

I have also agreed then to give a brief slot to the new 'Get Cycling Nottingham' (Cycling England / Nottingham PCT / Ridewise) cycling and health

project coordinator, Murat Basaran, who started work at the beginning of this week, and whom I met at this morning's GCN Steering Committee meeting. He is based on the Ridewise offices (c/o Groundwork Greater Nottingham) and is very keen to establish early contact with all the organisations involved. 
Hugh

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Roger Geffen" <roger.geffen@ctc.org.uk>
To: <cycle-planning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Friday, February 22, 2008 4:27 PM
Subject: [cycle-planning] Cycle Demonstration Towns - support from CTC

Dear all
As you will hopefully be aware by now, Cycling England has now formally
invited local authorities in England to submit bids for the funding to
create Cycling Demonstration Towns (CDTs).  For more info, see
http://www.cyclingengland.co.uk/demotowns.php.

CTC has strongly welcomed the funding announcement.  We are particularly
pleased that the "pre-requisites" for CDT bids (see p10 of the
"Information for Bidders" document,
http://www.cyclingengland.co.uk/documents/CyclingTownsCities-Information
forBidders08.pdf) are closely aligned with our own campaigning
objectives.

CTC is keen to work with local authorities who are working up bids for
CDT status.  Information about the support available from CTC is at
http://www.ctc.org.uk/DesktopDefault.aspx?TabID=4973.

…response from Karina Wells (28 Feb):
“Dear Hugh,
Great to see that Nottingham city council is intending to put a bid in for
the Cycling England award. Am I wrong in thinking that it is the County
Council who actually decides on highways and cycling paths schemes? Does
this bid not need the OK from CC to be effective?

Nottingham has made it clear that they are serious about trying to reduce
car use in the city. Workplace Parking levy, car free around the market
square, spending millions on putting trams in areas where there are lots of
students and in deprived areas, to name but a few. Even so, there are still
too many cars blocking our roads and it is not getting better.

If we want to reduce traffic, pollution, road expansion schemes, cost of
maintenance and repair of our road infra structure, we need to target a
different group of people than the one is usually focused on.  Various
amounts of funding are already being given for regeneration schemes in the
city but who are the big car owners? They tend to be the more affluent
people.

Personally I would feel that getting finance to create a safe 'corridor' to
encourage people living and working close to the 'corridor' to use bikes
more, is the way forward. This approach would benefit ALL people in
Nottingham not just some of the minority groups. So money would potentially
be well spend and used by a very large proportion of the population.

Also, over the past so many years Pedals have put forward a wealth of ideas
on how to pull together individual cycling routes and many suggestions have
not been taken up and or they are still sitting somewhere on a desk or
filing cabinet. I see from their website that Cycling England would like to
see action being put into place fairly soon. as you have already put in
enormous amounts of hard work, had hundreds of meetings and made 'useful'
contacts etc, why start from scratch, make use of this opportunity and join
all the ideas put forward in the past and incorporate them into the schemes
that already are being done or in the pipeline and present that as the
scheme for which Nottingham needs the money.

You can show that there are already numerous good cycling routes surrounding
Nottingham city which can then be linked up, making it a truly comprehensive
scheme with an even further reaching public.

There are plenty of groups like STAR and PCT etc who are getting funding to
get the deprived and unhealthy people on their bikes, but what is the use of
owning bikes, spending loads of time and money on scores of groups, local
government scheme workers involved to help the deprived if the
infrastructure is not considered to be safe and comprehensive enough?

Did you see Tuesday's programme. The Woman who stopped the traffic?
It showed how so many parents and children use cars (even for very short
distances less than 1 mile) when a bike could bring them to school much
quicker. The programme showed as well that many of the more affluent people
could and would leave cars at home and go by bike instead  (after some great
persuasion) to take children to school, shop locally and go to work as long
as it is safe and easy. It would be interesting to see if next week's
programme will be as positive (she will go to the less affluent places). It
might be good for Norman to watch the program.

Having funding from organisations like Cycling England could be a great
opportunity to get infra structure in place so that the future generations
in Nottingham can benefit from a healthier and safer life style.

It is a shame that the Highways people can't see that there is a link
between less cars on the road and huge cost savings on maintenance and
repair and less need for road expansion. I suppose it could be a difficult
concept to grasp for some. 

A bit long, but I hope it is of use to you
Regards, Karina”

PS. Point of clarification re one comment in Karina’s message: since 1998 Nottingham City Council, not the County Council, has been the Local Highway for the City, so does not need the County Council’s approval for cycling and other highway schemes.

…comment from Gary Smerdon-White (28 Feb):
“To clarify. A bid will be prepared by Nottingham City but I understand the County will be a partner and will be involved in investigation and consultation leading to the bid.”
Gary

…Nottingham Cycling Towns bid: further message from Gary Smerdon-White (4 March):
“From: Hugh McClintock (Dell) [mailto:Hugh.McClintock@ntlworld.com] 
Sent: 04 March 2008 11:39; 
Subject: Fw: Nottingham - Cycling Town Bid - request for comments on key questions
“Dear all
I mentioned this bid a few days ago and am now circulating a further message on the subject and appeal for suggestions and comments on some key questions, from Gary Smerdon-White. Things are now moving on fairly rapidly with this and there is a tight deadline for the whole bid to be finalised and submitted to Cycling England by 31 March.
 
My previous message about this elicited only one response, from Karina Wells, so I hope that we get more now. I appreciate that the message takes some digesting but it would be very helpful for me in formulating a more widely-based Pedals response to  have some more feedback within the next day or two please, if at possible and at the latest by the time of the Cycling Development Group meeting (chaired by Gary) on Wednesday 13th. Since I expect to be discussing it further on the phone with Gary and Dave Barthorpe well before then any comments before then would particularly be appreciated please!
Thanks, Hugh”
 
----- Original Message ----- 
From: gary 
To: helenv@nottinghamcvs.co.uk ; 'Helen Ross (E-mail)' ; 'Hugh McClintock (Dell)' ; 'John Cutler' ; 'Dodsley Paul' ; 'John Dowson' ; 'Rooke, Andy, TInsp2287' ; Karen O'Brien ; 'Doar, Rachel' ; 'Kevin Sharman' ; steven.bailey@CTC.ORG.UK ; 'Helen Clayton' ; 'Mike Madin' ; 'Matt Jones' ; 'Nicola jones' ; chris.roy@ntu.ac.uk 
Cc: Dave Barthorpe 
Sent: Tuesday, March 04, 2008 9:21 AM
Subject: Nottingham - Cycling Town Bid

Dear Colleague
Cycling England recently invited bids from local authorities for the creation of up to an additional ten Cycling Towns (CT) and one Cycling City. A CT is one that seeks to create an exemplary cycling environment that will help to make a transformational change in behaviour and local culture towards cycling. Six initial Cycling (Demonstration) Towns, including Derby were nominated a few years ago and the impact of their initiatives on cycling levels has been very impressive. 

