An excellent Youtube that explains how Holland got its cycling infrastructure (seen on the Spokes Canterbury facebook site). I was born in Holland and I never realised that so many people had to fight this hard to get their cycle paths! They also demolished buildings to convert them into car parking (sounds vaguely familiar…)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-AbPav5E5M
(rush hour in downtown Utrecht, where are the cars??)

Share an Idea clearly expressed the need, desire and support from the 30+% of non-cyclists who want to have real transport choice. This plan is a mid twentieth century plan with some cycling suggested ‘where necessary’ and when we get around to it. Routes are inadequate, incomplete and too often little more than a line on a map. Desire lines, obvious routes are left out.

It is a big ask for CERA to expect us to trust them to get it right. If CERA wanted the community to trust them they should have opened up the process from the start.

I can understand the hopes expressed here. People in Chch have been waiting for genuine cycling infrastructure for decades. We have had numerous Cycle Strategy’s which have remained unfunded and unrealized. With Gerry at the helm I can only say ‘Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.’

If we want cycling in Chch and in this plan we will need to make hundreds of submissions. Possibly we will be ignored, even castigated for being ungrateful. Still, we have been polite and ignored for years. It is time to be polite but firm and very persistent.

I suspect it is tricky to pre-judge CERA too much on the basis of what previous City Councils did (or didn’t do) pre-quake – we clearly have a game-changer in what has occurred over the past two years.

Also it does need reminding that this is a CENTRAL CITY plan – clearly with transport, how that connects to the rest of the city is important but that wasn’t their brief. For the wider city’s transport, readers might like to have a look at the findings from the recent Chch Transport Plan Hearings – http://resources.ccc.govt.nz/files/TheCouncil/meetingsminutes/agendas/2012/November/12OnlyCouncil22Nov12.pdf#nameddest=DraftChristchurchTransportPlan (warning: 30MB).

Maybe that was just spin; ‘we’ve ticked the consultation box, we have allowed the ratepayers to write on coloured paper’. .’excellent..’….’more tea minister…’

I’m with Robert on this. Where’s the infrastructure to get to quiet, leafy, picturesque cycling in the Frame. I want to be a Central City Chardonnay Cyclist but I want a safer way to get there, must I drive???. I want my children to be able to go places on their bikes without having to mix it with big trucks. Where is the plan for this level of equity.

What’s so hard about this – its not the money, so it must be the thinking. Think about the rugby stadium in this town, then think about what is not written, and what is not happening about cycling.

For example:

Where necessary, roads
that are prioritised for cycling will have
separated cycle lanes to allow safe routes
for all users. Other streets may also have
improved, safer cycle facilities.

What does “necessary” and “may” mean in this context? Can we please see the criteria for this? What about time frames? The devil is in the detail and the detail is missing.

Cr Tim Carter has already been in the Press outlining a tour of a new building with the developer, and how he was told of the cutbacks, short-cuts, take outs …to keep the cost down.

So the question is ‘How will they be encouraged?’
This the great throwaway line. If at this point in the planning there is no positional information for bike parking, we are left with the inevitable conclusion that it doesn’t exist.

I don’t see 21st Century cycling infrastructure as being a gift that I should be grateful for, like broadband, it really is a right.

There has to be equity in the transport infrastructure; 13 – 14 yr old kids can’t drive and many older people can’t either. I would assert that they should have access to safe dedicated cycleways like most other places in the developed world. And grown ups who need a low cost transport option, or who just want to cycle, should also have that. Are you saying that is unreasonable?

With that in mind, I’ll challenge anything that purports to deliver this, but lacks the detail to make the announcement credible. I also want people like you to have access to a much improved infrastructure, even though it seems you would settle for a lot less. Morris Oxford – that’s very ’50s. Look at the bottom right corner of your monitor, it’s 2012.