How we design liveable neighbourhoods with local communities

“I was delighted to see how the Local People project has been bringing the Kingston community together” - Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London

For place-making and street design, Sustrans, the Mayor of London and many London Boroughs share a similar vision of how we want our streets to work. We want streets that are healthier, greener and more attractive places in which to live, play and do business.

But what’s often most challenging is how we get there. We believe involving local communities through a collaborative design (co-design) approach is essential to deliver successful schemes.

Why involve local communities?

Involving local communities when designing liveable neighbourhoods is a no brainer. Local people are experts of their streets. Years of travelling through their neighbourhood by foot, by bike or by car results in a deep awareness of the issues and innovative solutions for them.

Gaining input from the community early on provides access to in-depth local knowledge and can save on monitoring, traffic count and modelling costs upfront. By engaging closely with local people from the beginning of a street design scheme and ensuring proposals tackle the problems they identify in the first place, the risk of local resistance during consultation – and a change of heart from our politicians - is substantially reduced. 

In fact, the approach is now endorsed by Transport for London (TfL): “An important element of Liveable Neighbourhoods schemes will be local engagement and involving communities in the development and delivery of proposals that affect their areas from an early stage” - TfL’s Liveable Neighbourhoods Guidance

Sustrans has championed the collaborative, design-led approach since 2004 with our first ‘Home Zone’ project in The Dings, Bristol. Our approach has helped us to develop bespoke walking and cycling solutions that reflect local need and – crucially – have local support.

When communities feel they own the solutions, they are also more likely to use the new infrastructure.  So there can be an increase in walking and cycling levels as a result of this collaboration.

“Cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because, and only when, they are created by everybody.” - Jane Jacobs, The Death and Life of Great American Cities

Where is the co-design approach working?

Sustrans have recently been working across inner and outer London, making big changes with relatively small budgets.

In Barking and Dagenham, the Marks Gate DIY Streets co-design project has delivered healthy streets infrastructure to reduce road danger alongside behaviour change indicatives, including a women’s only cycle club. It has contributed to a healthier community. Following the project, 79% of residents surveyed said that they walked or cycled more due to the changes to the local area.

Funded by the People’s Health Trust, the Local People project in Malden Manor, Kingston-upon-Thames, has been bringing the community together through co-design and by trialling small-scale changes to the local streets. A two-month trial of public seating and play equipment resulted in support for permanent change from 75% of survey respondents. The project shows how we can use street design to integrate communities and change behaviour.

“ I was delighted to see how the Local People project has been bringing the Kingston community together. ”

- Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London

We’ve also been working with boroughs and TfL to use collaborative design to deliver better results in the Quietways programme when needed. When a modal filter was proposed on Estreham Rd in Streatham to reduce through traffic, for example, 60% of residents were opposed to it.

With the backing of the Cabinet Member and ward councillors, we held two on-street events and six co-design workshops which led to revised designs being taken to formal consultation and a six-month trial being approved.

Two-years after our first survey, 60% of local residents now support the scheme and have specifically said that the engagement and trial was what led them to change their minds. N02 levels have halved and the street is a much quieter and more pleasant place to be.

“The judges feel that no organisation has done more to embody the spirit of healthy streets than Sustrans. We did not have a ‘greatest contribution to healthy streets’ awards category, but if we did then Sustrans would have won it without question.”- Brian Deegan at the Healthy Streets Awards 2017.

How do we do collaborative design?

Our ‘Collaborative Design’, or co-design process puts the people who use the streets at the heart of designing solutions to local issues. When designing better streets for walking and cycling, these people - from dads taking their children to school to newsagents selling the Sunday papers, from refuse collectors negotiating the streets to commuters cycling to work – are experts in the problems that need to be overcome.

Our co-design approach is far more in-depth than standard engagement processes. Our early and ongoing engagement means we reach out to all the people that use the street, rather than just the vocal few.