Significant funding is available for successful bidders – a total of £47million is available over a three year period (starting 2008-09). Whilst any funds awarded will have to be at least 100% matched, taken together this represents a real opportunity for Nottingham to make a real impact on the levels of cycling around the city, thus providing its citizens and organisations with health, environment and congestion related benefits. Cycling England have also stated their intention, subject to continued funding by DfT beyond 2010-11, to continue to support Cycling Towns and Cities as they recognise the importance of measures over the long term in cementing changes in attitudes and behaviours. 

 CE funds are available for a wide range of forward looking initiatives that will help make the required difference and these can be for a mix of hard measures (such as cycle paths and parking / security facilities) and also soft measures (such as promotion, training and cycling schemes for specific target groups). Thus funds can support capital investment as well as revenue funding, so long as it is clearly aimed at increasing the number of cycle trips in and around the city.

Myself and my associate David Barthorpe have been engaged by the City Council to work with partners to develop a bid for them. 

Whilst the timescales to develop a bid are quite challenging (bid to be complete by 31st March 2008!), it is essential to gain some input from key stakeholders and this note is to ask you to be involved in considering some potential options for inclusion within the City Council’s bid. The process we would like to go through can be summarised as follows:

 A.      Issue a few key questions to you that we hope will help you think
through what we required from you to help us develop the bid – these questions are included below. 

B.      Send us an email asap (to David and me please) with a couple of
alternative times (or periods) when one of us may contact you by phone to have a discussion with you around these questions for 30-45 minutes maximum.
The latest time that we would like this discussion to take place is by midday on Wednesday 12th March and the only time between now and then when both of us are unavailable is on Tuesday 11th March.

C.      We will summarise the outcome of all of these discussions, along with our parallel discussions with the City Council and invite you to debate them in a group setting during a meeting of the Nottingham Cycling Development Group on Thursday 13th March at the Council’s Exchange Buildings. I have included an hour on the CDG’s meeting agenda for this to be discussed and so if you are not already a member of the CDG, you are warmly invited to attend this meeting at 2.30pm. Please let me know if you will be attending.

D.      The outputs from the discussion on the 13th will be considered by the City Council soon afterwards, so that key decisions can be made on the main elements of the bid.

E.      It is possible that we may ask for some minor involvement during the latter stages of developing the bid. If so, this would be from w/c 17 March onwards but I emphasise this would be on an ad-hoc basis only and not in any way that makes a significant call upon your time. Finally…

F.      We will be doing a presentation of the key content of the bid on Thursday 27th March at 2pm for one hour or so, to which you are also invited. 

A bid is likely to have a greater chance of success if there is a focus on no more than three key themes. Cycling England are looking for a clear vision about what we trying to achieve and whilst ideally we may want to achieve a wide range of objectives, we have recognised that there will be a strong set of  competing bids and therefore when making comparisons, clarity of focus will be important.  

The themes do not have to follow a strict definition and (purely as illustrative examples) could be defined as one of the following:
*       Addressing cycling in a particular geographic area or radial route –
for instance route infrastructure / cycle parking / promotion / et al (and any combination of these),

*       Addressing cycling for a particular target group of the city’s
population – for instance by age group / health condition group / activity level group / et al

 What we are seeking to avoid is to be viewed as doing “a bit of everything” as this will inevitably mean spreading the resources relatively thinly and it will not present the bold and visionary approach that CE are looking for - We do not see a realistic chance of success without being prepared to make some clearly prioritised choices.
 
Therefore the questions we would like you to consider are:

1.       What key themes (your own definition) would you like to see addressed by the bid and why?

2.       If you were given the authority to direct investment of c. £1-2 million per year for each of three years (this is only approximate to help you get a good feel for the potential scale and scope), in very rough terms, how might you invest it to address your key themes?

3.       How would you measure the impact of the investment i.e. what target indicators might be affected and (roughly) by how much compared to the position pre-investment?

4.       Who would be the critically important participants in ensuring a programme would be successful and conversely, what do you see as the main risks or obstacles to be overcome?

I hope you are able and willing to help us develop a strong bid for what is undoubtedly an exciting opportunity to increase cycling around the city and look forward to you letting us know when we can ring you to discuss your thoughts. In the meantime, please feel free to contact either of us if anything is unclear or you want to know more.
Gary SW, 07860 311412
David Barthorpe, 07802871392”

…and comments from Susan Young (4 March):
“Hi
I would like to see more joined unless and routes linking together with major employers and shopping areas. This should help most people, especially if concentrated on Sneinton and St Anne's round to Forest Fields, Hyson Green, Radford and Lenton were the areas concentrated on. These are the more deprived areas of the city with some decent cycle facilities already. Looking at improving links to areas of recreation, decent cheaper shops (preferably not just expensive mainstream supermarkets) and some major employers, combined with cycle training and access to cheap bikes in these areas may help improve the feeling of isolation and food poverty many seem to be experiencing.
With regard to shops, there are loads, especially Asian run stores in Forest Fields / Hyson Green / Sneinton where you can get fresh veg and some staples at good prices.
 
Obviously the whole area cannot be covered, but there are initiatives in some parts to build on and 'missing links' can be a deterrent. Using places local people already congregate in such as the Chase in St. Anne’s may be a way of getting people already looking for more to get cycling and this will hopefully spread to others around when they see how simple changes can improve lives.
Susan

…and from Ian Cohen (4 March)
“Hi Both,
It occurs to me that this is an ideal opportunity to move the bike recycling project forward, linking it in to all the issues around focussing on the needs of the deprived inner city communities that Susan Young has referred to in her response earlier today.

