Bike ban- I have heard that there is a 1* school in Ipswich doing this

[bicycle doctor]

Right to ride to school – another school cycling ban

Wodensborough Community Technology College in Wednesbury has banned its pupils from cycling to school because of health and safety fears. The headteacher says they are concerned that pupils will be knocked down outside the busy school gates. Children have been stopped from bringing bikes onto the site and two pupils who’ve been parking their bikes outside have had them stolen. Schools cannot actually ban children from cycling to school, they can just prevent them from leaving a bike on the school premises, as they have done in this case. If you are aware of a school with a similar ban, please let us know through CTC’s Right to Ride to School campaign.

[AjaxBike]

Hi Kevin,

Thanks for bringing this outrage to my attention!

I did a quick search and found an article in the highly dependable
Daily Mail (cough).

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1228644/Pupils-banned-cycling-school-health-safety-fears-theyve-ridden-road.html

I've also written an email to the school to clairfy the situation of
the ban and to explain the reasons why.

Cycle Ipswich should be supporting local schools in enabling their
pupils to travel to school by bike. Don't keep us guestting, which
school in Ipswich is also considering this?

Thanks
Alex

On 20 Nov, 17:04, "bicycle doctor" <bicycledoc...@btopenworld.com>
wrote:
> Right to ride to school - another school cycling ban

[kevin.ablitt]

Hi Kevin,

 

Yes I can confirm that St Helens primary school:

 

1) Judge the nearby roads too dangerous for children to cycle, and therefore actively discourage children from cycling to school, even under parental supervision.

 

2) The school therefore provides no facilities for bicycles to be left on site for children. There are half a dozen bike racks for staff & adult visitors; children are expressly forbidden to use these.

 

3) This causes problems for parents who would ideally choose to cycle to school. Fortunately the school is only a ten minute walk away for us; but if I plan to go off somewhere when I pick Frans up, my only option is to cycle down with him in the morning & lock his bike outside the Council offices at St Edmund House next door to Suffolk New College and then make the three minute walk back to the school.

 

4) It's ironic that Frans cycles hundreds of miles (the youngest kid to do the C2C in 4 days at 8yrs old; cycling 651 miles from Lands End to Dumfries when still 10 yrs old this summer; just come back from a cycling trip in Flanders) but the school seeks to prevent him cycling the 1 mile to school.

 

5) I wonder whether the school's cycling policy is what lies behind their reticence to acknowledge Frans' amazing cycling feats; they have shown little interest or pride in what he's achieved.

Regards
Janus

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[Peter Miller]

On 25 Nov 2009, at 09:12, kevin.ablitt wrote:

Hi Kevin,

 

Yes I can confirm that St Helens primary school:

 

1) Judge the nearby roads too dangerous for children to cycle, and therefore actively discourage children from cycling to school, even under parental supervision.

 

2) The school therefore provides no facilities for bicycles to be left on site for children. There are half a dozen bike racks for staff & adult visitors; children are expressly forbidden to use these.

That is all very disappointing. Is the above on the public record? ie has the school published this policy on their website or has it been written about in the paper? If it is then I am tempted to add it to the 'transport in Ipswich' article in Wikipedia that we are developing at present (along with a reference to Kesgrave High School which has one of the highest levels in the country). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transport_in_Ipswich

This is a classic example of the car driving out all the other transport modes. Should we use this as a justification for reducing the level of parking in the town (or indeed not rebuilding Crown Street) - and investing in buses and cycling instead. I have been adding all the town centre car parks to OpenStreetMap as part of preparing for the LDF response and a huge amount of the town is giving over to parking. (http://www.openstreetmap.org/?lat=52.0558&lon=1.15226&zoom=15&layers=B000FTF)

I have also added most of the bus routes to OpenStreetMap. See them here: http://www.öpnvkarte.de/?lat=52.0577&lon=1.1889&zoom=13

Regards,

Peter Miller

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[Bryan Hall]

Surely the School governors should be questioned about this policy? Bryan H.