We work hard to create multiple opportunities for the community to share their expertise with design professionals. For example, at an on-street pop-up event, a parent’s coffee morning at a local school, a site visit with people who travel in wheelchairs or by joining refuse collectors for their morning shift. We:

• provide opportunity for engagement and ensure they are accessible, comfortable and inclusive so everyone from the community can take part if they choose to
• listen to the local community and we also make sure they know their voice has been heard by feeding back our findings to them afterwards
• bring ideas to life through innovative street trials, enabling people to see and feel the change on foot, by bike or by car and then refining the changes before they are made permanent.

By working in this way, we overcome initial resistance to change and uncertainty, and enable residents to get involved and have fun in the process.

Our ability to facilitate collaboration between the local community, our in-house urban designers, borough designers and traffic engineers is special because it results in agreed solutions.

By involving the local community from the beginning, we are more likely to reach a consensual position – rather than a divisive yes or no often brought about by traditional traffic consultation.

If you’d like to find out more, or if you’ve got ideas for streets that could benefit from our collaborative design approach, get in touch by emailing london@sustrans.org.uk

Find out how we turn the vision of ‘streets as places’ into reality

• Cycling in cities
• Liveable cities
• Walking

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Our School Active Travel Seminars

Playing our cards right with Living Streets Scotland

Seeing a street design project in action in Kirkintilloch

Beancross Primary pupils presenting on their I Bike experience

We recently hosted our annual School Active Travel Seminars, bringing together School Travel Professionals from local authorities throughout Scotland.

These events are an opportunity to network, share ideas, and hear national updates on encouraging walking, cycling and scootering to school. This year’s seminars were held in Falkirk and East Dunbartonshire, focussing on the themes of behaviour change and sustainability. We heard about a variety of exciting initiatives that have been taking place and the impact these are having on both schools and their wider communities.

We heard from officers in local authorities where an initiative aimed at making streets more welcoming for pedestrians and cyclists has been introduced – School Streets. By restricting vehicle access to the streets directly outside schools at the start and end of the school day, the area is safer and promotes active travel to and from school. Discussion groups explored the challenges and benefits of implementing School Streets, and heard how initial resistance has been overcome. 

There were also updates from partner organisations we are working with to transform the school run. Cycling Scotland presented an overview of their Cycle Friendly Schools Award, along with key updates on the Bikeability Scotland training they offer in schools. Living Streets Scotland shared highlights from their recent Walk to School Scotland evaluation report, delivered in the style of Play Your Cards Right!

There were updates on another active travel initiative, Beat the Street, which has been running in Dumfries & Galloway. We heard how this challenge has been getting the community moving to earn points (and prizes!) by tapping their Beat the Street cards against sensors throughout the town. The initiative is a fun way to engage the community with walking and cycling on Dumfries’ active travel network.

We also heard that active travel doesn’t have to be limited to journeys to and from school, but can be integrated into the Curriculum for Excellence. Graham Boyd, Heritage Education Development Officer at East Ayrshire Council, told us how the Kilmarnock Town Trail is being used to teach pupils about local history on guided walks – better than sitting in a classroom all day!

We took part in some outdoor learning ourselves with a field trip to see a local street design project in action. The Cowgate in Kirkintilloch has recently been redesigned to regenerate the town centre and give greater priority to people on foot and bikes. The project aimed to reduce the dominance of traffic, creating a space which encourages active travel and is more pleasant to spend time in.

We heard from teachers and pupils from Beancross Primary School, who told us about their experience of taking part in our I Bike programme. The pupils told us about their favourite parts – cycling to The Helix and having ‘bike breakfasts’ – but also about the positive changes they have seen to their school run, with more children now coming into school on their bikes and scooters.

We shared some of our own recent developments, such as our new Supporting Safer and Active Travel in Scottish Primary Schools leaflet which makes it easy to navigate the variety of initiatives available for schools. We also presented on the findings and recommendations of the Tackling the School Run report conducted by Systra in partnership with Wellside Research and Sustrans.

This year’s seminars were attended by local authority representatives from all across Scotland - from Dumfries & Galloway to Shetland! If you’d like to join the conversation contact schools-scotland@sustrans.org.uk. Active travel isn’t just a transport issue - we’d love to hear from people working in education and health & wellbeing.

