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Transport for London and Mayor of London Boris Johnson have set £4 million aside for improving cycling infrastructure in 13 London ‘Biking Boroughs’.
From Monday Feb 21st, each Borough will be able to bid for a share of the funding to spend on the likes of new on-street cycle parking spaces (£4m would pay for around 40,000 spaces, according to TfL), the training of 200,000 lorry drivers in cyclist awareness, training courses for 66,000 cyclists or 100km of quiet cycle routes in suburban areas.
Each Borough would be able to choose which combination of improvements it spends the money on, if successful in the bid.
The funding pledge is the latest in Boris Johnson’s ‘bike revolution’: “I promised a cycling revolution for the whole of London,” Johnson explained.
“This funding will enable our friends in outer London to develop exciting ways to make cycling bloom in their boroughs making it easier to replace some short car journeys with pedal power. We want healthier Londoners breathing better quality air on less congested roads and we all want an economic boost to our local shops and town centres. I believe developing Biking Boroughs can make this happen."
TfL said the aim of the funding is to create a local culture of cycling, creating ‘cycle hubs’ in town centre locations with a high density of potential cyclists and trips where boroughs should invest in cycle infrastructure. Other strategies include forging cycling communities, where residential areas of high cycling potential would receive investment to ‘break down the barriers of cycling’. Promotional activities are another part of TfL’s strategy.
Ben Plowden, TfL’s director of Better Routes and Places said: “Research shows how more than half of the trips in the Capital that could be made by bicycle are in Outer London – a total of 2.4 million journeys a day, most of which are currently made by car.
“Biking Boroughs aim to introduce simple, locally focused solutions that encourage residents to consider, for each journey, whether a bike could be used.
“Thousands of short trips made in outer London every day have the potential to be cycled, which is why we will be working with 13 boroughs to pave the way in encouraging a shift to two wheels.”
