Westminster Cycling Strategy

Appendix 3 Westminster Cycling Strategy: Consultation Report November 2014 2 Contents Page Executive Summary ……………………………………………………………… 5 1: Consultation details …………………………………………………………... 7 2: Profile of respondents ………………………………………………………... 10 3: Barriers to cycling and overall priorities ………………………………........ 13 4: Creating safer and more attractive routes (Strategy Objective A) ............ 17 5: Improving interaction between different users (Strategy Objective B)...... 24 6: Enabling bike ownership, storage and parking (Strategy Objective C)..... 29 7: Raising awareness and participation (Strategy Objective D) ………........ 32 Appendices Appendix 1 - Consultation summary and questionnaire Appendix 2 - List of organisations emailed a link to the consultation Appendix 3 - Summary of web coverage Appendix 4 - Media timeline of related stories Appendix 5 - Summary of written responses Appendix 6 - LCC response Appendix 7 - Summary of route specific issues raised and the Council’s response to these Appendix 8 - Map showing spread of comments on the Cycle Grid 3 4 Executive Summary A total of 1936 responses were received to the consultation, made up of 1875 questionnaire responses and a further 61 written responses (emails/letters). The response rate for this consultation is significantly higher than most other consultations run by the Council, indicating the degree of importance that many residents and visitors to Westminster attach to cycling as an issue. It may also be linked to the prominence of cycling and cycle safety issues in London in the weeks leading up to the consultation, during which six cyclists were killed on London’s streets between Tuesday 5th November and Monday 18th November. Respondent profile 67% of respondents to the consultation were male. There was a reasonable spread of ages within the 25-54 age group who made up 75% of responses. 25% of respondents were Westminster residents, 50% work in Westminster and much of the remainder pass through it. This profile mirrors that of the average cyclist within Westminster, and indeed 71% of respondents cycle at least once a week, a further 15% cycle once to three times a month and 13% never cycle. Those who do not cycle are more likely to be female, older and residents of Westminster. Barriers and priorities Of those who responded the most frequently cited barriers were lack of cycle route infrastructure (35%), safety (26%) and traffic volume / congestion (20%). Other common barriers were lack of cycle parking (13%) and road user behaviour (12%). Many of these barriers will be tackled by the proposed actions in the strategy. In terms of the relative importance given to different objectives within the strategy, 98% considered making Westminster safer for road users to be important. 91% felt that it was important for the Council to help different road users get on better together (i.e. through improved enforcement and education/training). 63% felt that supporting residents to own and maintain their own bikes (through improved cycle parking, cycle hire etc) was important. Safer and More Legible routes Making improvements to road junctions/accident blackspots and introducing a central London Cycle Grid were considered to be the greatest priorities by respondents, by a considerable margin (82%, 74% and 64% respectively). There was a reasonable level of support for the proposed cycle grid routes, with 37% indicating support for the alignments, but only 12% suggesting it was unacceptable. When asked if they had other suggestions for creating safer routes, dedicated space for cycling and /or segregation was mentioned by 49% and actions to address inconsiderate road behaviour (such as increased enforcement and training/education) were also felt to be important. Other common suggestions included a desire to see lower speeds (including 20mph limits) amongst 12% of respondents, HGV restrictions (5%) and more Advanced Stop Lines (5%). A range of comments were made in relation to specific cycle grid routes. Road user interaction 5 When asked to consider potential approaches that the Council could adopt in order to encourage good relationships among road users, those seen as important by the highest proportions of respondents were those that related specifically to the conduct of larger vehicles: just under two thirds (64%) of respondents felt that establishing a working relationship with TfL in order to provide training programmes for lorry drivers was among the three most important actions that the Council could take, while 59% felt that this was the case with regard to providing vehicle safety and cyclist awareness training for fleet drivers as part of council contracts. 57% felt that the rules of the road should be more strictly enforced. 