• Schools
• Young people

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People in Scotland vulnerable to transport poverty

Our transport planning system penalises people who can’t afford a car

New analysis shows the extent of vulnerability of people in Scotland to ‘transport poverty’ and highlights high-risk zones and their characteristics. This work is important because it enables policy makers to target higher risk communities when planning for transport.

The research undertaken by Sustrans brings together data on household income, car availability and access to key services using public transport in Scotland to make an approximation of the potential for pressure on household finances as a result of reliance on private transport. We go on to identify the most vulnerable areas.

Defining transport poverty

Although there is no formal definition of transport poverty, the importance of transport availability in relation to accessing jobs, education and essential services is referenced in many publications.

The 1998 Transport White Paper (Department for Transport, 1998) highlighted the impact of being financially excluded from accessing transport:

“Being unable to afford transport can limit everyday life. Job, training and education opportunities are more limited and there is less choice in shopping, adding to the family budgets of those least able to bear the cost”.

The guidance to the 2010 Child Poverty Act (Department of Education, 2010) says:

“Transport infrastructure, and accessibility to local services for children and parents, and employment opportunities for parents, are important in all local areas and are likely to be particularly so for those living in more remote or rural areas where the effects of growing up in poverty may be compounded by poorer access to services”.

And the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals are permeated with references to the role of transport and mobility in supporting poverty alleviation.

All of which gives us confidence to think that the variables that we have considered are an appropriate starting point:

• Income
• Car availability
• Access to key services using public transport

Calculating and mapping transport poverty in Scotland

Our methodology uses existing data to explore the concept of transport poverty. The model works around the assumption that areas most at risk are those with low income, high car availability and low access to essential services by public transport.

Each of these variables is used to assign a score to a geographical area. The scores generated are then combined to create a final ‘transport poverty’ profile - placing each area into low, medium and high-risk categories.

Of the 6,976 data zones in Scotland, 21% (1,481) were placed in the ‘high’ risk category. These areas encompass almost 488,000 households and a population of 1.1 million. Please note the measures are area based, rather than population based. Whilst each data zone has been allocated a category of risk based on an average measure of income, car availability and public transport accessibility, this cannot be extended to individuals living within those areas. 

Most high-risk data zones were located in accessible rural areas (29% of all high-risk data zones) and accessible small towns (28%). A further 19% were located in remote rural/very remote rural areas, 13% in large/other urban areas and 12% in remote small towns/very remote small towns.

Tackling transport poverty

Transport poverty is a complex issue but its impact is clear. Our transport planning system penalises people who cannot afford a car, who struggle to cover rising public transport fares and who lack access to public or private transport because of age, disability or where they live.

Amongst the high-risk data zones, we identified areas where essential services can be accessed by cycle within 10 minutes. Even in the small, accessible towns and in ‘remote small towns, the data indicates that cycling could present a viable alternative to driving to access services – travel times by cycling are reasonable, and some regular day to day journeys (namely commuting) are already being made by cycle. 

here are so many variables that link transport and poverty. But there is no doubt that active travel can provide a part of the solution to reducing inequalities. This is just one of the reasons why investment in walking and cycling is so important, and why Sustrans will seek to optimise the effects of our work throughout the UK on alleviating poverty.

Read the blog on what Sustrans think government needs to do to address transport poverty in Scotland

Download the report: Transport poverty in Scotland

• Communities
• Cycling
• Policy

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Transport poverty fuelled by poor planning and travel links

Transport poverty affects all sorts of people across Scotland. Cycling can empower people to take control of their travel

For many of us, the way we get to the shops or how we travel to the dentist isn’t something we have to worry about.

However, more than 1 million Scots live in areas where the transport options can be the difference between getting support and services they need or going without.

What is transport poverty?

Transport poverty is when people don’t have access to essential services or work because of a lack of affordable transport options. This could mean that someone is forced into owning a car to get to work each day, as their bus route has been taken away.

 

This can result in a burden on households for those on medium to low incomes and can reinforce pre-existing social disadvantages. Transport poverty makes it even harder for a person to break that cycle.

