Ipswich Road cycle lanes - a review

[@audrich8343]

Excellent analysis and commentary - thank you for sharing. I'm still trying to get over a near miss; a car driver had illegally parked over double yellows, I clearly signalled to overtake... and the car behind me decided it was a good idea to overtake me overtaking the stationary car... on a narrow, busy road (hence the double yellows). She was inches from me and had to pull in sharply to avoid another car coming in the opposite who had actually stopped for me. The thing was I'd come off my bike the week before and this was the first time I was back on it after my injuries had healed. Not a great confidence boost!

[@playingwithcars6169]

Good old Norwich. 'Do it once, do it crap'. They seem to apply this mantra to all of their efforts regarding the road systems. I use this cycle lane and it is pretty bad. You was very polite with that person in the red car. Well done.

[@reynoldio]

Thank you so much for your efforts - sterling work.

[@garavonhoiwkenzoiber]

This whole thing is a bad joke. I also hate that they make roads these days like they forgot to add tarmac. It feels like I need my gravel bike to commute!

[@middas212]

Seriously i don't know why they even bother re-surfacing the roads with that gravel technique. Two roads near me "resurfaced" this way, and the road is still full of bumps and dips and not flat at all, and i have to pick bits of gravel shrapnel out of my tyres.

[@garethdavies8077]

Look how many of those parked cars don't fit in the bays because they are too wide. Mainly SUVs.

[@Joe90V]

Given everything you've said and pointed out, how can Norwich be considered a safe city to cycle in, let alone top?

[@anrmlumlwundlistr7620]

Why not have a raised, two way cycle path on one side of the road in stead of a footpath on both sides? Keep some distance between road and cyclepath to prevent doorstrikes, perhaps with obstacles to prevent illegal stopping on the cyclepath.

[@J.S.A.]

Excellent video

[@HuwSayer]

Town Close are so selfish - their attitude is that convenience for their kids comes ahead of the health and safety of other people.

[@Arhats_Corner]

4:17 After taking a closer look on Google Maps, I think switch the positions of the parked cars & the bike lane could help somewhat as a compromise as a 'floating layby' would help to prevent the dangers swerving in to oncoming traffic as was shown earlier in the video, although with this arrangement door strikes can still occur.

[@steveprice9737]

Great vid, I'll do one for Walsall sometime, total nightmare, cycle lanes are designated as carparks by the council now.

[@NorwichCyclingCampaign]

car parking on major routes is totally braindead. Look forward to seeing your video!

[@woowar]

Oh dear... another half-hearted attempt by Norwich (oops, I meant Norfolk) County Council. I was trying of late to think of a recent example of a decent cycle lane in Norwich that is safe, useful and connected and couldn't really come up with one... such a long way to go to improve things..

[@mikesmith6705]