56% felt that campaign work encouraging safer and more responsible sharing of the roads is important. These results are unsurprising given the timing of the consultation in relation to the spate of cyclists involved in serious/fatal collisions with HGVs. It is worth noting that only a fifth of respondents had undertaken any formal cycle training and almost 300 consultees said they would like to sign up for cycle training. Bike ownership and storage Respondents are very clear in terms of how they feel that the Council could best support residents in this regard: 84% felt that the provision of a greater number of secure facilities in which to store bikes was among the most important actions that the Council could take in order to facilitate bike ownership. This was followed by 43% of respondents who thought the promotion of cycle security and marking should be a priority. 31% of respondents thought that offering courses in bicycle maintenance was important, and 30% considered the expansion of cycle hire into the rest of Westminster an important action. Encouraging more people to cycle When asked to consider potential approaches that the Council could adopt in order to encourage cycling in the City, respondents were most likely to highlight the promotion of cycle to school schemes (58%), incentives to encourage people to cycle more regularly (51%) and campaigns (43%). A number of respondents commented that the Council should adopt a balanced approach when targeting people to take up cycling – i.e. not just focusing resources on the ‘near market’, but also those that are harder to reach who are more likely to reap greater benefits as a result. Amendments to the strategy A number of amendments have been made to the Cycling Strategy and Cycle Grid to reflect the comments made by consultees. These are summarised at the end of each of sections 4- 7 of this consultation report. 6 1: Consultation details This chapter of the report explains the background to the consultation on the Draft Westminster Cycling Strategy and the methodology used to run the consultation. It details the types and names of the organisations that were consulted; the publicity undertaken by the Council, the press coverage received and other engagement activities. 1.1 Background 1.1.1 For many years Westminster has developed policies and delivered schemes to support and encourage cycling as a mode of travel, in recognition of the health, air quality, economic and other benefits it can bring to individuals, the wider community and environment, as set out in the Westminster City Plan: Strategic Policies (November 2013). 1.1.2 As part of the City Council’s Better City Better Lives programme the Council committed to producing a walking and cycling strategy. However, it was decided that although these two modes of transport share many similarities they can have very different impacts on the built environment and can often conflict, especially on Westminster’s complex, busy, urban network. The growing number of people choosing to cycle within Westminster and the need to have a strategy that caters for this growth alongside the publication of the Mayor’s Vision for Cycling (launched in March 2013) therefore required a more local level response to cycling that takes account of Westminster’s unique circumstances and challenges. Westminster’s Draft Cycling Strategy sets out a ‘Vision for Cycling in Westminster’, explains how the Council intends to help deliver the Mayor’s Vision and is structured around four high level objectives; each with a series of actions to help deliver these objectives. Finally, a draft implementation plan and a monitoring plan are included. 1.1.3 In addition to informal consultation with a range of stakeholders, the Council ran a formal consultation on the draft Cycling Strategy from Tuesday 3rd December 2013 until 20th January 2014. This report provides an overview of the consultation activities undertaken by the Council, the responses received and how the Council will address the issues raised. 1.2 Methodology 1.2.1 The consultation materials included a suite of three main documents; the Draft Westminster Cycling Strategy, a set of supporting Appendices and a large plan showing the proposed Cycle Grid routes. A consultation summary and questionnaire was also produced to assist with the consultation (see Appendix 1). 1.2.2 These documents were published on the Council’s website at www.westminster.gov.uk/cyclingstrategy, where consultees could fill in an online survey. Hard copies of all documents were made available in all Westminster libraries. Additionally, hard copies of the consultation summary and questionnaires were also put on display in sports centres and other community venues. 7 1.2.3 The consultation was opened on 3 December 2013 and ran for seven weeks until 20 January 2014 when it closed. However, hard copy questionnaires and written responses were accepted until 24 January 2014. Late responses were accepted from two organisations, whose responses were considered to be of particular interest (TfL and the Royal Parks). 1.3 Promotion 1.3.1 On 3 December 2013 a link to the consultation document was emailed to a cross section of stakeholders with an interest in cycling in Westminster. A list of these organisations can be found in Appendix 2.

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