Researching transport poverty

Sustrans first highlighted transport poverty five years ago, with our Locked Out report which looked at the issue for people living in England. Our researchers looked at household incomes and access to local services by public transport and compared it with car availability to assess the risk in each area.

 

None of these things are, on their own, a sign of transport poverty. But when low incomes combine with a lack of transport options, the necessity of a car for day to day living can lead people into transport poverty.

 

Sustrans Director of Insight, Dr Andy Cope, has written about how this methodology works in more detail.

The Scottish Picture: Accessible small towns and accessible rural locations at highest risk 

When our researchers applied their calculations to the whole of Scotland, they found that 20% of the neighbourhoods studied were at high risk of transport poverty. These areas are home to more than 1 million people in total.

 

As you can see from this map, the high risk places were largely based outside urban areas and 9 out of 10 had poor access to public transport.

 

Our researchers also evaluated how accessible everyday services such as GPs, schools and shops were by car and by bike. And, surprisingly, rather than being kept to remote parts of Scotland, the areas at higher risk were far more likely to be in accessible small towns (28%) or accessible rural locations (30%).

 

This means that people living in these areas have nearby public services, but low household income or a lack of transport options might make these difficult to access.

Vital services accessible by bike

However, in high risk areas, 61% were places where vital services could be reached in 10 minutes by bike.

Tackling transport poverty 

There are three things that Sustrans Scotland think Government should do to tackle transport poverty.

 

Firstly, we need a planning system that puts necessary services where people live. People should be able to access shops, schools and healthcare within a short distance on foot, without the need for a car. Instead, too often we see the products of a system that promotes large out-of-town retail parks with little option other than to drive. Or a system that allows new developments with few services and fewer active travel options for the reason that there are big roads for access by car.

 

Secondly, access to a car is lower in deprived urban areas, meaning accessible, affordable and frequent public transport should be a priority.

 

Finally, to empower people by making cycling an easier, safer choice for everyone.

To offer more people this choice we need:

• Safe cycle routes in all communities
• Secure bike parking, especially in residential areas
• Wider access to bikes through public bike hire, bike libraries or purchase subsidies
• Maintenance and repair facilities in public places

Cycling won’t be the choice for everyone, but it does offer an alternative to being dependent on a car for some, and the cost savings associated with swapping a car for a bike for local journeys can offer families a financial boost.

 

Improving opportunities for people to choose to travel by foot or by bike would also have lots of additional benefits. Low income areas are more likely to have worse health and pollution. Active travel improves public health, both physical and mental, and reduces air pollution.

Another reason we should all have the choice to cycle

We think cycling is something that everyone should have the choice to do. But currently this isn’t the case. For example, in Glasgow, the most well-off people are three times more likely to cycle than the least affluent. There is a false impression that cycling is something that only certain people do.

 

Cycling is a simple and affordable way to make everyday journeys and is a way of dealing with some the impacts of poverty by empowering people to take control of their travel. More needs to be done to make cycling a choice possible for everyone, regardless of who they are or where they live.

 

Read more in Andy Cope’s blog, People in Scotland vulnerable to transport poverty.

• Cycling
• Economy
• Health
• Liveable cities
• Policy

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Walking and cycling is the oxygen for healthy towns and cities

Walking and cycling are essential for healthy, vibrant and economically successful cities and Sustrans’ new Active Travel Toolbox provides the evidence to show how.

Part of the barrier to increasing walking and cycling in the UK is the outcome of a distorted way of viewing transport among many decision makers.

A German researcher coined the phrase ‘Wind-Schutz-Scheiben-Perspektive’ - windscreen perspective, in the 1970s, to point out that if you only ever see the street from behind a windscreen then you are unlikely to understand the needs of those other road users.

For example, do decision makers consider that many children who would love to walk or cycle to school cannot because of parental fears about motorised traffic danger? And, that in turn, this restriction is contributing to unhealthy weight gain in children.

Benefits of cycling and costs of inactivity

The research evidence-base on transport and health has grown in recent decades, and we know much more about the benefits of physical activity as part of the routine of daily travel.

