15. Reflecting on the Cycling Demonstration Towns

In the fading daylight, we retire to a quayside pub for a well-earned beer. I feel knackered. When Zsolt traces the route we’ve taken on a copy of the Exeter Cycle Map I see why – we’ve basically done a complete circumnavigation of the city, along with lots and lots of twiddly bits. Zsolt looks like he could carry on forever, which he probably will. I’m glad about that; cycling needs him.

There’s a growing sense of solidarity between us. After all, we’re soldiering on the same side, even if we’re playing different roles. Zsolt gets things done, I think and criticise. He’s the goodie, I’m the baddie. He’s the pragmatist, I’m the idealist. I know that I’d be crap at his job, whereas he’s clearly exceptionally good at it. But whatever else we may or may not be, we’re both cyclists, and in this together, doing the best we can. Maybe it’s that increased familiarity, maybe the sociologist in me brings out the muse in him, maybe it’s the late hour, fatigue or beer – whatever it is, we shift to a more reflective mood.

Reflection, for Zsolt, is a rare luxury. With just three years in which to make a difference, everything’s happening really fast, so fast there’s no time to think. Cycle Exeter is just doing, getting on with the job. He hopes that thought has already happened, somewhere else. Of course, he’d like more time to reflect, but he recognises that’s not what the demo town project is about. He’s conscious mistakes could, quite possible will, be made. But he seems reasonably relaxed about that. Confidence must come from knowing that Exeter’s widely regarded as doing well, from knowing you’re leading the leader of the pack.

What, I ask Zsolt, are the biggest challenges?

“I think it’s sustaining the commitment and investment once the project’s finished”.

I ask whether they’re seeking follow-on funding. Zsolt’s answer is more sophisticated. He sees building on Exeter’s time as a demo town as about more than money. It’s about entrenching a pro-cycling culture into the city. Here’s Zsolt’s real strength. He’s not like me, always looking for the ‘radical’ option. He’s much more interested in assembling a pro-cycling city, bit-by-bit.

“There’s lots we can do”, he says. “There’s planning guidance, stuff to do with securing developer  contributions. We can make sure that at the end of the project, that’s the best it can be. So in years to come, if we don’t get additional funding, we can be sure our engineers know how to design best practice.

“Then, last year we had an event in Bike Week called Cycle Sunday. This year we’re getting it sponsored by a solicitor’s company. Next year they want to take over the organisation. So that should be sustained.”

I’m impressed.

“Then, there’s a big mountain bike park up towards Dartmoor, Haldon Forest Park. One of the local bike shops ran an event up there. We helped with publicity, making posters. That’s what we want to do really, get projects off the ground, start making it a virtuous cycle. So eventually, we won’t have to do anything”.

“As long as you get people cycling. At the end of the project if I found out that nobody knew about the cycling demonstration town project, but there were more people cycling, then it’s a success. It’s not about ‘have you heard of Cycle Exeter?’, or anything like that”.

And what’s Zsolt’s vision? What does he want Exeter to look like ten years from now?

These questions throw him slightly, as though they’re not the kinds of things he spends his time thinking about. He suddenly seems younger, less sure of himself, less the consummate professional.

Off his usual turf, Zsolt improvises a response. “I think that cycling helps engender a culture of vitality and vibrancy … It’s just about people realising that, you know, basically cycling can make your life a bit better, really”.

I’d applaud this response from a man-in-the-street. I’d accept it from most city or county councillors. But coming from the Project Manager of the most highly regarded of the cycling demonstration towns, it strikes me as a bit, well, illiterate I suppose. So I persist. These questions are important, to me anyway.

“So what proportion of all journeys do you think, potentially, could be made by bike in Exeter?”

“I haven’t got a clue!”

I try again. Government talks of increasing cycling by 20%, that’s seen as ambitious. We need to start talking about increasing cycling to 20% of all journeys, which would be a start.

“Could it be 20%? Could it be Copenhagen levels, 30%?”

“I don’t know really”.

Zsolt tells me that one area of Exeter already has 8% of journeys by bike, which, considering it also has the biggest concentration of car dealerships in Europe, “is pretty good”.

“I don’t know about Copenhagen levels”, he goes on. “If there was ten years of investment, you know. But in three years, you can’t expect that. And Cycling England is already lobbying the Government, to say that three years isn’t enough. We can start to see growth, but …”.

