We hope they mentioned every single underpass that blight most of the walking routes into the city.
The bridges over the CME aren’t great either (aside from the lovely new one to Northumbria Uni).
The 1960s/70s redesign of the city centre really wasn’t great for safety.
It’s disappointing that @danhollandnews.bsky.social didn’t address this with him - voters can’t really judge policies if they are uncosted.
Hope you enjoyed both the Tunnel & Pedalling Squares (both well worth visiting)!
Completely shocked by those confessions - it’s practically in your backyards!
An image of a person with a pushchair down a residential street near inconsiderately parked cars. The person is wearing striped clothing and walking past a black car. The setting includes brick buildings and a view of houses on a hill in the background.
It's happening! 📢
On Tuesday, MPs will consider an amendment to enable local leaders to ban pavement parking in their area. We need you to help us get this amendment on to the Bill.
Ask your MP to agree to Amendment 265 when it's considered on Tuesday: https://bitly.livingstreets.org.uk/4tMU2Uq
As the article says:
“According to @wheelsforwellbeing.org.uk width requirement for cycle tracks for disabled people is 2m for 1-way tracks & 3m for 2-way tracks. This is the same as is the width requirement for cycle tracks in the Government’s guidelines on cycle infrastructure design (LTN1/20).”
“Enhanced traffic flow planning will help visitors leave the site more easily.”
Visitors could also walk; cycle (any parking?); get the Metro or take a bus on a very busy route - why no mention of these by the operator?
@mikecookson.bsky.social
@junasathian.bsky.social
@northeastptug.bsky.social
Retweeting as aside from being a comprehensive guide (with one caveat) - the pics are from the NE’s own Whitley Bay!
The caveat is that there is no mention of a childback tandem - cargo bikes might grab all the attention, but tandems are a lot of fun and (at least 2nd hand) are much cheaper.
This is a really interesting article - but there’s no need for the question in the title - cycles are a mobility aid & this needs to be recognised more.
Street bins
Street bins
Our multi storey car parks are under utilised, and driving around looking for an on street parking bay just adds to congestion.
Lack of delivery bays and taxi bays leads to poor driver behaviour when picking up or dropping off.
And don't get me started on the bins. Get them in enclosures!
Strongly agree with this. Newcastle should start a kerbside audit, deciding on the best use for that valuable task estate.
Every space could be a loading bay, taxi bay, disabled bay, tree pit, a SUDs, a bin store, cycle locker, bike lane, bus lane, a car charging bay, a car club bay.
Or a cafe.
The sad thing about that is that people believe it’s a viable solution & it wastes so much time delaying more effective measures. There are real costs for such time-wasting to people’s health.
Here there’s been talk of aligning traffic lights for years with no obvious signs of success.
We may regret this but we really have to ask - what were they?!?
We’ve heard of some strange things in a decade of taking an interest in air pollution, but that has to be one of the weirdest.
We have that debate too - even though we have an annual blog looking at local collisions that shows just how bad local standards of driving are.
The tragedy of the whataboutery is that it leads to objections to much needed road safety improvements.
That sounds like the old Newcastle air pollution plan.
It didn’t work - so we got the CAZ in the city centre & we onlyvhave 1 lane for cars on Gosforth High Streets (reduced from 2 - now a bus lane & a car lane). The Gosforth AQMA is now going to ve revoked & the city centre levels are much lower.
Hopefully franchising will help with integrating the bus & rail - at present the Northumberland Line competes with the express buses.
Despite those issues, the Line is still a phenomenal success & shows the demand for rail.
www.northumberlandgazette.co.uk/travel/counc...
It’s a lot of money & there are other projects for traffic in Blyth that aren’t being funded - one is a railway line that would run via our Gosforth to the airport via several workplaces.
There’s also an interesting objection that the traffic figures date from 2023 & don’t include impact of the Northumberland Line: a line so popular that they are having to add extra carriages! Again, this would make an interesting investigation for @chroniclelive.co.uk
@northeastptug.bsky.social
Strong statement from the planner:
“Everything is telling you that this will alleviate the congestion coming into Blyth. We’re saying it will work – there is nothing to tell us that it won’t other than speculation on your part.”
Hopefully @chroniclelive.co.uk will investigate later if she is right.
A bar chart with three columns. Road: 1051.8km Footway: 1416.8km Cycleway: 36km
📊 Newcastle has 1051.8km of roads, 1416.8km of footway, but only 36km of cycleway.
🚲 The city's safe cycling infrastructure is 3.42% the length of the road network.
🗣️ When you speak to candidates standing in next month's elections ask them if they support safe cycling for the whole city.
I think you saw my link to the sentencing guidelines.
I'm aware of that case which is in the report I wrote last year. I agree it warranted a life ban. Only one case that year resulted in a lifetime ban - the prison sentence was 1 year longer than Anderson's.
This is a great writeup about an exploratory walk along a lost rail line in County Durham from Ferryhill to Bishop Auckland.
It's a shame that these routes are lost and not even accessible by foot or cycle wheel.
northeastbylines.co.uk/news/environ...
📅Earlier this year the Government announced local councils would receive new powers to prohibit pavement parking.
🔎We took a look at the damage pavement parking causes in Heaton
🔗 www.spaceforheaton.com/a-year-in-th...
🗣️With elections next month, ask your candidates what they'll do about this.
Adding these lost lines to the NCN would be such a great project for the NE as it would just open up the county for people & would be great for tourism. Some might even get the railway reinstated (it happened in Sunderland).
Why don’t judges ban for life? Asking as there was an utterly horrific & heartbreaking crash on the A1(M) killing an aunt & baby nephew where the family of the victims has a petition asking for life bans.
(Also v interesting article esp as this subject great concern to our members).
The law on dangerous driving is confusing because most have lost an understanding of what minimum driving standards look like.
(Not my choice of headline)
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
3. Also as a side issue, politicians of all parties need to start talking & listening about Newcastle’s lack of public toilets as this is seen by residents as important re accessibility.
As well as the Regent Centre, this concern led to many complaints about the Exi & PF park cafe closures.
2. - public toilets are seen as a necessity
- people liked the idea of a cafe: for what it could serve; for enabling toilets & for making the Regent Centre feel safer
- also interest in the @senrug.bsky.social Blyth-Airport plan which would pass through the airport.
There’s lots of interest.
1. We have had a lot of interest in posts on our FB pages about this. Comments include:
- concern re antisocial behaviour at the Regent Centre & wanting this to be tackled
- people like that the roof is a landmark & keeps them dry (this doesn’t necessarily mean that we need to keep it)…
Morning!
If you’re someone who loves walking/cycling & history, I’ve built a walking planner & companion for the website.
You put where you want to walk, and it will automatically pop up with historic sites from our project and of listed structures.
Let me explain a bit more!