Conversely, we also know more as to the costs to individuals and societies through low levels of physical activity, both in terms of the risk of major diseases like Coronary Heart Disease (CHD) – the UK’s no.1 killer - and mental health impacts of insufficient physical activity on depression and wellbeing.

The costs to health for CHD alone is £4 billion a year from low levels of physical activity and an unnecessary burden on the NHS, on employers, and on families.

Negotiating transport planning complexities

The decision-making process in transport planning in England is perhaps more complex now than it has ever been.

Aside from funding through the Department for Transport for national programmes, local highway authorities need to interact with other bodies which have influence and access to funding. Not the least of these are 39 Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs), local business led partnerships with local authorities.

LEPs play a central role in determining local economic priorities and accessing funding. In order to help LEPs in their understanding as to the central role of sustainable transport in helping economies thrive, the Department for Transport funded the collation of an evidence toolbox. Designed to help LEPs, and local practitioners more widely, make more informed decisions about transport planning, public health is one area of focus.

So what would help people travel actively?

Firstly, in the longer term, the way we separate housing from jobs and local services determines the distances people need to travel. With large spatial planning programmes in progress across England to support housing growth now is an important time to highlight the critical role of mixed-use developments where local services are within easy, walking and cycling distances. The shorter the distance between home and work the greater the likelihood of walking, or cycling.

Secondly, there are the environments we travel in. Segregated cycle routes that create dedicated space for bicycles come up high on many people’s requirements. Default 20mph speed limits also help. It is hard for areas with 30mph speed limits to ever be pedestrian or cycling-friendly.

Promoting routine physical activity

Physical activity, through active daily living, is at the core of improving the way transport planning can help towns and cities work more efficiently. Physical activity is, arguably, the nearest thing we have to a ‘magic bullet’ that can be prescribed for many ills associated with current mobility provision and lifestyle behaviours.

Achieving just 30 mins on at least 5 days each week reduces the risk of dying under the age of 75 by 30% on average, let alone the associated reduced periods of illness during a lifespan.

Moreover, there are a myriad of associated ‘co-benefits’, such as better academic attainment in schools when children are more physically active (more oxygenated blood flowing through the brain), improved air quality, more reliable journey times for all travellers, and so on.

Walking and cycling is the oxygen for sustainable, vibrant and economically successful cities.

The Active Travel Toolbox is anchored in peer-reviewed evidence, for improved health and wellbeing of the workforce with increased levels of walking and cycling. Case studies provide real world examples of businesses where interventions have led to both improved health outcomes and ways in which behaviour changes can be introduced.

The Toolbox provides clear evidence to the LEPs: active travel is essential for economic prosperity and the health of society. Period.

Get free access to the Active Travel Toolbox

• Air Quality
• Cycling in cities
• Economy
• Liveable cities
• Policy

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Turning London into a Cycling City for all

Dutch infrastructure encourages incidental active travel by allowing bicycles on trains and stations being designed for easy access with a bicycle to and from the platform.

Dutch cycle and pedestrian suspension bridge, which runs next to the railway bridge, crossing over the Waal River.

Along the Super Cycle Highway we arrived at motorways where cycle under and overpasses allowed us to continue our journeys uninterrupted

The Mayor’s Transport Strategy proposes to turn London into a city where more people want to walk and cycle. Louise Gold, Senior Project Officer, reflects on how we replicate the success of global Velo-cities.

This year I attended the international Velo-city conference in the Netherlands. Velo-city is an annual conference bringing together global transport professionals in a carefully selected ‘cycling city’, to showcase the best in sustainable transport policy, infrastructure and behaviour change. The official opening ceremony of Velo-City 2017 in Arnhem Nijmegen, aside from having all the requisite bells and whistles for an event of its’ size, was genuinely inspiring. “Dream big!” Cried Leo Bormans, one of the opening speakers. “Don’t go for liveable cities. Go for happy cities!”

How do we make London a happier city, where more people want to walk and cycle?