The council has made such a ham fisted hash of this matter that even the cycling lobby is not supporting it. It is not fit for purpose, there are question marks as to whether it is actually in compliance with the Governments “Infrastructure Cycle Design”. Firstly Rule 61 of the Highway code states cyclists may exercise their judgement and are not obliged to use them. The code states that cycle lanes should be at least 1.5m wide, ideally 2m. The code also states that cyclists should maintain a distance of at least 0.5m from the kirb. This does not state whether this distance is the wheels of the cycle or the extreme width of the handle bars. However, when you apply the rule that motorists should leave a space of at least 1.5m between the vehicle and the cyclist they are obviously not talking about the distance from the cycle wheel. With this in mind is it therefore the left hand handlebar that should be 0.5m from the kirb. If this is the case, the right hand extreme of the handlebar is now going to be around 0.9m from the kirb, leaving a distance of 0.6m from the edge of the cyclist to the edge of the cycle lane. This basically means that the motorist needs to maintain a distance of at least 1m from the edge of the cycle lane white line to comply. Assuming that the cyclist doesn’t have to swerve/maneuver around drains and manholes etc. It should be noted that due to the drains etc. the first 0.5m of the lane is unusable anyway. Rule 67 take care when passing parked vehicles, leaving enough room (a door’s width or 1 metre) to avoid being hit if a car door is opened. The limited parking space provided is the width of a car. Therefore the council has made no provision for consideration of the 1m space noted above and have placed the cycle lane in its most dangerous position. Ideally the cycle lane should start at least 1m away from the parked cars, however, this is not really practical because then you are pushing motor vehicles into the middle of the road making two way traffic impossible. However, 6.4.19 of the Governments “Cycle Infrastructure Design”, states that there should be a distance of 0.5m between the parking space and the start of the cycle lane. This is further illustrated on page 65. The Ipswich Road cycle lane does not have this and is apparently contravening the above mentioned design. Quite simply it makes this half hearted and ill conceived cycle lane a “pig in a poke”. Rule 72 item 2 When riding on busy roads, with vehicles moving faster than you, allow them to overtake where it is safe to do so whilst keeping at least 0.5 metres away, and further where it is safer, from the kerb edge. Town Close School I also have a child at Town Close School and this cycle lane has impacted parents to the nursery, reception and pre-prep quite drastically. We now either have to park a considerable distance from the school to walk our 3-7 year olds to school, or drive in to the drop off area in the school which has been put in place due to this cycle lane, but is bearly fit for purpose, (no fault of the school). This situation will become worse in winter months when it will not be practical to walk young ones hundreds of yards to school in poor weather. This in turn will lead to traffic congestion on Ipswich Road as more parents will need to drop their children off in the drop off area.All before and after school interaction with teachers is lost as well as inter-action with other parents. Summary The council can eliminate all this contradiction and confusion by simply removing all of the cycle lanes and imposing a 20mph speed limit all the way down Ipswich Road with speed humps either side of college and school entrances. Cyclists can then cycle in the middle of the lanes in compliance with the highway code with out fear of having doors opened on them or cars entering the cycle lanes. Hoewer, I fear that this is probably a far too cheap and practical solution for Transport for Norwich!.

[@NorwichCyclingCampaign]

Hi Mike Thanks for those detailed comments. Most of them are covered in the video, but I would point out that the really narrow section of cycle lane is 1.5m wide, which does conform to LTN 1/20, the design standard, but it is the absolute minimum and you are correct to highlight the close passing of vehicles and the various drains and manhole covers that make cyclists swerve. It's also important to note that the wands have yet to be installed and they should help with the segregation. The lay-by is a great concern and we have raised it with the council and hopefully we'll have something to report about that in the not too distant future. But yes, in the meantime if's a great danger which we did try to highlight at the planning stage, again as we say in the video. How that got past the safety audits is a bit of a mystery frankly. Regards Town Close school and the on-street parking provided on the section between Cecil Road and the ring Road. Again, we've covered this in the video, but to be brief, it's destroyed the main purpose of this scheme, which was to provide the first phase of a protected route cycle route from at least the Tuckswood and Eaton Rise estates located just the other side of the outer ring road. This would have been of great use to hundreds - perhaps over a thousand - children and young people who attend both the Hewitt Academy on Cecil Road and City College. It would have enabled them to use independent active travel to get to the school and college. Because this section of cycle track was removed in favour of a few on-street parking spaces the main value of the scheme was lost. In all fairness, Ipswich Road is a very busy arterial road, especially at peak times and it is of very restricted width. It frankly makes no sense at all to give around a quarter of the limited road width over to a handful of parents driving their kids to school when it deprives hundreds of young people the their ability to cycle to school or college. There is in all honesty no room on this road for on-street parking, which is why we are so opposed to it. In addition, traffic regularly queues at the gate of Town Close school, blocking the road for all the other traffic. All in all I think it's only fair that the school comes to some other arrangement with its parents for getting the kids in and out, it is not fair or reasonable to expect the many hundreds of other people to suffer as is happening now or to cause such a significant disruption to the other traffic. Perhaps you could lobby the school to provide some kind of school bus service from the park and ride at Harford? I commuted along this section of road for over 40 years and I can assure you it is not a place for cyclists to ride in the traffic. The section from Newmarket Road to Cecil Road - where the lanes actually got built - is nominally a 20 limit, but not all drivers obey it. For all the shortcomings those cycle lanes are needed. A 20 limit without traffic calming isn't really much use sadly, such is the low standard of driving we have to deal with. The section past the parking bays, where kids are supposed to ride in the traffic, is 30. As we say in the video, riding there is little short of terrifying. It must be improved. Derek Williams