---

From: Peter Miller [mailto:peterm...@googlemail.com] On Behalf Of Peter Miller
Sent: 25 November 2009 11:40
To: cycle-...@googlegroups.com

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[Des Pawson]

Well done Frans . shame on St Helens

DES

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[chiefsub68]

This is what the Sustrans and Bike Club teams in Colchester do:
challenge schools making soppy decisions like this. I bet all the
teachers go to work by car, adding to the problem (many use their cars
as filing cabinets rather than sort the books they need for the day).
If anyone needs any advice, I'm sure Alex Wise of Bike Club (he covers
Southend, Col and Cambridge) will be happy to talk. He is at
<alex...@bikeclub.org.uk>. I'm pretty sure that Alex has an off-the-
peg campaign plan to challenge schools like this. You may have your
own Sustrans Bike to School people but, if not, speak to Aba Pifferi
<aba.p...@sustrans.org.uk>.

Best wishes

Will

[Caroline Page]

Just so's you all know, I've passed this exchange on to Jane Chambers who is the County Councillor for St Helens. She appears to be taking it very seriously  and she is meeting with the head of the primary school on Monday to examine the matter fully.

 

It does seem to be very inappropriate in terms of all sorts of things - carbon footprint, congestion,  child health - all of which the school should be considering

 

Caroline Page

 

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[Peter Miller]

On 27 Nov 2009, at 14:22, Caroline Page wrote:

Just so's you all know, I've passed this exchange on to Jane Chambers who is the County Councillor for St Helens. She appears to be taking it very seriously  and she is meeting with the head of the primary school on Monday to examine the matter fully.

 

It does seem to be very inappropriate in terms of all sorts of things - carbon footprint, congestion,  child health - all of which the school should be considering

Good news.

We must however sympathise a little with the school; they are situated between two busy roads in a hilly part of town - I am not sure how large the catchment area is, but there must be genuine issues of concern about young child cycling on St Helen's St, Woodbridge Road and Warwick Road. It is approaching winter and I am not aware of any 20mph speed limits on these roads or much common sense amongst many drivers who in my experience like to accelerate up Woodbridge road - hills seem to have that effect on people.

Can I suggest that this matter is approached as one that will require intervention by the council to increase safety as well as by the school to support children who wish to cycle. Can we also open this up to the wider question about cycling to schools across the town.

What I would find very useful for starters would be a map of the school catchment area marked up with coloured pens to show the safer and more dangerous locations. I have prepared one here that people can download and use if required here. Print off the pdf version and then draw on it with felt tip pens (red for dangerous and green for safe) and add numbered notes for places of particular concern. This should form a very useful resource for us and is a process that  we could possibly repeat with other schools.

http://walking-papers.org/print.php?id=x8lvzdtd

My company has funding from the DfT to develop just such a dialogue between schools, pupils, parents, the police and the local councils and would be able to help in practical ways with this work.

Regards,

Peter Miller

ITO World Ltd

www.itoworld.com

[Alex]

I've not commented much as I'm not a parent, my schooldays ended two decades ago and were in a wholly different region of England anyway, but what I will say is this FUD was used to stop kids cycling to my high school back in 1985 and I am still angry today at how this frightened my parents so they wouldn't let me have a bike throughout my early teens, and cost me so many years of riding.

Ironically I instead ended up wandering on the streets, making the "wrong sort of friends" and thus getting into drug use and low-level gang activity, which occasionally included criminal anti-social behaviour, despite coming from a "perfect" family background with loving parents who stayed together until my Dad passed away.

I've grown up now and am a "good boy" but with hindsight can't help but feel I would have been a better one had I had cycling to occupy my weekends rather than more nefarious activities (might even have got into competitive riding)

Alex

[Bryan Hall]

Thanks Caroline hope the responses are positive. Bryan.

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From: Caroline Page [mailto:cro...@aol.com]
Sent: 27 November 2009 14:22

To: cycle-...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Bike ban- I have heard that there is a 1* school in Ipswich doing this

Just so's you all know, I've passed this exchange on to Jane Chambers who is the County Councillor for St Helens. She appears to be taking it very seriously  and she is meeting with the head of the primary school on Monday to examine the matter fully.