For the conference, I stayed in a Bed & Breakfast in Arnhem, where just down the road a street had been shut to through traffic with temporary road blocks. In the evening, the result was a street full of people talking and a bar fit to burst. On Holland’s cycle streets, cycles are king and cars are guests. The result is a country where 53% of adults do moderate physical activity 4-7 days a week and a Cycling City like Amsterdam where 85% of adults cycle at least once a week.

In Holland this type of people-centered infrastructure is everywhere – no wonder it consistently ranks as one of the happiest countries in the world.

To achieve Dutch cycling levels Ruth Oldenziel, a Dutch academic and co-author of the conference book “Cycling Cities: The Arnhem and Nijmegen Experience”, says we must look at five things:

1. The cultural status of cycling
2. The urban setting
3. Access to other modes of transport
4. The wider political context
5. Social movements

1. The cultural status of cycling

To become a cycling city, “cycling requires cultural status”, explained Oldenziel at the beginning of the conference. And in Nijmegen, Holland, where King Willem-Alexander opened the show, cycling has cultural capital in abundance. 

I went to Velo-city to give a presentation about a project I recently finished in Marks Gate, a housing estate in East London, and a place where the car is king. The borough is connected to the rest of London by two large dual carriageways, its own population severed by them.

My presentation was part of a session entitled “Tips and Tricks on Behaviour Change”. I spoke in the main hall of the conference, in front of hundreds of participants, showing both the international interest in and the seriousness with which the conference organisers regard softer measures for change.

While other speakers were academic in approach, I talked about the practical application of the project, which addressed challenges facing the culturally diverse East London community, including poverty, high unemployment, obesity and low activity levels.

I described the keys to success as being the combination of active travel initiatives, community-led street design, and infrastructure that we employed in Marks Gate. A combination we need to replicate across London if we are to become a Velo-city.

But Marks Gate is no longer the norm; The status of cycling in London has begun to change. The London Mayor’s draft Transport Strategy (published in June 2017) put active travel at the heart of its message, quoting the Chief Medical Officer in the annual report 2011, when he said:

“London’s streets should be for active travel and social interaction, but too often they are places for cars, not people.”

2. The Urban Setting

After the first afternoon at the conference, Tom Sharland, Head of Infrastructure Delivery at Sustrans, and I cycled through Regio Arnhem-Nijmegen on the fully segregated 15.8 kilometre Super Cycle Highway. The route involves cycling along a cycle and pedestrian suspension bridge, which runs next to the railway bridge. This crosses over the Waal River, which stretches out to the horizon.

Along the Super Cycle Highway we encountered motorways where cycle underpasses allowed us to continue our journey uninterrupted. Lighting along the route is shaped like chain links, to help cyclists recognize the route and act as an advert to drivers that the route is there. A cycle service station was being built along the highway and on the second day we were subject to a stunt to promote it, where cheerleaders dressed as Emojis shouted, “You’re amazing!” as we rode past. It’s hardly surprising Tom described cycling this route as one of the best experiences he has had on a bike!

The London Mayor’s new draft Transport Strategy puts a Healthy Streets approach at its heart, which bodes well for creating the kind of urban setting where people walk and cycle. A new type of thinking is required to put into practice the theory of reducing car dependency and increasing active and sustainable travel. It requires an understanding of how Londoners interact with their city and what defines their quality of life, with particular attention to the streets where daily life plays out.

3. Access to other modes of transport

Toward the end of my week in Holland, I visited Basisschool De Hoeven, a school situated on the fast cycling route Nimegen-Beuningen. Having direct access to an off-road route and access to parking being placed away from the school entrance, has meant 60% of children cycle to school. It also means Basisschool De Hoeven doesn’t have the problem of poor air quality engulfing it, which we have to toxic levels at the entrances of London’s schools.

On the tour of Basisschool De Hoeven primary we learnt about changes the municipality have made to the route, for instance allowing cyclists to have priority at busy junctions. Interestingly, construction often went ahead despite local residents’ opposition. When I asked how they were able to implement the changes when there was community opposition to designs, our guide looked at me blankly and said, “Cyclists were getting hurt”.