I think Gary, that you already have a fairly clear idea of what a bike recycling project involves and what the issues and opportunities are but if you feel that you need any further information, especially around the aspects relating to employability and skills training (for both unemployed adults and disengaged young people), please let me know.
All the best, Ian.”

…from Arthur Williams (4 March):
“Hugh,
I agree with Susan’s comments, but would also like to add the following, as a general idea:

In order to get the most effective reduction in car use, the priority for encouraging cycling must focus on the journeys that are in peak traffic periods (because that’s when the switch to cycle has most benefit in terms of travel time-saving and congestion reduction). That means:
1st priority: Commuter cycling & Cycling to school
2nd priority: College and University students (many already use public transport or walk/cycle); Shopping trips

As far as the cycle route network is concerned, I think the focus should be on strategic links to complete safe commuting/school run routes, cycle parking at schools/ shopping areas.

One useful link I can think of is a cycle route around the West and North-West of Forest Rec. joining with safe crossing at the double roundabout to link Mansfield & Hucknall Roads + Clarendon College to Arboretum for cyclists travelling to/from NTU and City Centre – this was a missed opportunity the last time they redeveloped around the west entrance to the Forest. There also needs to be a focus on safe entry points to the City Centre – redesigning areas such as Friar Lane, Carrington Street, for example, to give direct and safe access routes into the Clear Zone.

There needs to be some more strategic thinking about the role of cycling as travel within the city. Every time that a cycle facility is denied because it slows down the flow of traffic, the planners are speeding up car travel at the expense of safe cycling. If only they thought the other way round – slowing down the flow of traffic makes sense if it encourages a proportion of car drivers to leave their vehicles at home because they (or their children) can get to work/school just as safely, yet quicker and more healthily, by using their bikes. The school run can be particularly significant in causing congestion because two journeys are made by car (parent travels with child to school and then travels alone back home, or on to work having made a significant detour – and justify their use of the car by thinking that they are making one journey in for two purposes!!). Often, additional cycle facilities (e.g. traffic signal crossings) can also be designed alongside improvements for pedestrians, too.

Let’s have something that will really make a difference to our city, our environment, our health!
Regards, Arthur”

PS. I will give a further update on this bid at our meeting, following the Greater Nottingham Cycling Development Group on Thursday 13 March. The bid has to be in by 31 March.

…comments of 13 March from Aran Eales of The Art Organisation, Station Street:
“Hi Hugh,
 
    Thanks for all your information about the Cycling Bid going in for Nottingham.  Where it says "make sure the bid is concentrated in one area, so the resources aren't spread out", I think a bicycle rental scheme is perfect.  It encourages cycling in all age ranges, should decrease city centre traffic and the health benefits for the city are obvious.  If a bike shelter is going to be put in near the station anyway, maybe another focus should be working on cycle lanes around the station.
    I like the sound of the system in Inverness, where the bikes that are rented out are recycled.  There is a possibility of a bike workshop at the Art Organisation on Station Street.  However are their any buildings near the Milk Dock Area that could be used?  It would be convenient if the office and workshop for the rental scheme where right next to the storage.
    In terms of costs of setting it up, I don't think it would be too much.  We wouldn't necessarily have to buy new bikes (the universities confiscate hundreds - as do the Police, I'm sure we could get them donated).  So the cost would be setting up the office and workshop, the rental infrastructure (bike locks/card swipe etc), and wages for staff.  I think it could be economically self sufficient within a couple of years.
     Ideally we need a full proposal researched and written up, including a feasibility report, business plan etc.  Maybe the bid could fund somebody to do this.  (I would be happy to take this on - or maybe something Pedals could do?)  
     In the mean time, we've started collecting and fixing up bikes that we can find.  If we can't get any funding we may have to start on a (very) small scale and build up slowly!
 
    Hope the meeting goes well today, let me know if there's anything else I can do to help.
All the best, Aran Eales”

B7. Cycle facility and traffic management matters
(including some discussed as extra agenda items on 18 Feb)

Proposed traffic management measures for the St. Mary's Gate-Broadway area – my message of 19 Feb to Justine Ramowski, City Council:
“Justine
Thank you for your letter of 13 February (ref. TM/JMR/TMP6638M/A2) about these proposals which we discussed at the Pedals monthly meeting last night.
 
We much welcome the proposed measures to reduce the number of unauthorised vehicles using the Broadway area as a cut-through and the installation of automatic bollards from the early evening until early morning, provided that these are conspicuous and well lit and with adequate gaps for cyclists to pass through safely and comfortably.
 
We also very much welcome the proposals in this scheme to the east-west cycle route across the City Centre to facilitate legalisation of cycling from Pilcher Gate to Goosegate via St. Mary's Gate and Warser Gate. We very much hope that this will soon be followed by a series of other measures to improve cycle access across the city centre, east-west, west-east, north-south and south-north, with clear and consistent (if discrete) signing and marking. 
 
This, we suggest, should include minor changes to the layout and signing of the contra cycle lane on Pilcher Gate near the multi-storey car park entrance to make it less of a sharp zig-zag than now and also so that cyclists using the marked cycle lane between the pair of No Entry signs (just east of the car park entrance) are not effectively encouraged to ride illegally in doing this manoeuvre.
 
One other general comment is that, while we much welcome the substantial expansion of cycle parking in the City Centre in the last few years, the Lace Market area does not seem to have benefitted much from this (other than in the recent Hockley/Goosegate PPR scheme, of course). We therefore wonder if more locations for cycle stands could be included in this scheme please, and also, on a related point, whether the existence of the cycle lockers in the Pilcher Gate multi-storey car park could be more widely publicised, particularly via signs outside the car park entrance and on the approaches to it.
Hugh McClintock
Chairman, Pedals

Proposed Pilcher Gate contraflow cycle lane changes – my message of 4 Oct to Steve Brewer and Justine Ramowski:
“Steve / Justine
Thanks for this. I have now had a look on site which reinforced my feelings that Option 1 is definitely preferable, i.e. the one with the straight through contraflow cycle lane past the multi-storey car park entrance and cutting out all of the zig-zag. That would also have the benefit of giving a bit more useable footway space for pedestrians to walk on and therefore make them hopefully less tempted to walk in the cycle lane! 
 