 

It does seem to be very inappropriate in terms of all sorts of things - carbon footprint, congestion,  child health - all of which the school should be considering

 

[pete]

On 27 Nov, 14:39, Peter Miller <peter.mil...@itoworld.com> wrote:

> We must however sympathise a little with the school; they are situated  
> between two busy roads in a hilly part of town - I am not sure how  
> large the catchment area is, but there must be genuine issues of  
> concern about young child cycling on St Helen's St, Woodbridge Road  
> and Warwick Road. It is approaching winter and I am not aware of any  
> 20mph speed limits on these roads or much common sense amongst many  
> drivers who in my experience like to accelerate up Woodbridge road -  
> hills seem to have that effect on people.
>
> Can I suggest that this matter is approached as one that will require  
> intervention by the council to increase safety as well as by the  
> school to support children who wish to cycle. Can we also open this up  
> to the wider question about cycling to schools across the town.
>
> What I would find very useful for starters would be a map of the  
> school catchment area marked up with coloured pens to show the safer  
> and more dangerous locations. I have prepared one here that people can  
> download and use if required here. Print off the pdf version and then  
> draw on it with felt tip pens (red for dangerous and green for safe)  
> and add numbered notes for places of particular concern. This should  
> form a very useful resource for us and is a process that  we could  

> possibly repeat with other schools.http://walking-papers.org/print.php?id=x8lvzdtd

>
> My company has funding from the DfT to develop just such a dialogue  
> between schools, pupils, parents, the police and the local councils  
> and would be able to help in practical ways with this work.

The problem is serious and getting worse too. IBC is squeezing cars by
closing down routes such as the Rope Walk and the dock roads. This
means the same number of cars must use a smaller number of roads. More
cars per road means overcrowding and less room for pedestrians and
cyclists. Car are big metal things so pedestrians and cyclists come
off worse in any encounter. This helps IBC get cars banned from some
roads to make life safer for pedestrains and cyclists. Once that has
been achieved the next move will be to ban cyclists to make life safer
for pedestrians.

pete

[Sandy Martin]

I’m with Peter on this one.  It’s very difficult to have a policy which doesn’t have SOME anomalies – and producing a school cycling policy which caters for primary-age children who have cycled from Lands End to Dumfries is a classic example.  To make cycling to St Helens safer, I think you would need to introduce some major engineering which would enable cyclists to use alternative routes – an alternative route north of Woodbridge Road would need a clever link across the allotments site from Lacey Street to Hayhill Road and also a bridge across the railway to Belvedere Road – both of these possibilities would be wildly expensive and have in any case been scotched by the Hayhill development by Crest Nicholson.  St Helens St is not quite so difficult and dangerous, but I’m not sure I would want a primary school child using it.

 

Sandy

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[Peter Miller]

On 30 Nov 2009, at 00:13, Sandy Martin wrote:

I’m with Peter on this one.  It’s very difficult to have a policy which doesn’t have SOME anomalies – and producing a school cycling policy which caters for primary-age children who have cycled from Lands End to Dumfries is a classic example.  To make cycling to St Helens safer, I think you would need to introduce some major engineering which would enable cyclists to use alternative routes – an alternative route north of Woodbridge Road would need a clever link across the allotments site from Lacey Street to Hayhill Road and also a bridge across the railway to Belvedere Road – both of these possibilities would be wildly expensive and have in any case been scotched by the Hayhill development by Crest Nicholson.  St Helens St is not quite so difficult and dangerous, but I’m not sure I would want a primary school child using it.

Looking at aerial photography on Google - which dates from prior to Bramley Road being built - and it looks as though the planners could very cheaply have included a footpath from Bramley Road to Haslemere Drive which would have provided a safe back-street route almost to St Helen's School via Lacey Street. Was there a good reason that this wasn't done, was it resisted for some reason or was it not considered?

A cycle bridge to Belevedere Road would have been very useful, but as you say it would also have been a lot more expensive; possibly too expensive to justify across the size of the initial development, but possibly not for the completed development.

I have created a map here showing what I believe was are talking about. Do please tell me if I have got it wrong.

http://www.umapper.com/maps/edit/id/49318/

Regards,

Peter

[pete]

Peter,

There isn't going to be a cycle bridge.

The route could be down Woodbridge Road if only the various "keep
left" islands were removed from the road as these prevent drivers
giving cyclist reasonable space when passing. Cyclist and motorist
must be *allowed* to share the same roads in safety. Very often
traffic calming measures act against cyclists and the mad construction
of "islands" etc to use up end of year cash surpluses should be
protested.

pete

[Sandy Martin]

