Major scheme bid gets £25million funding!
The Secretary of State for Transport, Mr Phillip Hammond, announced to Parliament yesterday (26th October 2010) that the £25 million major scheme bid has been approved. Known officially as “Ipswich – transport fit for the 21st century”, this will provide improvements in traffic flow and management around Ipswich, including the upgrades of several cycle routes.
The Local Transport Minister, Norman Clarke MP visited Ipswich today, to view the proposal.
Cycle Ipswich provided a response to the major scheme bid, and will be taking an active interest in ensuring that our recommendations are adopted.
You can read the Cycle Ipswich response document here.
Ipswich station travel survey
Suffolk County Council are conducting a survey to assist with an update of the Ipswich station travel plan.
The survey takes just a few minutes and is at http://www.suffolk.gov.uk/stationtravelplan
Cycle Ipswich has formed a Rail Focus Group which will be providing recommendations for improvements to SCC during October 2010. Contact Alex Oldman if you are interested in being involved in this exercise.
Next meeting: Friday 24th September 2010
The next meeting of Cycle Ipswich will be on Friday 24th September 2010 from 7pm until 9pm at the Brewery Tap, Ipswich.
The Brewery Tap is located on Cliff Quay, just behind the Riverside NHS medical centre. There is a map on the Google place page. There is not much secure bike parking, so bring a lock and some lights for getting home afterwards. The Brewery tap have an excellent selection of bar food and restaurant meals, as well as local beers and other beverages.
We’ll be starting a consultation on cycling and rail in Ipswich. We’ll be looking at recommendations in the following areas:
- Security
- Storage
- Ticketing
- Routes to station
- On train cycling provision
- Other areas…
The aim is to provide an objective and balanced priority list of recommendations for future improvements.
We will publish our conclusions in mid-October.
If you have something you want to share with us, why not post at our discussion forum?
Proposal for a bike ride with a purpose
I’d like to propose a bike ride to take place on 10/10/10 – preferably
at 10 o’clock!
The climate change organisation 350.org has teamed up with 10:10 to
get people to do constructive work parties to combat/highlight climate
change. You can read more about this here:
http://www.350.org/about/blogs/getting-work-2010-our-new-plans.
The point of our bike ride would be to follow selected routes on the
Ipswich Cycle map and feedback to a central document. We might for
example, use the crowdsourcing software provided by http://www.ushahidi.com/
which was developed for disasters and emergencies but which can easily
be used for other purposes. (You could well argue that climate change
is a disaster, of course.)
The document could then be used to lobby IBC and SCC/HA to fund and
organise improvements.
We could meet in the centre of Ipswich and then split into twos and
threes and each group could ride a pre-agreed route. The point of the
crowdsourcing would be to upload problem areas of routes to a map from
our mobiles. We could also supply a questionnaire for those who prefer
that. I haven’t tried the software as yet.
I have talked to the Transition Ipswich Transport Group about this and
I’m sure that some people from there will support it.
Please let me know if there is any enthusiasm for this project. I
would need at least a couple of other people who are keen to get it
organised. I was involved in organising the 350.org/ Transition
Ipswich bike ride last year but I still consider myself to be a rookie
in these matters!
Gavin Turk leads Les Bikes du Bois Rond
As part of Fleet: Art in the Haven Ports, acclaimed Young British Artist Gavin Turk, a contemporary of Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin, organised a 17 mile ride from Ipswich’s maritime to Felixstowe’s Languard Fort.
May of the bikes used were part of Gavins art collection.
This footage is close up and shows the art in action, as the participants cross the A14 slip road near Ravenswood Ipswich. The route followed Sustrans National Cycle Network Route 51.
Cycle Ipswich are calling for a cycle crossing to be installed at this site to improve safety and the speed to cross the road. The footage has been edited to remove the one minute wait before traffic is light enough to stop. This same crossing is regularly used by pupils and parents on the Nacton School Bike Train.
Proof that FixMyStreet.com works
If ever proof was needed of the effectiveness the Tim Steinberg’s MySociety experiment, it will be in my recent experiences of the FixMyStreet.com website.
Following discussion with Des P, we agreed that something needed to be done with the kerb at the top of St Nicholas Street.
So on June 28th, I logged onto www.fixmystreet.com and reported the fault. You can submit a problem anonymously. You are encouraged to post a photo, which obviously would help enginers asses the problem remotely – saving time and money.
 Before |
 3 days later – survey evidence! |
 After |
Response
Just three days later, the site had been surveyed, as evidenced by the spray paint.
The fix
Now, just two weeks later, we’ve got a tarmac ramp, over the kerb. It doesn’t look like a long term fix, but it has already vastly improved the ride at that junction. What I impressed by is the convenience, anonymity and response that this site offers. Hats off to Ipswich highways for monitoring and responding to the alerts. Hopefully we can have a proper party when a more permanent fix is put in place.
Conclusion
What a great website! To report a fault in your street – road surface, signage, lighting, visit www.fixmystreet.com
Community Cycle Routes
Someone mentioned that the Tourist Information Centre in Ipswich often gets request for cycle routes around town and outskirts to local villages and pleasant places. Strikes me that this is something that many people in Cycle Ipswich could benefit from. Likewise the wider cycling public.
I’ve had a go at making one using uMapper. It’s probably a bit clunky but I’ll try to improve it once I get a bit more skilled with the software. Belstead to Capel Cycle Route
If anyone else would like to make one, we could maybe create a section here to keep the links. I’m going to be adding them to my transport blog and to the Transition Ipswich wiki
