Bradford Cycle Lane

[growingvegetables]

.... it's a dud.

I'm not going to let you off with that .

1. Nobody's forcing you to stop, push buttons, and wait! Your commute, your call. Use it, use bits, don't use it - no worries. (I will point out that the buttons to push are at traffic lights, where you may well hit a red anyway.)

Fastest way from my front door to ticket machine in Leeds Station - York Road. Before CSH was ever dreamed of, I could do it in just under 20 minutes. This morning? Using CSH/their roadworks () for uphills (when I am slow), and out on the road for the downhills (me mixing in with the traffic, riding at 15, 20, 25mph)? Bang on 18 minutes. No difference in time - but hugely more pleasant on my slow uphills .

2. "Leisure cyclists are not going to use it anyway." Not sure what you mean?

- that nobody in their right mind goes for a scenic, leisure ride from Seacroft to Bradford, via Armley? TRUE. Oh most definitely true. But is isn't designed as that - it's just a reasonably practical "spine" that people might use bits of, as suits their needs. And it works as that (pretty well, with caveats; see below).

- or literally, that leisure cyclists won't use it? Sorry, but ...... this weekend or next, anything up to 6 or 7 in the family may take the train to New Pudsey, and take in a leisurely 3.5 mile ride to Bradford Industrial Museum. Brilliant destination - and just SO easy. "We" include everybody from me and son #2 (5-6000 miles pa, battle-hardened road warriors), through to son #1's girlfriend, who only learned to ride a couple of months ago and has done 1 x 10 mile country-lane and bridleway ride; maybe even to ex-partner trying out her trike.

We would not have contemplated such a social ride along the pre-CSH 6-lane, 40mph dual carriageway!

And from the number of slow riders I saw on Saturday, we won't be the only ones to use little bits of it!

3. With all that, there ARE bits that do not work.

- The Stanningley "shared space" is a nightmare. IMHO, the remodelled junction works pretty well, but the "shared" approaches/exits are a ******* nightmare; one fast, impatient, close pass after another. Not helped at all by the fact that the cyclists are "dumped" without any warning into the main speed-monkeys' traffic lane. Thank the Stanningley NIMBYs for that little disaster.

Hey - but it sure as hell makes one appreciate the leisurely miles one has ridden! Having conversations, spotting interesting buildings and views! WITHOUT having had to focus on the million and one, second-by second calculations, assertions, and safety calls of the road.

- The ring-road junction has not been improved at all; there was little point, given that the whole junction is to be remodelled/rebuilt fairly soon (we are talking "planners' soon" - a rather longer perspective than you or me ).

- And the "Mike's Carpets" junction in Armley is just a disaster. Needs demolition and restarting from scratch. No amount of money poured into it will improve on the installation of the toucans westbound.

[Unfortunately, they spent money on it.

This is what it WAS. It is now very significantly MORE dangerous. Unbelievably so. Sorry, I was so ******* shocked by how incredibly badly that painted red strip has been "improved", I didn't take a photo.]​

Hey - but that's something you can do something about. Go and see it - and add your complaint to mine (and I suspect many others) before somebody gets killed there. And with respect - a wee bit more useful than writing the whole thing off as "a dud".

 

[Pete Owens]

I am curious why this thread seems to be going on so long (14 pages spanning over a year). A crap cycle lane is hardly news. From the photos it seems to be entirely typical - no worse or better than thousands of others up and down the country - OK it has featured twice in Facility of the Month, but then it is quite long so there is plenty of opportunity for absurdiy. So why so much discussion about this particular lane?

 

[MarkF]

I'm not going to let you off with that .

1. Nobody's forcing you to stop, push buttons, and wait! Your commute, your call. Use it, use bits, don't use it - no worries. (I will point out that the buttons to push are at traffic lights, where you may well hit a red anyway.)

Fastest way from my front door to ticket machine in Leeds Station - York Road. Before CSH was ever dreamed of, I could do it in just under 20 minutes. This morning? Using CSH/their roadworks () for uphills (when I am slow), and out on the road for the downhills (me mixing in with the traffic, riding at 15, 20, 25mph)? Bang on 18 minutes. No difference in time - but hugely more pleasant on my slow uphills .

2. "Leisure cyclists are not going to use it anyway." Not sure what you mean?