[@mikesmith6705]

Derrick, thank you for your comments, its good to exchange views with someone with a different perspective on this matter. Firstly I would be interested to know where the data came from that demonstrates "hundreds of other people suffer" whilst parents of Town Close drop off or collect their children. I took my children to Town Close between 2004-2015 and have another that is now in her third year there. Town Close has never been a problem to other traffic until the cycle lanes were installed. The one thing that screams out to me is where are the cyclists!. Seriously, I'm not being facetious but never see more than two cyclists on this stretch of the Ipswich Road between the Boundary and the junction with New Market Road when I am dropping off or picking up. I certainly see very few cyclists going into the college or turning into Cecil Road. So any verified date that confirms the average cycle traffic at peak periods would be welcome. Quite simply it seems to me that the whole road is being carved up just to accomodate a very very small number of cyclists compared to a far far greater number of vehicles that use this road for access to the college, Cecil Road and Town Close. How is this justified and where does this cycle traffic come from in the first place?. I must say that I find it ridiculous on any road where you have a section of cycle lane that is put there to accomodate and protect cyclists but then it just stops half way down the road, as it does on Ipswich Road. Its like saying yes we are going to protect you until its inconvienient to do so then we are throwing you to the wolves. And I just love the new bus stop just after Town Close that just cuts off the cycle lane, what a joke. It seems that those charged with implementing this scheme simply wanted to be able to tick something off of the list rather than working on a viable long term solution for all road users. Eitherway, the simple fact is that this section of the Ipswich Road is never going to be able to accomodate both cyclists and motorists without major changes such as compulsury purchase of private land down the whole length to enable the road to be widened. This of course is never going to happen. Another factor that needs to be considered is that there is, and always has been a considerable amount of traffic not only going up and down Ipswich Road, but traffic entering and exiting both Cecil Road and Town Close Road, especially between the hours of 08:00-09:00 and 15:00-16:00. These two junctions alone dictates that unless you block off these junctions you will never have a safe cycle lane, even if it were justified. How is it that because what seems like a few people wanting to cycle into Norwich down this road that millions of pounds has to be spent to accomodate them, (even though it doesnt accomodate you). I'm not knocking you as cyclists but I just can't see the justification. You cannot justify distrupting the significant amount of motorists that are using this road to access either the school, the city, the college or parents dropping off at the Hewitt. As a motorist and a parent dropping off at Town Close and using the Ipswich Road I feel particularly unfairly persecuted at these developments, especially when this idea is as half baked as it is. I'm not saying that there should'nt be cyclists or cycle lanes on Ipswich Road or anywhere else but to do so needs a lot more planning and consideration than has gone into this scheme. I do not believe it is justified to simply carve up every major artery into the city to accomodate a cycle lane. By all means have safe routes for cylcists into the city but maybe its a case of cyclists on Ipswich Road and Unthank Road for instance converging on Newmarket Road where a dedicated cycle way on a much wider road, is implemented. With regard to your comments on the low standard of driving I'm afraid I can only smile at this. In the last week I have seen a cyclist cycling down the outside of the traffic heading North on Ipswich Road on the other side of the road, I nearly had a collision with a young cyclist at the Dereham Road-Old Palace Road lights who simply went through a red light at considerable speed and on Wednesday on Mile Cross Lane a cyclist flashed from one side of the road to the other without either stopping or looking, so lets not get into the pot calling the kettle black!. @@NorwichCyclingCampaign

[@NorwichCyclingCampaign]