I am not clear what your deadline for comments on this is but I will mention it anyway at the next Pedals meeting (on Monday 17th) and get back to you with any further comments. Arthur Williams is also going to look at it closely, I know.
Hugh
 
PS. Did you get my couple of emails a few weeks ago pointing out the need for cycle stands on the north side of Upper Parliament Street, near the old Coop and towards the Tollhouse bar roundabout. Passing that way again today I noticed several bikes having to be locked to railings around trees, in the absence of any cycle stands. Is this being looked at please?

----- Original Message ----- 
From: Steve Brewer 
To: 'Hugh McClintock (Dell)' 
Sent: Monday, March 03, 2008 4:41 PM
Subject: RE: my response to NEP article on illegal traffic signs (Mon 25th Feb) [Scanned]

Hugh
I will investigate the issues you have raised and where possible take corrective action, in the meantime you may wish to comment (to my colleagues Ian Nash or Justine Ramowski) on the attached options for Pilcher Gate.
Steve Brewer
Sustainable Transport Officer

…and comments from Arthur Williams (13 March):
“I agree that the scheme is potentially good for cyclists wanting to travel west to east across the city. I also agree with his suggestion that Option 1 is better for the cycle lane on Pilcher Gate – there doesn’t seem to be a need for a wider raised area between cycle and traffic lane. There are 4 issues I think need consideration for the scheme:

1. Will there be some markings/signs to warn drivers that cyclists can use some of the narrow street in the opposite direction to the traffic flow?

2. Will there be signs warning drivers not to get stuck in what may effectively be dead-ends?

3. Is there anything (apart from one or two signs) preventing drivers going from Broad St. across into Stoney St., right into Warser Gate, left into St. Mary’s Gate and hence into the car park from the “wrong” direction? I’m sure there will be some that will try it.

4. If the west-east route for cyclists follows from Castlegate into Low and Middle Pavement, left into Weekday Cross and Fletcher Gate, then there is an awkward right turn (across tram tracks) to get into Pilcher Gate. Would it be sensible to have a small “waiting area” on the west side of Fletcher Gate where a cyclist can wait for the street to be clear before crossing perpendicular to the tracks into Pilcher Gate?
Regards, Arthur Williams”

Proposed TRO (Traffic Regulation Order) - King Street environmental improvement scheme (TMP6691) – my message of 10 Feb to Scott Harrison, City Council:
Scott
Thank you for your letter of 7 February (ref. TMP6691/KING STREET) about the proposed environmental improvement scheme between the Old Market Square and Queen Street. This was discussed at the Pedals monthly meeting yesterday evening. We are glad to note that you state that '"Access for cyclists and pedestrians will be maintained at all times" and therefore support the scheme, provided that:-
 
 a) care is taken to ensure that bollards are conspicuous and well-lit, with adequate spacing to ensure that cyclists can ride through safely and comfortably 
 
 b) that the present cycle stands at the point where King Street and Queen Street join are not removed or, if they are, that they are resited very nearby.
 
Before the start of work on the Old Market Square scheme 2-3 years ago there was a very well-used group of cycle stands at the west end of Long Row / Smithy Row and since their removal these have been greatly missed. We have noticed therefore that there is now a lot more 'fly parking' of bikes to trees, columns and benches etc. in this area and it would be much appreciated if some kind of proper cycle parking provision could be reinstated in the Long Row / Smithy Row area, to help the convenience of cyclists visiting shops etc. in this area as well as the Council House and this end of the Old Market Square.
Hugh McClintock
Chairman, Pedals”

proposed cycle crossings on London Road and Meadows Way? – response from Chris Carter to my email to Stewart Thompson and Caroline Stylianou (City Council) of 19 Feb:
“Hugh
Design work for this scheme has been commissioned but not yet agreed. It is likely we will consult on the scheme later this year. It has to fit in with other infrastructure planning for the Waterside Regeneration area which is still being worked on.
Regards, Chris
 
-----Original Message-----
From: Hugh McClintock (Dell) [mailto:Hugh.McClintock@ntlworld.com] 
Sent: 19 February 2008 16:02
To: Stewart Thompson; Caroline Stylianou
Cc: Jenny Kukan; Steve Brewer; Cathy Melia; David Clark; Chris Carter; Gary Smerdon-White
Subject: proposed cycle crossings on London Road and Meadows Way? [Scanned]
 
Stewart
Caroline
Dave Clark mentioned at yesterday evening's Pedals meeting that, as a local resident in The Meadows, he had heard about the plans for safe cycle crossings on London Road, north of the Cattle Market Road junction and on Meadows Way which is very good news. 
 
Could you please give us some details of what is proposed and how far the plans have got and when we are likely to have an opportunity for Pedals to make some comments please?
Thanks, Hugh”

Planning application for proposed replacement of footbridge at Castle Marina: comments of 20 Feb. from Arthur Williams:
I’ve only two comments: I hope that the surface drains off well and retains its grip, because otherwise it could be dangerous in icy weather. Secondly, if they’ve got a bit of money to spare, and extra wide bit at the top would be nice, so that pedestrians could stop and watch the boats in the marina without blocking the bridge for other users. I couldn’t see a width on the plans, but it appears to be nearly 2 m wide.

Actually there’s a third point – raised by another cyclist as we looked at the notice together this morning – what arrangements will be made during the construction to allow continued use of the towpath?
Regards, Arthur

…and from Chris Gardner:
“Looks good and plans indicate internal width dimension to be 2m between handrails. Also does say that surface will be 'Steel deck surface with combined waterproof/ antiskid surface applied”
Cheers, Chris”

Broad Marsh Cycle Lockers – message of 3 March from Chris Carter, City Council:
“In case you had not picked up on this:
The cycle lockers that were situated in the Broad Marsh car park have now been re-located to the Bus Station. Our rationale for this move is that;

1. The lockers were being very underused within the car park

2. We were receiving complaints from Trent Bus Drivers who wanted to use the lockers but because of the car park's operating hours were unable to do so.

3. The car park is to close for redevelopment within the next 18 months (the bus station is to remain open for a longer period)

Although the move has been driven by operational reasons I think it will benefit cyclists in that:

1. The lockers are now available to cyclists on a 24/7 basis and not restricted by the car park opening hours.

2. The Bus Station is more accessible to the cycle routes on Carrington Street and therefore keeps cyclists away from the busy vehicle entrance lanes into the car park on Colin Street.