- that nobody in their right mind goes for a scenic, leisure ride from Seacroft to Bradford, via Armley? TRUE. Oh most definitely true. But is isn't designed as that - it's just a reasonably practical "spine" that people might use bits of, as suits their needs. And it works as that (pretty well, with caveats; see below).

- or literally, that leisure cyclists won't use it? Sorry, but ...... this weekend or next, anything up to 6 or 7 in the family may take the train to New Pudsey, and take in a leisurely 3.5 mile ride to Bradford Industrial Museum. Brilliant destination - and just SO easy. "We" include everybody from me and son #2 (5-6000 miles pa, battle-hardened road warriors), through to son #1's girlfriend, who only learned to ride a couple of months ago and has done 1 x 10 mile country-lane and bridleway ride; maybe even to ex-partner trying out her trike.

We would not have contemplated such a social ride along the pre-CSH 6-lane, 40mph dual carriageway!

And from the number of slow riders I saw on Saturday, we won't be the only ones to use little bits of it!

3. With all that, there ARE bits that do not work.

- The Stanningley "shared space" is a nightmare. IMHO, the remodelled junction works pretty well, but the "shared" approaches/exits are a ******* nightmare; one fast, impatient, close pass after another. Not helped at all by the fact that the cyclists are "dumped" without any warning into the main speed-monkeys' traffic lane. Thank the Stanningley NIMBYs for that little disaster.

Hey - but it sure as hell makes one appreciate the leisurely miles one has ridden! Having conversations, spotting interesting buildings and views! WITHOUT having had to focus on the million and one, second-by second calculations, assertions, and safety calls of the road.

- The ring-road junction has not been improved at all; there was little point, given that the whole junction is to be remodelled/rebuilt fairly soon (we are talking "planners' soon" - a rather longer perspective than you or me ).

- And the "Mike's Carpets" junction in Armley is just a disaster. Needs demolition and restarting from scratch. No amount of money poured into it will improve on the installation of the toucans westbound.

[Unfortunately, they spent money on it.

This is what it WAS. It is now very significantly MORE dangerous. Unbelievably so. Sorry, I was so ******* shocked by how incredibly badly that painted red strip has been "improved", I didn't take a photo.]​

Hey - but that's something you can do something about. Go and see it - and add your complaint to mine (and I suspect many others) before somebody gets killed there. And with respect - a wee bit more useful than writing the whole thing off as "a dud".

Not interested, ridden it more than once, won't again, I'll use the road because it's a dud.

 

[classic33]

I am curious why this thread seems to be going on so long (14 pages spanning over a year). A crap cycle lane is hardly news. From the photos it seems to be entirely typical - no worse or better than thousands of others up and down the country - OK it has featured twice in Facility of the Month, but then it is quite long so there is plenty of opportunity for absurdiy. So why so much discussion about this particular lane?

Because two councils pushed the idea that this lane would end cycling on the road between the two cities. Despite the opinions of many out there.

 

[NorthernDave]

I am curious why this thread seems to be going on so long (14 pages spanning over a year). A crap cycle lane is hardly news. From the photos it seems to be entirely typical - no worse or better than thousands of others up and down the country - OK it has featured twice in Facility of the Month, but then it is quite long so there is plenty of opportunity for absurdiy. So why so much discussion about this particular lane?

In addition to what @classic33 has said, probably because of the huge amount of money that is being spent on it, because parts of it are so horrendously bad that is difficult to believe that anyone who has ever ridden a bike has been allowed any input and because it's more than 6 months past the opening date and there are still sections that haven't even been started yet..?
That's just 3 reasons off the top of my head.

Edit to add one more - that the people behind it have articles in the local media almost every day telling everyone how great it is, despite the above...

 

[glenn forger]

This is a two-way section:

http://westleedsdispatch.com/cycle-superhighway-safari-mixed-response-social-media/

 

[Roadrider48]

I hope the bus stop never gets busy.

 

[mjr]

1. Nobody's forcing you to stop, push buttons, and wait! Your commute, your call. Use it, use bits, don't use it - no worries. (I will point out that the buttons to push are at traffic lights, where you may well hit a red anyway.)

Indeed. Also, unless the design is unusual, the push-button crossing red light will be advisory (red bike+man or just red man) rather than compulsory (red circle or red bike on its own with amber/green aspects below) so you might still get across more quickly sometimes if the crossing has good enough visibility to see if the road is clear - which it ought, to give you a better chance when motorists jump red lights, but bizarrely not all do.