I prompt him in what I think’s the right direction. “The context  has changed, hasn’t it, since the demonstration town project was launched? Climate change is now there on the political agenda, in a big way”.

“Exactly”, he says, sounding relieved. “Sitting behind me in my office is one of, I think, only two Climate Change Officers for local authorities in the country. There’s a big push, there’s an advert on telly at the moment, about ‘Doing it for Devon’, this campaign to make Devon the greenest authority. So I got pulled into the advert to make sure there was a good cycling element in there. Probably as an authority, we’re three or four years ahead of a few of the others”.

Local authorities are tuning into climate change. Yet they’re still not tackling the causes of climate change. A recent Government report on cycling notes how 56% of all car journeys are under five miles. Imagine wiping out those car journeys at a stroke – over half of all car movements suddenly gone, our towns and cities suddenly full of cycling silence, except for the sound of tinkling bells.

If you’re less idealistic, imagine the one quarter of all car journeys which are under two miles disappearing, overnight, into cycling. Such imagining isn’t insane – it’s what’s led the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden and Germany to change course. So why isn’t Britain following? Why are we still so far behind? Talk about a future of mass cycling here and people tend to respond with obstacles – rain, hills, fear, bagfuls of shopping, children, complicated journeys. Perhaps elsewhere people are better at seeing not obstacles, but opportunities – safe, sane, quiet streets, fresh air, exercise, a renewal of their town and their relationships with it.

To genuinely promote cycling, there has to be enlightened visions of how mass cycling can produce much better lives, streets, communities, cities – a much better society and a viable planet – coming from the highest level of government. I’ll say it again, we need the Prime Minister to move by bike. Such leadership must influence discussion, debate and ‘buy-in’, all the way through to the child whose parents, their confidence boosted that they really are doing ‘the right thing’, now let her ride to school.

The Netherlands and Denmark are getting there, it’s even looking a little like London might be getting there, but on the whole it feels to me like Exeter has not got there, yet.

Exeter’s project is a pragmatic one. It’s very unrevolutionary aim is simply ‘to make Exeter a cycle friendly city’. Given the limited funding available, that’s understandable. Given Zsolt’s workload, it’s understandable. Above all, given the lack of vision from on high, pushing our cities in a dramatically more sustainable direction, it’s understandable.

Cycling England is doing the best it can. Cycle Exeter is doing the best it can. Zsolt is doing the best he can. I’m certainly not knocking him – he works for the Government and he’s following the Government line, doing the very best he can within the situation he finds himself. But I fear it’s not good enough. If the best of the cycling demo towns isn’t aiming for at least half of all local journeys by bike, what hope is there?

Actually, to be honest, I’m angry. The demo towns are being dressed up as pioneering ‘best practice’, as setting examples worth following. Yet they’re trying to promote cycling without disturbing a single car driver. Not only does that not wash, it’s an outrage – because it’s a betrayal of cycling’s potential. We should be moving beyond the car. We must move beyond the car. We have some good intentions, but it’s time to start changing our behaviours. It’s time for politicians, policy-makers, engineers and planners to facilitate that behaviour change, by changing theirs. They should be leading the way, not be feeling paralysed by fears of being seen to be blocking people’s inalienable right to drive.

This is no trifle. Our children’s futures, their lives, are at stake. It’s life and death stuff, for people, for communities, for cities and for the planet. So we need to be bold. Time is not on our side. If we want to change the faces of our cities and towns, which after all form the world which we all must continually confront, for the better, then we must be hard. We must reappraise priorities, reschedule commitments, make tough decisions, create better futures.

I love feeling the beauty of encroaching darkness from the saddle of a bicycle. I feel it now, as I pedal the day’s last couple of miles down river to the youth hostel. The outlines of the trees grow dimmer against the darkening sky, the jibbering hubbub of the estuary’s birds fades down to the occasional twitterings of those last few home to roost. The wind of the day has dropped to the stillness of dusk.

There’s no one about. It’s almost eerie. Perhaps the atmosphere is accentuated by my sense of disquiet – about what I’ve seen happening to cycling in Exeter, which is demonstrating what could happen across the country. It’s nagging at me now. I like Zsolt very much. He’s a good man doing a job he believes in, to the very best of his ability. Perhaps we’re very similar, Zsolt and me – we both want more for cycling than we’re individually able to deliver. Love of cycling, I decide, through my hunger and tiredness, is about recognising its unfulfilled potential, to make our own lives – and the lives of others – almost perfect.

Advertisement