In the London Mayor’s draft Transport Strategy, TfL describe the pressing need to increase and improve access to different modes of transport: Unless new ways are found to plan the city as it grows, overcrowding will see some public transport lines and stations grinding to a halt, air quality will get worse and streets and public places will become ever-more dominated by motor traffic.

4. The wider political context

On the Wednesday morning of the conference, Tom Sharland gave a presentation about the Sustrans London Quietways programme. London’s Quietways are a network of new cycle routes following quieter streets, parks and waterways opening across the capital. At Sustrans, we’re proud to be helping to make Quietways happen, in our role as Transport for London’s delivery agent.

To make Quietways a comprehensive network across the whole of London means working with all 33 local authorities, across the political spectrum, which is a challenge unique to London. Quietways interventions include traffic calming, road closures and development of new cycle paths. 

A wide range of people attended Tom’s session, from cities all over Europe and as far away as New Zealand. Most attendees’ interest was around transport planning but there was also curiosity around the political commitment from the London Mayor and the level of funding available.

Cycling transport planning has often been seen as an “add-on” for local authorities. But with strong political will in London and TfL’s Healthy Streets agenda, things are improving. The London Mayor’s new draft Transport Strategy renews a commitment to cycling routes. As well as improving environments for local walking and cycling trips, better connections must be provided over longer distances so that London can become truly connected for walking and cycling: An expanded network of cycle routes on both busier roads and quieter streets will be developed to help Londoners use cars less and cycle more.

5. Social Movements

There is a burgeoning social movement for change in the UK, which Sustrans is a part of, along with other organisations, campaigners, community groups and individuals.

Like in the UK in the 1950s and 1960s, car ownership in the Netherlands dramatically increased, and congestion on the streets left no room for cyclists. What was exceptional was that when deaths increased with car ownership, people in Holland rallied against the form of transport that in 1971 killed more than 3,000 people, 450 of them children.

A social movement, emotively named Stop de Kindermoord (Stop the Child Murder), was born. Fuel was added to the fire (or not) during the Middle East oil crisis in 1973 when oil-producing countries stopped exports to the US and Western Europe. This forced the Dutch government’s hand in deciding whether to invest in cycling infrastructure. Everywhere else in Western Europe progress was seen as driven (sorry) by the motor vehicle but Holland was now sceptical of a reliance on foreign oil. And by the mid-1970s the social movement for improved cycling infrastructure was in full swing. The city had responded to the challenges and adopted a pro-cycling policy.

While London and the UK are seemingly a long way behind Holland, this story just shows that roads for cars can be adapted for cycling and walking use and campaigning does work.

A London for Wellbeing

Leo Bormans, speaker at the Velo-city event, asked a philosopher he knows to describe happiness in two words. Initially his friend regarded it as an impossible task. And yet after consideration, he came to the conclusion it can be described as “other people”. Bormans therefore identified “connection” as the means to happiness and cycles as connectors. “The greatest threat,” said Leo, at the beginning of the conference, “is not lack of security. It is isolation.”

Isabelle Clement, Director of Wheels for Wellbeing, spoke toward the end of the week, in a session about All Inclusive Cycling. Her talk was entitled “Beyond the Bicycle: Toward a True Cycling Revolution”. “Isolation kills people,” she echoed Bormans words. Access to move, meet people and exist in a city is therefore integral for everyone’s quality of life – children, elderly and disabled people alike.

Part of the vision for Healthy Streets includes a Mayoral ambition that Londoners walk or cycle for at least 20 minutes every day – currently only 34 per cent of Londoners manage to do this.

The Mayor of London’s Healthy Streets for London document also highlights the fact that in London, a quarter of men and a third of women aged over 65 do not leave their house at all on a given day. New analysis this year shows that if every Londoner walked or cycled for the suggested 20 minutes a day, it would save the NHS £1.7bn in treatment costs over the next 25 years. This includes 19,200 fewer people suffering from dementia, and an estimated 18,800 fewer Londoners suffering from depression.

The Mayor’s Strategy takes us a step closer to a connected London and makes it clear that improving our city for walking and cycling will turn it into a more liveable, happy city for everyone:

The Healthy Streets Approach does not just benefit health through enabling people to be physically active, it also helps to reduce the negative health impacts of transport noise, air pollution, road danger, social isolation and the ‘severance’ effects of busy roads.

