Cycling in the UK

Last week I attended a conversation in Frome Town Hall with Laura Laker. ‘The benefits of access to nature and physical exercise extend to everyone’. How very true. And Laura elaborated with wise and sparkling words on the theme of cycling: for pleasure, to get to school, for commuting to work, for maintaining health and wellbeing. Yet much of the UK road system still follows narrow and winding mediaeval routes where visibility is poor and the risk to cyclists is great. That the National Cycle Network is national only in that it aspires to cover the whole country, not that it is publicly funded infrastructure, is both a surprise and a disgrace. People certainly want to cycle: the numbers soared during the coronavirus pandemic, when motorised traffic was minimal, but plummeted with the return of vans, lorries, and four-by-fours. Whether there will ever be metalled cycle tracks in the UK running parallel to the bulk of the roads is a moot point. It seems that few in government positions are ever interested. To gain a broad perspective on all of this, I recommend reading Laura Laker’s wonderful Potholes and Pavements (Bloomsbury 2024) .