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Bricycles AGM on Tuesday 6 June at 6.30

This year’s AGM will be at the Crown and Anchor, 213 Preston Road, BN1 6SA.

Location: http://bit.ly/2qsKsYl Opposite Preston Manor at the northern end of Preston Park. Crown&Anchor

Website: https://www.thecrownandanchorinn.co.uk/

We’ll meet in the room at the back of the pub at 6.30 pm. There will be a review of the year and the election of officers. There are opportunities for more people to help with our activities.

We are looking for someone to take care of the website, posting relevant and topical content. We use WordPress which is fairly straightforward. Help also needed with general administration.

More Bricycles Rangers are always welcome. They keep an eye on riding conditions in Brighton and Hove. Can you cover a local area? Contact Tom Jones whatevers@brighton.gb.net

Are you interested in more social occasions, rides or meetings?

We hope to see you on 6th June!

Elm Grove Junction Update

“The message that everyone is trying to kill you outweighs some croissants from the Mayor on Cycle to Work day.”

Essential reading of the week is Dani Ahrens powerful and pertinent summary of the last leg in the journey of the petition which she started to seek improvements at the Elm grove Junction. The quote above is from the speech she made to the Environment, Transport & Sustainability Committee last week, and the full submission and her commentary can be found on her blog HERE

The response from the council to her petition of 781 signatures wanting improvements at this junction was – on the face of it – promising, with the council announcing that the junction will receive an upgrade in 2016/17,  but as the only detail given was the possibility of cycle advance signals, the suspicion is that the key problems with the junction will remain untouched. A suspicion backed up by another council ambition to “improve the efficiency of the junction” – some thing which Dani points out in her blog, can be a counter productive priority;

“I think it’s more important to make the road safer for people on bikes and on foot. In the long run, making roads feel safer for people travelling by bike is the best way to improve the efficiency of the road system. But the changes necessary to do that can’t be made if they have to happen without altering the existing capacity of junctions and roads to accommodate motor traffic.”

Also Dani is concerned that the suggestions made in her petition – for example introduction of a simultaneous green light phase for cyclists – have not been responded to, which may indicate that the council are reluctant to look beyond the limited palette of standard response to consider something more innovative or imaginative.

Whilst the council warn that they are working on a very tight schedule for this, and don’t have time or resources for a wide ranging consultation, they do invite contributions, and  if anyone would like to put forward suggestions then they are very welcome to do so by emailing Travel.Planning@brighton-hove.gov.uk. by November 1st.

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Improve Elm Grove – Petition

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Back in July, following an incident where a cyclist was hit and injured by a left turning lorry at the Brighton Elm grove junction, local resident Dani Ahrens felt something needed to be done and put together a petition calling for a junction review at this spot. For more on this, look HERE.

The petition has so far gathered 200+ signatures and will be submitted to the council Transport and Environment Committee in October. Signatures can still be added until September 29th – to do so, look HERE.

To outline just how hazardous the current junction layout is, a new flyer has been put together detailing past incidents. See above and below for details or download a copy HERE

As we noted back in July,Brighton & Hove City Council has committed itself to supporting the  Space For Cycling Campaign  which includes support for:

  1. Protected space on main roads and junctions
  2. Removing through motor traffic in residential areas
  3. Lower speed limits
  4. Cycle-friendly town centres
  5. Safe routes to school
  6. Routes through green spaces

We very much hope that the council is willing to live up to this commitment and to have another look at this junction with a view to making it safe for all.

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Annual General Meeting

Our AGM is on Tuesday May 17th at 6.30 pm at The Fountainhead pub, 102 North Rd, Brighton, BN1 1YE Location: http://bit.ly/1Qknarb

There will be reports and a short formal meeting to elect officers, currently:

Membership secretary       Tony Green
Treasurer                                 Tony Green
Secretary                                 Adam Pride
Campaigns officer                Becky Reynolds
News editor                             Becky Reynolds
Web Manager                          Vacant
Infrastructure Adviser         Duncan Codd

…and there will be time for a chat and a drink.Bricycles2012 - no text2_2

East Brighton Walking and Cycling workshop

IMG_1577East Brighton Walking and Cycling workshop tomorrow! Anything to request? Updated ward asks at https://bricycles.org.uk/brighton-and-hove-by-ward/
Mott MacDonald has been appointed by Brighton & Hove City Council’s Transport Planning team to undertake a study looking into potential walking and cycling improvements in the East Brighton area, bounded by Old Steine in the west, Arundel Road to the east, Edward Street/Eastern Road to the north and the upper promenade to the south.
This project forms part of the Council’s Local Sustainable Transport Fund (LSTF) project which received external Government funding and runs between April 2015 – March 2016.

Time to Cycle!

More than 120 riders are making their way to Paris to call for an end to environmental damage and to get urgent action on climate change at the COP21 summit. The first group of cyclists arrived from Balcombe on the A23 cycle track video here and called at Withdean Park in Brighton on Sunday December 6th before a reception at Brighthelm. You can follow their journey. See Time to Cycle and Brighton’s Climate Action Network for links.

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Brighton and Hove City Council signs up to Space for Cycling

IMG_2288ed2Great news! We are delighted that Brighton and Hove City Council have voted to support CTC’s Space for Cycling campaign. There was agreement at the Environment Transport and Sustainability committee on November 25th 2015 to ask Brighton and Hove’s Chief Executive Officer to sign the council up to the initiative. 20140514 - SpaceforCyclingcroppedThis shows admirable unity of purpose between the Labour Chair of the committee, Councillor Gill Mitchell and the Green Group, led by Councillor Pete West, who tabled the motion. Bricycles has been promoting Space for Cycling since the start of the campaign led nationally by the cycling charity CTC. We now hope to see a continued and renewed focus at local level on the remaining barriers to cycling, particularly dealing with busy roads and dangerous junctions.

CTC’s blog on this and the Autumn Spending Review

Space for Cycling has 6 themes:

  1. Protected space on main roads
  2. Removing through motor traffic in residential areas
  3. Lower speed limits
  4. Cycle-friendly town centres
  5. Safe routes to school
  6. Routes through green spaces

More information here on what Space for Cycling means.

Ride for Space for Cycling!

We are delighted to see that the new Leader of the Labour Party chooses to ride a bike! We’re inviting Jeremy Corbyn and all the delegates from the Labour Party Conference to ride with us to support Space for Cycling. The conference runs from Sunday September 27th to Wednesday 30th September.  It will probably be one morning before conference starts! More details soon. They will be posted on our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Bricycles IMG_2288ed