Making our streets more welcoming places to spend time, walk, cycle and access public transport helps to strengthen our communities and reduce unfair health inequalities.

Find out more about London’s Quietways

What is a liveable neighbourhood?

• Cycling
• Cycling in cities
• Liveable cities
• Policy

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Planning for walking and cycling

Urban designers, engineers, and architects should familiarise themselves with effective design techniques which encourage people to travel on foot or by bike.

This article was originally published in Scottish Planner.

Chiquita Elvin, Licentiate member of the RTPI and Land Development Officer at Sustans Scotland, explains the importance of walking and cycling infrastructure in new developments.

We all want to live and work in places that are vibrant, healthy, more active and less congested. To create such places, we need our cities and towns planned and designed to prioritise people on foot and bike over vehicular movement. 

Over the past few years, we have seen a real appetite amongst politicians and decision-makers in Scotland to do more to encourage people to travel by foot and bike for more of the journeys they make every day. From government strategies such as Cleaner Air for Scotland or the National Walking Strategy, to the recent doubling of the Active Travel budget to £80m per year, Scotland has set ambitious targets to improve air quality and boost the number of people walking and cycling.

But whilst political will in Scotland is geared towards enabling and encouraging walking, cycling and sustainable transport, what we see developed doesn’t always marry up. This is often down to the planning decisions which are made both at regional and local levels. Where a new development is located, and how it is laid out, will impact on its ability to encourage people to walk and cycle. It is essential that consideration is taken on how a site links to surrounding streets, green spaces and travel networks throughout the design and delivery process.

Admittedly, this isn’t a radical notion and most planners may consider this to already be a given, yet Sustrans still frequently sees missed opportunities in sites across Scotland.

Sustrans Scotland are typically asked to introduce active travel infrastructure, through our Community Links, Street Design or National Cycle Network programmes, after streets are built and properties are occupied. Roads are seen as an economic necessity whilst quality paths for walking and cycling are often regarded as ’nice to have’. Infrastructure for active travel should be in place before properties are occupied. A 2016 RICS study shows, walking and cycling infrastructure is a key part of placemaking, and placemaking adds value to a development. Sometimes by as much as 50%.

More importantly, people often reconsider how they travel when they make life changes, such as moving house or starting a new job. Having good quality active travel infrastructure available to them from the outset, makes it more likely they will choose to make journeys on foot or by bicycle.

So where do we see change coming from? Change lies in collaboration. High-quality regional planning has the ability to influence local policy and decisions, helping to deliver innovative, sustainable and comprehensive active travel infrastructure as part of every new development in Scotland. For example, the inclusion of regional active travel networks in the most recent SESPlan2 means Local Development Plans in the region are required to take account of this network and safeguard land accordingly. The creation of this network was only possible due to partners working together at a regional level. It is very unlikely to have come about with individual local authorities working on their own LDPs in isolation, despite the additional shared value. Better collaboration, in particular with active travel partners, will be necessary to make a success of the proposed changes to Regional Partnership Working.

It would be unfair to suggest there had been no progress. Sustrans Scotland have been fortunate enough to work with a wide range of professionals across different sectors. We work in partnership with local authorities and key agencies and our experience of working with landowners and developers has been very positive. In this we have gained significant experience in the consultation, design and delivery of active travel infrastructure. To enhance this experience, we have the necessary behaviour change knowledge that is required in order to maximise the potential of built features.

It is essential for developers to be more attuned to the value of walking and cycling. Urban designers, engineers, and architects should familiarise themselves with effective design techniques which encourage people to travel on foot or by bike.

And, most important of all, planners, designers and developers alike need to be bolder, more ambitious and innovative, in order to be a catalyst for real, sustainable and long lasting change to people’s travel habits. In doing so, we can help create places; cities and towns that put people truly at their heart.

Learn about active travel planning in new developments

Find out more about our work in Scotland

• Cycling in cities
• Policy

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