To answer @Pete Owens - I think one reason this one attracts such criticism is that it's worse than most of the Cycle City Ambition projects and it's a very visually-obvious back-to-the-80s kind of substandard rubbish on a large scale. The only larger sibling project was Manchester's and "Velocity" was spread across the whole urban area rather than on one route. West Yorks also called theirs a "cycling superhighway" which invited comparisons with the new NS and EW ones in London which shames them.

 

[MarkF]

This is a two-way section:

http://westleedsdispatch.com/cycle-superhighway-safari-mixed-response-social-media/

This comment resonates with me:- "It's exactly the kind of design which has led to deaths and anti-cycleway sentiment here in Germany".

As I posted earlier, I took my Australian cousin up it, a full on helmet wearing, hi-viz safety guy and yet, by mile 2 he was begging to ride on the ring road in the traffic.

 

[classic33]

As I posted earlier, I took my Australian cousin up it, a full on helmet wearing, hi-viz safety guy and yet, by mile 2 he was begging to ride on the ring road in the traffic.

Tell him its use is compulsory!!

 

[NorthernDave]

In addition to what @classic33 has said, probably because of the huge amount of money that is being spent on it, because parts of it are so horrendously bad that is difficult to believe that anyone who has ever ridden a bike has been allowed any input and because it's more than 6 months past the opening date and there are still sections that haven't even been started yet..?
That's just 3 reasons off the top of my head.

Edit to add one more - that the people behind it have articles in the local media almost every day telling everyone how great it is, despite the above...

@Pete Owens I've just remembered another couple of points -
About 8 or 9 years ago, there was a scheme on the LCC website, in conjunction with Sustrans (if I remember correctly), to re-open the former railway line from Cross Gates all the way to Wetherby as a cycle route and tie in with the NCN (R66 passes very close to Cross Gates, R655 - I think - is at Wetherby).
This was going to cost massively less per km than the CSH (which is costing around £1million/km, if it comes in on budget, which seems unlikely), but got quietly shelved and I've been unable to find a trace of it since about the time the council started touting plans for an "Outer Outer Ring Road" from Red Hall across to Colton "to support the regeneration of east Leeds".
The other thing, which is a wider societal point, is that LCC have been tantalising the people of east Leeds with promises of a mass transit system since (at least) the early 80's, when plans were first published to install a monorail. Since then we've seen £millions spent on studies, plans, compulsory land purchases and goodness knows what else for various schemes and not one of them has seen the light of day. We did briefly see bendy buses, but they only lasted a few years and are now just a faded memory.

The fact is that LCC has a horrendous track record on pretty much every type of transport project and the CSH seems to sum it all up in one huge omnishambes.

 

[classic33]

Off-Topic, The monorail was it supposed to run out York Road as well as parts of the city centre?

 

[NorthernDave]

Off-Topic, The monorail was it supposed to run out York Road as well as parts of the city centre?

The monorail was going to run from the city centre right out to Seacroft (and possibly another route to the south of the city?). It was certainly intended to serve a large percentage of the population that the CSH is now meant to attract onto their bikes, so on that basis I'd say it's relevant background info to question and the subject of transport projects on this side of Leeds.

 

[classic33]

That'd have been from the old bus station, which is why it was retained in the city city centre. Leeds library got the plans from the West Yorkshire Transport Executive for this period.

Current bus station is what came second in the 60's, Ignoring the coach park added on in recent years.

 

[NorthernDave]

Quick update. The current official opening date for the Whinmoor/Seacroft* - Leeds section was Monday 18th July.

Unsurprisingly it's still nowhere near finished and there are still significant sections where work still hasn't even started (Shaftesbury junction outbound, the outbound section opposite Seacroft Hospital all the way to the Melbourne roundabout, for example). Where work is being carried out it is at a such a glacial pace it is difficult to establish if anything is actually being done day to day.

* - I say Whinmoor / Seacroft as no-one seems clear where it starts. The official signs indicates that the route starts on Barwick Rd at the junction with the A6120, but the route actually continues up Stocks Rd, Hansby Drive, across Seacroft Gate, through the subways under the Windmill roundabout and along York Road to (at least) around the Baildon Drive junction...