Hi Mike Right, first of all the demand: It is often said in planning circles that the absence of swimmers in the river is not an indication of lack of demand for a bridge. In other words cycling on Ipswich Road at the moment is downright dangerous and that danger is a huge deterrent to cycling. It's only by providing the infrastructure that we could hope to encourage more people to cycle. That is not only true for children but adults as well. This isn't some wild theory, as we see now in London, huge numbers take to bikes where there is proper infrastructure. In The Netherlands of course, cycling is the norm and just about every school kid cycles to school. The Hewett Academy has around 317 students at present, although it has the capacity for 1,493. It's catchment is in large part from the Tuckswood and Eaton Rise estates. City College has 10 or 11,000 students many of who will be coming from the south of the city along Ipswich Road. Indeed, if you take a walk around the CCN campus, you'll see several large bike sheds full of bicycles. I don't think you can argue there isn't a great potential for cycling to the school and college for, as I say, hundreds of young people. There are, of course, also people heading for the city, many of those would consider commuting by bike if it were less dangerous. Without those cycle lanes - together with the further phases across the ring road and toward Harford, this potential will never even start be realised. Incidentally it is the policy of Norfolk County Council to be actively encouraging people to cycle, especially children to use active travel to get to school. There are many reasons to do this, not least of all for the health of the children but also of course, in these difficult economic times, cycling is a very cheap way to travel. The purpose of the road is to facilitate traffic to move along it and cycles have every right to be there and to be accommodated safely. As we both agree, space is extremely limited, therefore priority should be given to moving traffic rather than parking cars and especially to providing segregated cycle infrastructure rather than space for car parking. Riding past these parking bays is not for the faint hearted. When the traffic is moving you have to cycle in the centre of the lane so as to avoid getting "doored". This of course delays the traffic and leads to aggression. As I say, its a terrifying experience which is not going to encourage people to cycle. The loss of this section of cycle lane makes the rest of the scheme close to pointless. You also understand that infrastructure is no good if it doesn't connect and provide continuous routes, but this is just what has been lost by removing the section from the ring road to Cecil Road, which, as I say, is by far the most important part of the whole route. You will indeed see cyclists riding on the pavement past the parked cars and even riding contraflow in the cycle lane on the other side. That is a sure sign of that something is seriously wrong. If you watch the video, you will see a woman riding an empty cargo bike along the pavement, presumably having just taken kids somewhere, because it's just too dangerous to use the road along with several children riding on the pavement. I think in fairness, this is unacceptable. As regards dangerous drivers, I am a very experienced cyclist and quite road savvy, but I am constantly close passed or cut up at junctions even when wearing hi-viz jackets. If you doubt how how bad driving standards are on the roads I invite you to get on a bike and give it a try. I'm not condoning bad cycling, but you must remember your car is significantly heavier than my bike and the laws of physics mean you will do far more damage to me than I can do to you. Bottom line is Ipswich Road is a major traffic artery and as such it should be allowed to do that job without being obstructed by parked or queueing traffic.As I said, please lobby the school to provide some other way to handle the traffic it's creating. Either by opening it's gate earlier or by running some kind of bus pick-up service from the Harford park and ride. But those parking bays on Ipswich Road are creating a significant danger and deterring many people from cycling.

[@daisysmithson7558]

I've never seen a cyclist in any of the lanes, and the 20mph speed limit, particularly out of school hours is an absolute joke. But then, cyclists don't have to adhere to a speed limit, it is just the terrible car driver that has to abide by it. It is all a big mess, doesn't make either cyclist or car driver happy. I'm a car driver, I find it all a huge pain in the bum and consider it to be a waste of tax payer money.

[@NorwichCyclingCampaign]

Well, your views are your own. In fact a lot of cyclists use those lanes, although the bit that was really needed -from the ring road to Cecil Road, which would have provided a protected route for children at the Hewitt school was scrapped in favour of on-street parking so people can drive their kids to school. You chose to drive, that's up to you, but do remember we all pay for the roads through general taxation and also remember that you don't pay the full cost of driving, nothing like the full cost.

[@TRUTHoo6]

​@@NorwichCyclingCampaignactualy as a car driver I pay general tax then ontop of that I have to pay dvla each year. Cyclist should also pay extra as they now allowed to ride on roads like cars. Oh just a extra tip for cyclists not related to this pist. IF I HAVE TO OVERTAKE YOU AT 1.5M DISTANCE, PLEASE DON'T PULL UP NEXT TO ME AT A TRAFFIC LIGHT LEAVING A HALF A M GAP BETWEEN YOU AND MY CAR. STAY BEHIND MY CAR.