Information and publicity is being provided for cyclists but it would also be helpful if you are able to inform Pedals members of the change
Regards, Chris
Chris Carter, Team Leader Transport Strategy
City Development, Exchange Buildings North, Smithy Row

…comments from Susan Young (4 March(:
“When I dropped my parents off in Broadmarsh bus station in the early hours one morning I was pleasantly surprised that it was not too bad an experience so having the lockers available 24/7 in a place where at certain times of the small hours there are people around sounds not too bad.
Susan”

NEP article (by Jon Robinson) on illegal traffic signs (25 Feb) – my response:
“Dear Jon
I was interested to read your article in Monday's Evening Post (25 Feb) about the various instances of illegal traffic signs in the city as I have often wondered about several of these, including a number of cycle signs which Pedals has, so far at least, failed to get the City Council to change to make them legal and less confusing.
 
One example is on Pilcher Gate by the multi-storey car park entrance where cyclists are allowed to continue further east in to the Lace Market, unlike other traffic. This facility is in principle very welcome for cyclists. However, to ride that way following the marked contraflow cycle lane you first have to ride between two 'No Entry' signs which is illegal, as opposed to putting in a cycle gap alongside a No Entry sign.
 
A similar situation exists on the Andrews Road approach to the toucan crossing of Mansfield Road, opposite The Forest. This is a very useful crossing for cyclists but to approach it from the end of Andrews Road you have again (illegally) to ride past a No Entry sign.
 
A third example is to be found near the bottom of Arkwright Walk in The Meadows, a signed cycle route in to the City Centre from Trent Bridge and West Bridgford, with a welcome 'except cycles' supplementary plate under the No Through Road sign near the Portland Leisure Centre as you approach from Trent Bridge. However, just a little further north the 'No Motor Vehicles' sign that used to be in position was changed about two years ago to a 'No Entry' sign. The result is the absurd situation of one sign telling you that this is a legal cycle route being followed very soon by another telling you that (if you obey the law) you cant ride past it!
 
Another blatantly misleading sign is on the slip road (in the direction of Clifton Bridge) from the junction of Meadows Way and Robin Hood Way just east of Queen's Drive on the other side of The Meadows. In this case the cycle route direction sign which forms part of the general white and black traffic direction sign was re-erected facing the wrong way by contractors responsible for a resurfacing scheme nearby about 2-3 years ago. It is ludicrous to have a sign which clearly points in completely the wrong direction, including directing Lenton- and Beeston-bound cyclists towards Clifton Bridge!
 
All these problems have been pointed out to the City Council more than once by Pedals but still nothing has been done.
 
As an organisation which advocates safe and legal behaviour by all road users, including drivers and cyclists, we want to see this reinforced by clear and legal signage, particularly in relation to speed limits as enforcing these is vital for the safety of vulnerable road users in particular. It is therefore vital that these various problems are sorted out as a matter of urgency so that no one thinks they can get away with ignoring such essential measures!
Yours sincerely,
Hugh McClintock
Chairman, Pedals (Nottingham Cycling Campaign),

Appeal for quick wins – minor cycling scheme ideas – from John Lee, City Council (4 March)

----- Original Message ----- 
From: John Lee 
To: 'Hugh McClintock (Dell)' 
Sent: Tuesday, March 04, 2008 11:01 AM
Subject: RE: restoring Rushcliffe Borough Council's cycling commitment - some suggestions in response to your offer of support [Scanned]

Hi Hugh 

I’m putting together a list of “quick win” cycling/walking minor schemes for 08/09, similar to the racecourse road improvement scheme including signing / lining / maintenance bits 

Can you list any that spring to mind and ill add them to the list 
Regards , John”

…My response to John (4 March)
John
Thanks for this which I will circulate and have a think about before getting back to you.
 
Have you had a chance to consider further the ideas I put to you before about further cycling direction signs in the ng2 and Riverside Retail Park areas and the various approaches to the Rennie Hogg Road link and also introducing a similar cycle cut-through at the west end of Crossgate Drive?
 
Also, not far away (as I pointed out to Helen Richardson some months ago) the section of the riverside path near the junction of Queen's Drive and Riverside Way gets badly flooded when there is a lot of rain for some days and you can see how cyclists then bypass it by riding up on the grassy bank to the side. The Environment Agency don’t seem to have provided proper drainage for this bit when they upgraded the path as part of their flood alleviation scheme a year or two ago.
Hugh
 
PS. No sign of improvements along the boundary of the ng2 site when I last rode along Birdcage Walk a day or two ago. Have you heard any more about these plans?

response from Angela Gilbert to appeal from John Lee for ideas for 'quick win' cycling minor schemes in the City for 08/09 
Angie
Thanks for the reminder about this which I noticed again myself just a day or two ago.

I am copying my response to several City Council folk who may perhaps be able to update us on why this is taking so long to sort out!
Hugh

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Gilbert Angela" <Angela.Gilbert@nottingham.ac.uk>
To: "Hugh McClintock (Dell)" <Hugh.McClintock@ntlworld.com>
Sent: Tuesday, March 04, 2008 11:49 AM
Subject: RE: appeal from John Lee for ideas for 'quick win' cycling minor 
schemes in the City for 08/09

Hi Hugh,
This reminds me to again mention that the surface area we spoke about
some time ago by the University's South entrance when turning immediately
right from the Campus towards Beeston has still not been extended. The
opposite corner, on the south side of the cycle track/footpath by the
science park entrance covers an adequate area so the parallel area on
the north side of the cycle track should offer the same safely surfaced
area for both cyclists and pedestrians. At the moment they have to use
the grass verge which is now just an area of unsightly, slippery mud.
best wishes, Angie”

…response from John Lee:
“Hugh 
Thanks for that I understand that university boulevard is going to be resurfaced shortly and
we are asking for this area to be included, if not then its on the quick wins list, also I have noted the need for cycle stands on the north side of Upper Parliament Street, near the old Coop and towards the Tollhouse bar roundabout, which you have previously raised with colleagues 

John Lee
Senior Rights of Way Officer
Traffic Management
Environment and Regeneration
Tel: 0115 9156078
Fax: 0115 9156150”

