The evening was about generating ideas, identifying what
is working well, what is not and what collectively we might just try to
achieve. Splitting everyone into random groups to encourage and facilitate
discussion might not be everyones cup of tea but the exercise worked well.
Having generated ideas in a team there was then time to revolve around and read
the other groups thoughts.
Unsurprisingly, there were a lot of similarities as well
as some interesting ideas.
The
highlights for me were:-
- Introduce 20mph speed restrictions throughout city centre ( those of you who have read my previous blogs will know I am a massive fan of this). On the speed limit front, one idea was to reduce the speed limit from 60mph to 40mph on rural country lanes to avoid nasty surprises on blind and narrow roads which makes it hard to avoid collisions.
- Better communication between all road users and pedestrians, encourage understanding, tolerance and respect. In particular an education campaign using local media - The Bath Chronicle being mentioned as one avenue that could be used to help champion the cause.
- A drive to get schools involved with the cycle awareness scheme that exists in Bath and to encourage more kids to cycle
- Better communication between road planners and developers and cyclists. Get the infrastructure right before you build was the message.
- Lots of stuff on routes, improving route links and decrease the instance of routes to nowhere.
An idea I particularly like is to encourage driving
instructors to introduce and teach the concept of safe driving near cyclists to
learner drivers. Other stuff such as showers at stations, a monthly bike
to work / school day, brightly road painted cycle lanes and a £5 per capita
cycling budget were also muted.
Overall, a great positive start to improving councillors
listening to the cycling community. It
is not just up to them to implement and turn these ideas into a reality. It is up to us all to help. So if you can step up to the plate, volunteer
your skills, advise, support, but do get involved and Bath will surely become a
more cycle, road and pedestrian friendly city.
I was also in attendance last night. It was indeed an interesting meeting, although clearly some of the facilitation exercises that were planned were designed for smaller groups. That wasn't the fault of Paul (the facilitator) though as clearly he'd been given an estimate of numbers - we then maxed out the room!
ReplyDeleteOne thing that hit me before, during and after the event is that the sum involved is a drop in the ocean. I'm not sure if some people appreciate how, across the whole council area (some comments and thoughts on the night were very Bath-centric) £500k could get swallowed up in just a couple of projects.
The other thing that hit me was that at the end of the night we still only had some very high level thoughts down. Infrastructure, routes, behaviour, legal, schools etc. Because we were told to capture three big wishes/visions, there was no real projects that came out of it. And many of those wishes will take a lot longer than 12 months, and a lot more than £500k, to accomplish.
I know that you have to start somewhere, but I'm not sure if the enthusiasm of some people took that into account :-)
Maybe a second follow up meeting to go into those areas in a bit more detail would have been good?
The other thing I wasn't expected was talks of committees. It would have been good if, in advance of the meeting, they were mooted.
When they were mentioned many questions bounced into my head, such as "how much time are they talking about committing? Who steers these groups? How much sway do they actually have? What actual expertise is really required to assist in those broad areas?"
I understood the rationale for doing it, but couldn't raise my hand without that understanding.... not living within Bath (where the meetings are bound to be held) and having kids I couldn't commit anything.
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ReplyDeleteBlimey, Rob, I find myself agreeing with everything you've said here and I was certainly as dubious as you when I saw the facilitator John Myers start his flip-chart routine. In fact, I was even more dubious as I went into the meeting expecting it to descend into the usual argument between cycling's various passionate but warring factions over which is the worthier of receiving attention of the council's over-stretched budget.
ReplyDeleteYou knew there was a 'however' coming, right? It's true that what came out of the meeting was a lot of blue sky thinking about road-users' general behaviour and the involvement of educators, among other things. But I was impressed that John's energy kept the whole thing rolling along so that these points got aired at all. It could so easily have been a litany of all the things every cyclist agrees are lamentable - the dreaded glass-strewn 'bike lanes to nowhere' just for starters - but the fact that 50-odd cyclists including our councillors went away with a wider vision of the issues over and above the countless micro details that affect us all as cyclists daily quite literally made the hair on my arms stand up. Maybe why I put my hand up for the 'behaviour' group to meet later. But then my children are now at an age when they cannot wait to 'encourage' me out the door. On my bike, of course.
I suspect you'll find yourself being co-opted before you know it as your experience as a commendable daily commuter along that dreadful A367 should speak for many cyclists and potential cyclists.
My thoughts exactly when the call for joining some ill defined 'committees' was suddenly sprung upon us. We should have been preprepared for that.
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