That’s precisely what I was envisaging Peter.  But as Pete Turtill says, it wasn’t ever going to happen – not because it isn’t sensible, but because we just don’t do serious spending in this country on cycling!  I had a bit of a tussle with the County Council’s officers some years ago about the amount that we spend on cycling – I suggested that as we had a target for 10% of all journeys to be by bicycle and we were nowhere near achieving that, we needed at the very least to spend 10% of the capital roads budget on cycling schemes (I think we were spending something like 0.5% of the capital budget on cycling schemes at the time, and I don’t suppose for one moment it is any better than that now).  And as I said, it is too late now anyway, with much of the Hayhill development already built.  Incidentally, before voting against the Hayhill development (on all sorts of grounds, which I won’t bore you with) I and other Labour Councillors on the Planning Committee did point out that if residents were going to use buses they would need to cross Woodbridge Road and they would need a crossing.  Well they were denied a crossing and they were denied a bus-stop – but what they did get were some traffic islands which I tend to agree with Pete don’t help anyone at all.

[pete]

On 30 Nov, 09:51, Sandy Martin <sandy.mar...@suffolk.gov.uk> wrote:
> That's precisely what I was envisaging Peter.  But as Pete Turtill says, it wasn't ever going to happen - not because it isn't sensible, but because we just don't do serious spending in this country on cycling!  I had a bit of a tussle with the County Council's officers some years ago about the amount that we spend on cycling - I suggested that as we had a target for 10% of all journeys to be by bicycle and we were nowhere near achieving that, we needed at the very least to spend 10% of the capital roads budget on cycling schemes (I think we were spending something like 0.5% of the capital budget on cycling schemes at the time, and I don't suppose for one moment it is any better than that now).  And as I said, it is too late now anyway, with much of the Hayhill development already built.  Incidentally, before voting against the Hayhill development (on all sorts of grounds, which I won't bore you with) I and other Labour Councillors on the Planning Committee did point out that if residents were going to use buses they would need to cross Woodbridge Road and they would need a crossing.  Well they were denied a crossing and they were denied a bus-stop - but what they did get were some traffic islands which I tend to agree with Pete don't help anyone at all.

If IBC wanted to help cyclist all they have to do is allow cyclist to
use Footpaths that belong to IBC. Others that do not belong to IBC
could be upgraded to Bridleways. There is only the Ramblers excellent
Footpath Secretary and me likely to object, The Ramblers FP Secretary
is retiring in February and I am happy to co-operate and I have indeed
offered my co-operation to SUSTRANS without response. This is
essential as without co-operation this would not happen. It just needs
an undertaking by SUSTRANS not to declare RoW as Cycleways in Ipswich.

pete

[Peter Miller]

On 30 Nov 2009, at 09:51, Sandy Martin wrote:

That’s precisely what I was envisaging Peter.  But as Pete Turtill says, it wasn’t ever going to happen – not because it isn’t sensible, but because we just don’t do serious spending in this country on cycling!  I had a bit of a tussle with the County Council’s officers some years ago about the amount that we spend on cycling – I suggested that as we had a target for 10% of all journeys to be by bicycle and we were nowhere near achieving that, we needed at the very least to spend 10% of the capital roads budget on cycling schemes (I think we were spending something like 0.5% of the capital budget on cycling schemes at the time, and I don’t suppose for one moment it is any better than that now).  And as I said, it is too late now anyway, with much of the Hayhill development already built.  Incidentally, before voting against the Hayhill development (on all sorts of grounds, which I won’t bore you with) I and other Labour Councillors on the Planning Committee did point out that if residents were going to use buses they would need to cross Woodbridge Road and they would need a crossing.  Well they were denied a crossing and they were denied a bus-stop – but what they did get were some traffic islands which I tend to agree with Pete don’t help anyone at all.

 

Thank you for the background information. Transport policy T15 of the Regional Spatial Strategy says that transport spending should be prioritised to achieve a modal shift away from the car - we are pushing for that to added to the LDF which could be pretty useful for supporting spending on cycling if we can get it in.

I am keen to set up a place to record this sort of information where it can easily found. I will do some work on it at some point during the winter. Making the poor decisions of the past available for easy review might help concentrate people's minds in the future.

Where do we stand on the new flats being proposed on the waterfront. I understand that there is a planning application in for a new set of flats south of Neptune Marina on Orwell Quay? If so, then I think we need to probe how much parking is being proposed in the scheme and push for a bunch of car club car in place of many of them.

Are there any other planning applications in that we should be making a fuss about?

Regards,

Peter

Sandy

 

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From: Peter Miller [mailto:peterm...@googlemail.com] On Behalf Of Peter Miller
Sent: 30 November 2009 06:29