....Quick wins – response of 5 March from Jenny Kukan City Council (to Robin Phillip’s complaint about dangers for cyclists on the roundabout by the west entrance to Nottingham University):
“Hugh,
Stewart asked me to investigate this one and I’ve asked John Lee to put it on the list for the ‘quick wins’ budget next financial year.
Jenny Kukan, Technical Officer
Traffic Management
0115 9156454”

…and some more from me (5 March)
“John
A few more ideas I have thought of in terms of extra cycle parking:-
- Angel Row, at various locations between the Old Market Square and Listergate
- at various locations in the Lace Market, (e.g. towards the bottom of St. Mary's Gate) depending on where space permits, which I know may be a big constraint in this area
Hugh

…and some more from me (9 March):
“John
You said "keep them coming" so I am taking you at your word!-
 
Cycle signing:
 
Much of the cycle route signing in The Meadows (much of which dates from the early 1980s) has gone missing or been vandalised and I recall that, in about September/October 2006, I met one of your colleagues (?Kerry Haley) to discuss the comprehensive ideas for improving cycle signing in The Meadows that she had asked me for. I have heard no more since.
 
The list was certainly quite long but also including replacement signs at several places where signs have been missing now for several years, e.g. on the Bathley Street West approach to the cycle cut-through to Victoria Embankment and on Victoria Embankment at the western end of the Suspension Bridge. The cluster of direction signs here has now been missing for about 7 years at least!

Don’t forget also my more recent suggestions for adding to the signs you erected last year on Birdcage Walk and the Longwall Avenue path and new Rennie Hogg Road link, e.g. on the links between those paths and the 'ng2' site cycle cut-throughs and further away inside the Riverside retail park.

Lighting
 
Canal side path on the north side of the canal in Lenton between Alderney Street and Castle Boulevard.
Hugh”

Ring Road cycling experiences: message of 9 March from Jimmy Gee:
“Jimmy
Thanks for this and sorry to hear about your unfortunate cycling experiences on the Ring Road.
 
I am very much aware that much of the cycling provision on the Ring Road is unsatisfactory, especially the further north you go from the QMC and yet at the same time it is basically a very important cycling 'corridor' on the west side of the city. 
 
The City Council have longstanding plans for a 'Ring Road Major' scheme for the Ring Road and Pedals has been trying to impress on them the importance of achieving good standard cycling provision as an integral part of these when they are eventually implemented.
Hugh McClintock, Chairman, Pedals
 
----- Original Message ----- 
From: <jimmy.gee@ntlworld.com>
To: <lneylon@ntlworld.com>; <Hugh.McClintock@ntlworld.com>
Sent: Sunday, March 09, 2008 2:36 PM
Subject: [Website Enquiries] Ring Road

•	Jimmy Gee sent a message using the contact form at
> http://www.pedals.org.uk/contact.
> 
> I, Monday to Friday, cycle the ring road from St Leodegarius Church to the
> QMC via the jubilee campus. Without exception I am tested on my skills as
> a clairvoyant, stunt-rider, samaritan, turner of the other cheek, "yes I
> know you did not mean it but you did it", put my life on the line etc.
> etc., Dodge the overhanging tree branches, dodge the underground tree
> roots, dodge the glass, dodge the pedestrians, dodge the cars, dodge the
> dogs off leads, dodge the dogs on leads, dodge the kamikaze drivers at
> roundabout drivers, dodge school children from/to school with and without
> ipods..............Why do I cycle to work? I know why I do but I would not
> encourage anyone else to.
> Never mind, back to work on Monday...Yipee!!!!..

…and his further comments (9 March):
“Hi Hugh,
Thank you for your reply to my "airing" of my cycling experiences to and from 
work.
I honestly have to sit back and balance my decision...cycle or not to 
cycle..?!?!? Thankfully at present, mainly due to self fulfillment, I choose 
to cycle.
If I had a wish list to improve my, and hopefully other cyclist experiences, 
not forgetting changes that would encourage far more people to take up the 
cycle experience, these would be....

(a) Cycle only system along the centre of the ring road with underpasses 
and/or prioritised traffic light system in favour of bicycles. (Was that the 
first cuckoo?).

(b) "Changing time" for cyclists at work both at start and end of shift, 
let’s say 15 minutes both events, inside working hours. (Pauline Peck are you 
listening?).

(c) Appropriate changing facilities at work. To include local showers and 
lockers. (Linked with (b)).

(d) Scrap all "chicane" pedestrian crossings (cyclist roulette points). 
Replace with pelican crossings. (Or nothing would be better!}.

(e) No parking.....waiting.....stopping....deliberate impeding sections 
where cyclists transfer from cycle path to road back to cycle path. 
(Cyclists know what I mean!).

(f) No parking on Western Boulevard cycle paths. (I thought this was 
supposed to be?).

(g) No driving cars along Western Boulevard cycle paths. (As above).

(h) Repair and maintain the cycle paths. (Tree roots, tree branches glass 
everywhere).

Would love to help/contribute in anyway to achieve the above.
Jim.

…and comments on this (in blue) from Susan Young (10 March):
(a) Cycle only system along the centre of the ring road with underpasses
> and/or prioritised traffic light system in favour of bicycles. (Was that
> the first cuckoo?). One can dream but good, safe access needed to this facility.
>
> (b) "Changing time" for cyclists at work both at start and end of shift,
> lets say 15 minutes both events, inside working hours. (Pauline Peck are
> you listening?). Easier and more access points at workplaces, contraflow etc for cyclists and pedestrians and enforce parking restrictions of these.
>
> (c) Appropriate changing facilities at work. To include local showers and
> lockers. (Linked with (b) ). Covered cycle stands at all entrances too
>
> (e) No parking.....waiting.....stopping....deliberate impeding sections
> where cyclists transfer from cycle path to road back to cycle path.
> (Cyclists know what I mean!). It's a tiring path, mentally and physically, stop-start-stop-start, crane the neck through 200+ degrees, see round corners.....
>
> (f) No parking on Western Boulevard cycle paths. (I thought this was
> supposed to be?). Most of the ring road cycle paths seem to double as parking bays
>
> (g) No driving cars along Western Boulevard cycle paths. (As above). A regular occurrence along some of Middleton Boulevard too
>
> (h) Repair and maintain the cycle paths. (Tree roots, tree branches glass
> everywhere). In addition, poorly maintained verges between the cycle path and road is an additional hazard, especially where bollards are on the cycle path i.e. Middleton Boulevard and Hawton Crescent, and hedges which have been allowed to thicken and overhang the pavement squeezing pedestrians towards the cycle path which is narrow enough already.

