Yesterday
the Department of Transport issued an evaluation report of the Cycling City and Towns. The report aims to ‘explore their [the people in those areas] experiences,
attitudes and behaviours in relation to cycling and the cycling investment in
their towns.’
Furthermore: ‘the research aimed to provide evidence to help interpret the
findings of the post-intervention survey when the results are available in 2013’ and
also ‘it aims to contribute to our
understanding of cycling behaviours and how people may best be encouraged to
consider cycling as a viable transport option’.
There are 12 Cycling Cities and Towns in the UK which are
essentially areas which are testing whether increased investment in cycling
encourages long-term behavioural change – or to put it more bluntly: if we
build it, will they come? Among them are
Chester, Blackpool and Southport.
The 7.5MB pdf makes interesting reading for anybody interested
in what motivates non-cyclists to jump on a bike or occasional cyclists to
become more regular users.
Although I’ve not read the entire report [yet] the central
finding appears to be an incredibly detailed way to say it’s complicated.
The diagram below shows the various inter-connecting elements which
can influence people to cycle more or to cycle at all. We all have our own ideas on which elements
of these should be given precedence over others and these in turn are
influenced by our own circumstances and experiences.
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| Factors which encourage cycling - taken from the report |
It’s clear that there’s no silver bullet which will make people
take to their bikes in large numbers but the core understanding that effort, in
all its forms, needs to be applied to encourage people to do so, is encouraging
at least.
The bigger question of course is if, when and how will policy
makers respond.
