Get Glasgow Moving’s response to SPT’s consultation

Guest blog

Ellie Harrison, GoBike member and Chair of Get Glasgow Moving, shares her view about SPT’s Regional Active Travel Strategy consultation which closes this Sunday 1 September.

Featured image: ‘Dutch’-style junction on protected cycleway – West Mains Rd/Torrance Rd, by East Kilbride train station, South Lanarkshire (Sept 2023).

The Regional ATS sets out three ambitious targets which are meant to be delivered by 2030:

• Target 1: By 2030, car kilometres in the region will be reduced by at least 20%.
• Target 2: By 2030, transport emissions will be reduced by at least 53% from the 2019 baseline.
• Target 3: By 2030, at least 45% of all journeys will be made by means other than the private car as the main mode (p.31).

Yet the Strategy itself runs to 2038 with many of the proposed interventions being ‘long-term’ in that they won’t be fully-delivered until the end of the Strategy’s term. It is therefore highly unlikely that these three targets will be met by 2030 without proper investment and an accelerated delivery plan.

Cost of Transport

In order to achieve modal shift to sustainable forms of transport on the scale that is necessary by 2030, the cost of transport must be regulated. This is so that it aligns with the ‘Sustainable Travel Hierarchy’ which is the guiding principle of both Transport Scotland’s NTS2 and SPT’s Regional ATS (p.25). This means ensuring that cycle hire is always cheaper than public transport, and that public transport is always considerably cheaper than taxis and private car use.

In order to deliver this, it is vital that SPT takes over the governance of the cycle hire scheme (currently managed by Glasgow City Council and run by German company NextBike/Tier). Transport for London (TfL) and Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) already run the schemes in their respective city-regions. It is essential that we have one consistent cycle hire scheme rolled out across the whole of Strathclyde (not a hotchpotch of various schemes). This is so that commuters by rail or bus from one local authority to another can easily use bikes at either end of their journey.

“Only a fully-integrated system… will be capable of delivering modal shift on the scale we need to see.”

Ellie Harrison, Get Glasgow Moving

SPT governance of the cycle hire scheme should ensure it can deliver an integrated payment system across all modes, with an affordable daily price cap. Provided that the region’s bus network (and its suburban rail network) is also brought under SPT’s control – as is the ambition of the concurrent Regional Bus Strategy. SPT could also deliver an integrated journey planning app (like TfGM’s new Bee Network app) which shows cycle hire stations and availability alongside bus/tram routes, stops and live timetables. It recommends the quickest/cheapest multi-modal journey from A to B. This is what is required to achieve SPT’s stated aim of “Integrating Walking, Wheeling and Cycling with Public Transport” (p.33). And it’s only a fully-integrated system, like that currently being rolled out by TfGM, which will be capable of delivering modal shift on the scale we need to see.

In order to “promote and incentivise active travel” (p.39) it is also vital that people using their own bikes do not face additional costs – i.e. secure cycle storage should always be provided free of charge.

Access

In terms of “Promotion, Travel Behaviour Change, and Information” (p.39-40) it is important to prioritise schools, where we have the opportunity to normalise cycling for all young people as they are growing up. Every child in every school in Strathclyde should complete Bikeability training and be able to borrow a bike from their school to use on a daily basis. This policy should be looked at in conjunction with the local authorities’ and SPT’s statutory duty to provide free transport to schools. It may be possible to save costs and deliver better health outcomes if some of this is done by active travel, particularly if organised on mass as a ‘Bike Bus’.

The normalisation of active travel will only truly happen as a generational shift, which is why it is vital to focus on education and training for children and young people. Alongside building the Regional Active Travel Network, this is what will make cycling safe and accessible to all.

SPT Board

The Regional ATS is an important document. Its aim to create a “regional active travel network which is safe and attractive for all users, and that offers an inclusive way for people to travel actively regardless of age, gender, or disability” (p.34) will be transformational for Strathclyde if/when it’s fully delivered. It is therefore a serious concern that SPT’s Board members do not appear to have read the Strategy or to understand the vital role that active travel plays in any fully-integrated public transport system. Recent comments from SPT Board members in Strategy & Programmes Committee meetings bemoaned the amount of Scottish Government funding going into active travel. This is despite the fact millions of pounds of this funding is now being channelled through SPT! These illustrate that senior figures like the Chair and Vice Chairs seem to be ignorant of this area, which threatens to undermine the delivery of the Strategy.

In order to overcome this, two urgent actions are necessary:

1. To use the spare capacity for appointed members on the SPT Board (currently only 7 out of a possible 9 seats are filled) to bring in people with specific expertise in active travel (i.e. representatives from GoBike, Cycling Scotland or Sustrans), and,
2. To ensure all SPT Board members undertake Bikeability training. As far as we are aware, there are only two current Board members (Cllr John Ross from South Lanarkshire, and Cllr Christy Mearns from Glasgow) who have any experience of cycling and/or use a bike as their main mode of transport. Such training can be done in an inclusive way by using fully-accessible bikes like those available at Free Wheel North, and will be vital for enabling Board members to properly appreciate the problems with current active travel provision and the need for urgent investment.

Despite the clear ambition set out in the Strategy, SPT currently lacks any visible leadership in active travel. And so when the Regional Bus Strategy and the Regional ATS are ready for implementation, SPT should also seek to adopt the delivery model being deployed by TfGM with two high-profile and qualified Commissioners. In Greater Manchester, Dame Sarah Storey as the Active Travel Commissioner works alongside Vernon Everitt as the Transport Commissioner (overseeing bus franchising). They are able to give an equal platform to the different sustainable transport modes and to oversee and ensure total integration across them.