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Bristol wins the UK's first Cycling City

by Beaulieu | June 19, 2008 at 12:48 am

561 views | 10 Recommendations | 2 comments

OPINION

This is good news although it would have been even better if the demonstration town was in Kent, which is a hard-core car-orientated county.

LONDON (Reuters) - Bristol is to be the country's first "Cycle City" after winning 11.4 million pounds of government funding to improve facilities for cyclists. The city won the cash after promising to encourage 2.5 million more people to take up cycling with a range of bicycle-friendly schemes, including:

- a Paris-style on-street bike rental network

- a central bike lock-up facility for commuters, including showers and lockers

- dedicated cycleways from the city's suburbs into the centre.

The Department for Transport also announced funding for 11 "Cycling Demonstration Towns", including Blackpool, Cambridge and York, to add to the existing six appointed in 2005.

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Beaulieu

at 03:00 on June 19th, 2008

I was in Paris last year, though I didn't try the Velib as I brought my own bicycle. It is interesting how Britain seems to 'catch on' late to these things.

It's good to see this happening in Rome.

But it will be even better when they finally reach these hard care provincial towns.

Jordan Yerman

flagged this story as Good Stuff

at 04:24 on June 19th, 2008

It's a great start- Britain is a relatively small country, with only a few mountainous regions: it's ideal for cycle-based tourism. In New Zealand, people travel between cities on foot or by bicycle with some regularity, I'm told, thoguh I don't know much about their infrastructure.