Experimental Right Turn Ban – Nottingham Road / Valley Road – City Council further letter of 15th February (from Simon Blacknell)
Does anyone wish to see / respond to this letter (a follow-up to the one of 17 Jan). The experimental order comes into force on 14 March (for 12 months) ; 14th September is given as the deadline for objections or comments.

New Cycle lockers at NET Line One Terminus and Park and Ride site, Phoenix Park – email of 10 March from Andy Holdstock of the NET Team in response to mine to him of 9 March:
“Hugh
It is intended that six lockers will be installed at Phoenix Park as early as possible in the new financial year.  Funding for maintenance has been agreed and will be undertaken by the City Council’s Streetscene team.  Usage and maintenance requirements will be assessed over a twelve month trial period.
 
It would be greatly appreciated if Pedals could assist in publicising the lockers once they are installed.
 
A progress report is included as part of the Operations Report for NET Line One for next week’s GNLRT Advisory Committee.
Regards, Andy Holdstock
NET Project Office
Environment and Regeneration
Lawrence House
Talbot Street
Nottingham NG1 5NT
Tel. 0115 9156520
Fax. 0115 9156092

PS. Can anyone please take my place at the next meeting of the GNLRT Advisory Committee on Tuesday 18 March at County Hall as I am away that day?**

Riverside path latest improvements
Work is progressing well on two sections of path on the north bank of the Trent
a)	west of Clifton Bridge, round the back of the Park and Ride site towards Queen’s Drive
b)	west of the City / Broxtowe boundary towards Beeston Lock

Attenborough to Long Eaton upgraded multi-user path: exchange of messages (18-19 Feb) involving Anne Sladen and Gary Smerdon-White etc.
“Hugh
There is a capital scheme starting which will improve and extend the big track up to the Erewash border (near where Anne started) which should also cover improved signage. I find the existing river and canal side tracks good even now all the way out from Nottingham to Trent Lock and onto Ilkeston although there are far too many A barriers and kissing gates to manoeuvre through and poor cycle path signage

Getting Broxtowe and Erewash PCs to look at the signage, gates and barriers would be useful.
Gary

From: Hugh McClintock (Dell) [mailto:Hugh.McClintock@ntlworld.com] 
Sent: 18 February 2008 16:02
To: Anne Sladen
Subject: Re: multi user path, Attenborough to Long Eaton

Anne
Thanks for your message about this which I will mention (time permitting) at the Pedals monthly meeting this evening. 
 
I first tried using that path last June, I recall, having first learnt about it both by glimpsing it from a passing train and then seen it included on the latest Derbyshire county cycle map, and at that time, though parts were flooded, it at least had no A-frame barriers to negotiate! In fact I am rather surprised to hear that it now does since I thought that the County Council (unlike the City, I might say) had realised the problems that they can cause, both for cyclists and wheelchairs users, etc. and had decided to use different types of access control, where any were really necessary (as they recognised e.g. in the 2006 revision of their Cycling Design Guidance).
 
I recall that I also noticed on my visit the lack of signing and mentioned it soon afterward to Ed Ducker, the then Cycling Officer at the County Council who, as you probably know, left the County Council just before Christmas and who has not yet been replaced. I recall him telling me that he was aware of this and that signing was proposed (in coordination with Derbyshire CC), though I never followed it up again before he left. I might add that if often seems to happen that cycle route signs do not appear for a year or two after paths are completed and I could quote you various other examples! I think I also suggested to Ed that it would be useful for this route to be signed to and from the nearby sections of Sustrans Route 6 as well as the riverside path and its links to The Big Track route etc., as well as from Attenborough Wildlife Centre.
 
I guess that the person who can now best let us know the current position is Pete Jarman, Recreational Routes Officer, to whom I am copying this message and who may also wish to comment on the use of A-frames on this path.
best wishes, Hugh
 
PS. I imagine that this new path will be included on the County Council's new cycle map for the south of the county, being prepared by Paul Rea, and due out this summer, but I will also copy this response to Paul for him to confirm this.
----- Original Message ----- 
From: Anne Sladen 
To: Hugh McClintock 
Sent: Monday, February 18, 2008 2:50 PM
Subject: multi user path, Attenborough to Long Eaton

Hi Hugh
This morning I tried the new multi user path from near Barton Lane level crossing (Nr Attenborough Nature Reserve building), and runs parallel to the railway to the railway foot crossing at the end of Barton Rd in Long Eaton.

It is easy going, though there are several A type barriers forcing you to dismount for to get through.

However I was very surprised not to see any destination or usage signage either pointing to it or on it.
 
I had thought that one of the ideas of it was to make a multi usage circular path from Attenborough' Nat Reserve (Barton Lane) using the R Trent path and return by the railway path.
The only signs were Notts wildlife trust ones, (and a curious commemorative bus stop near the LE end!).
 
Of course part of the issues here may be that it crosses the county boundary (R Erewash).
Do you have much info on this path?
Regards, Anne”

Cycle parking at Beeston Station; email of 7 March from Anne Sladen:
“Hi Hugh
When down at the station earlier today I noticed signs up to the effect that cycles not parked in the cycle storage facilities will be removed.
I wonder if you were aware of this?
As it can be difficult to find a vacant cycle parking spot, bikes are frequently locked to the railings under the bridge, which I presume is not approved bike parking space.
Regards, Anne”

Cycling in Broxtowe Report to the Broxtowe Planning and Community Select Committee meeting on 19 March
I hope to raise the Beeston Station cycle parking issue on 19th March when I have been invited along to come and answer questions about cycling when Broxtowe Borough Council Development Committee discuss a report to them on Cycling in Broxtowe as well as various other issues not covered in the generally useful report, i.e. the impact of the NET extension on cyclists in Broxtowe and the need for improved cycle links between the north and south of the Borough along the Outer Ring Road from Beeston and Wollaton to Strelley, Nuthall and the Blenheim Industrial Estate west of Bulwell etc.

Gedling Colliery site redevelopment and access road plans – comments of 3 March from Nick Hynes:
“Hello Hugh,
And thanks for the attached.  One scarcely knows where to start... the main road running along the edge of Carlton le Willows school's grounds, inserting an obstacle between it and Burton Joyce (where many of the pupils live), and the message this sends out about cycling to school... the failure to make any use whatsoever of the railway line (which even now remains attached to the national network, albeit unused for years), and where once were rumours of a park-and-ride facility... the similar failure to make use of the tunnel which once provided a (rail) link under Mapperley Plains and through to Woodthorpe... this is, as the highways officer rightly suggests, very hilly terrain, this development seems to be about encouraging car traffic and strengthening the case for an additional Trent crossing somewhere to the east of Lady Bay Bridge, and appears to offer near-nothing at all to cyclists.
 
I hope there is something positive/relevant you can extract from this!
Nick”

-----Original Message-----
From: Hugh McClintock (Dell) [mailto:Hugh.McClintock@ntlworld.com]
Sent: 03 March 2008 12:33
To: Neil Harby; Paul Rea; Chris Beattie; Nick Hynes; Arthur Williams
Subject: Fw: new Gedling Colliery redevelopment and access road plans [Virus checked]
Any comments please on the implications for cyclists of these redevelopment and new road plans, including the proposed new access road connecting to Burton Road where the new GITS road joins the old Burton Road just west of Burton Joyce?
 
I will put this on the agenda for the next Pedals meeting, on Monday 17th March.
Thanks, Hugh”

Sharp Hill (West Bridgford) – Landmere Lane Rights of Way claims by Rushcliffe Cllr. Rod Jones (message of 11 March):
“Hugh
The County Council have reached an important stage re my application for 11 rights of way on the Hill and in the Wood.  8 have been accepted as used over 20 yrs.
 
One which might particularly interest you is: 
 
path 6 (from South corner of Wood to A52  along the A52 and then under the A52 underpass to Landmere Lane)[sadly fully blocked by earth in Feb 2008];  
 
The farmer did say at the outset that he was trying to sort pedestrian access with the Highways Agency.  So it is strange its been fully blocked when stiles/bullpen gates etc would suffice.
 
If you would know people who used that underpass (before it was blocked 3 yrs ago then recently fully blocked) - would you let me know or give them my contact email?
 
In view of the recent blocking of this path- I am going to continue to collect more statements of useage in case this one goes to appeal. 
Rod”

Any comments please?*

B9. Miscellaneous items:

Bicycle to Work study and proposed Bicycle to Work Scheme – message of 19 Feb from Norman James, STAR Consultancy, Loughborough
“Hi Hugh
Your name was given to us as a contact by Jenny Bentley of Notts CC.
 
STAR is now undertaking a study on behalf of a consortium headed by Rural Community Action Nottinghamshire (RCAN), to assess the feasibility of a ‘Bicycles to Work’ scheme for Nottinghamshire and the City of Nottingham.  RCAN (previously Nottinghamshire Rural Community Council) currently operates the county's successful Wheels to Work scheme, based on moped hire.  This study will consider the feasibility of extending this idea to bicycles, with clients receiving training from Ridewise (a Nottingham-based not-for-profit cycle training organisation), to enable them to benefit from the scheme even if they haven’t cycled before.  The aim of the project is to improve access to work for unemployed people or people at risk of unemployment.  

With this in mind, we would like to obtain your views regarding the potential demand for a Bicycles to Work scheme, your priorities for such a scheme and any practical issues which the scheme should address.  Ideally, we would like to meet with you in person.  Either myself or my colleague, Clare Greensmith, could meet with you on the following dates in Feb:

If, given the tight timescale for this project, you are not able to meet, we would be happy to hold a telephone interview with you.  There is some scope to extend the consultation period into the first week of March if you are not available at all in February.  

I would be grateful if you could let me know by return email whether you would be willing to participate in this important study and your availability to do so. 
 
Thanks and best wishes,
Norman
Norman James
Director, STAR
Loughborough Innovation Centre
Epinal Way, Loughborough, Leics
LE11 3EH
08700 632117 (t)
01509 228892 (f)
07917 692443 (m)
norman@startransport.co.uk
www.startransport.co.uk
Markham Vale Office 01246 242024

PS. Karina Wells and I had a useful meeting with Norman James on 27 Feb.

Bikes on NCT buses – incident experienced by David Nicholson-Cole

David Nicholson-Cole, former Pedals Membership Secretary in the 1980s-early 90s, who has recently returned to cycling complained to me a few weeks ago when he was ordered off an NCT bus when he attempted to board with a folding bike. I told him that I was unaware of anyone having such a problem before and advised him to check the conditions of carriage and to make a formal complaint. This he has now done:-

“Yes, they sent a letter of apology, plus a follow up email after i responded by email.
I will carry a copy of the carriage conditions in future.

 They pointed out that they have the benefit of CCTV recording in such cases.

 The driver was in the wrong, of course, but they pointed out that i used fruity language, although only AFTER he had made his wrong decision, and anybody so provoked would do so, especially if caused to miss a train.

 They said that I had said it was not a bicycle, to which i replied "too right... its only a bicycle when its opened out... until then, its a piece of luggage, not different from a folding pushchair or a guitar".

  They did point out that the passenger should Hold the item safely, as putting it in the rack could get chain oil on the bus or other people's luggage... to which i replied that the recording shows that i was Instructed to put it in the rack after the driver had accepted payment, and secondly if the driver had mentioned this, i could have shown him the dry kevlar belt. 

Driver can use discretion to refuse on grounds of: Over Size (obstructive).... Over Dirty (likely to ooze or drip or smoke, or crap), Hazardous (eg on wheels, lunging down corridor and hitting someone). A fully folded up bike is none of these.
  Thanks for following up the enquiry.
  ===David”

Has anyone else had such an experience?*

Bike thefts article by Carlton Reid:
Carlton Reid of bikebiz has written a really good article on locking bikes and bike theft, I've not come across it before, but it's worthwhile reading, especially for the views of the "professional" bike thieves.

Of interest is the claim that M-shaped Sheffield stands are much better to lock bikes to as they help prevent bottle jack attacks on U-locks.
http://quickrelease.tv/?p=327
Ian Fardoe
Cycling Development Worker
Wildside Activity Centre
Wolverhampton
tel. 01902 572240
Hugh, 13.3.08