“The BLIGHT Of The Nation!” Residents FURIOUS As Council Spends £5.3m Upgrading Cycle Lanes

Residents in Bournemouth have been left furious after a council spent £5.3 million on upgrading cycle lanes on one of the “widest and safest” roads in the area.

Millions of pounds was spent resurfacing and widening the existing lanes on Glenferness Avenue in the seaside town.

Talk’s Alex Phillips discusses the story with head of campaigns at the TaxPayers’ Alliance Elliot Keck.

Click here for more from TalkTV https://talk.tv

If you need any help visit: https://talk.tv/helplines

#cycling #cyclists #bournemouth

cyclopaths continue to be the blight of the nation and here to talk about this more is Elliot kek who’s head of campaigns at the taxpayers alliance Elliot how you doing good afternoon Alex great to be here I remember during lockdown when old Sid Khan decided uh what better way to spend a load of cash in London because no one was getting the tube uh than changing everything into cycle paths through the city they did run along Milbank you know all along the river temps and before you knew it the traffic was moving about 1 mile per hour ambulances couldn’t get anywhere what is it with this obsession with cyclop paaths well I think it just goes to show that every cash trrap Council always manages to find the money when it comes to one of their own personal pet projects and I think in this case we see5 million being spent on a road that I was just looking at actually this morning it is a wide Road it’s a road that’s very safe it very very rarely has accidents and critically it’s in an area where you don’t have an alternative to driving really in in reality this is a road where the local bus stop has about one or two buses an hour where you’re a good half an hour drive from the train station so if you have if you’re um uh if you’re a normal person living in that area and that road becomes more congested as a result it’s really really going to harm your ability to get around I mean it’s clear that the obsession with cycle part is all about this drive for Net Zero they make it impossible really in a many cities and towns around the country to own a car these days whether it’s parking fines whether it’s Road tax whether it’s ules Le 20 M hour zones they may as well just make cars illegal right now um but I mean are people up taking up cycling in droves listen I think there has been an increase in in the number of people cycling and I think there’s listen some areas of London where you know undoubtedly because of the wealth of options of public transportation it probably is worth uh bringing in more cycle lanes and uh investing more in cycle Lanes but it cannot come at the expense of local residents cannot make life impossible for motorists for emergency vehicles and for businesses trying to move Goods around and I think over the last few years we’ve seen an incredible shift away from uh uh driving and it’s not been we’ve not brought the public with us politicians have not brought the public with them and I think we probably do need to start Shifting the pendulum back I mean the problem is here and someone has said from the local area um that there are already two substantial cycle Lanes on this particular Road in Bournemouth and it’s a waste of money and another local person said the money would be better spent repairing potholes and improving the roads in general for motorists I mean the roads out there are an utter State it’s like bumping along the Market Street in a CRA the roads are so rubbish you your teeth are chattering together and you’ve got spinal injuries by the time you’ve got to your final destination and ironically the people most likely to fall foul of a a pothole in a big way aren’t actually the car drivers it’s the cyclists well absolutely and there was a story in the times actually earlier this week that showed that potholes cost the UK economy 14.4 billion pounds we also know that the spending of councils on fixing potholes has fallen by 25% and just recently um a a young woman broke her ankle on a pothole so again it goes to show that you know listen when when when a council decides it wants to spend money on something I.E cycle loans it can find the cash very easily but when it comes to things that frankly it doesn’t care that much about something like potholes unfortunately some that’s when it’s um scrambling for cash yeah well so what are your thoughts on all of this because cycling seems to have become one of those topics that really divide Society now it’s almost like brexit isn’t it are you pro cyclist or you fed up with them I’m I’m ambivalent I think I think I mean look cycling is just fine right but um I I think it’s right to say that cycling shouldn’t take precedence over the car uh the bus the delivery driver and so on whether we like it or not we are now a society that relies on motor transport because it’s faster and it’s more efficient um and the fact now that some councils are actually taking Lanes out from car use uh so that you know a cyclist every 20 minutes can kind of use a particular part of the road unhindered I mean it seems to be not only mad but it’s it’s purely ideological I think it really is but I I think it’s it’s not quite as crazy as the other stuff that of course councilors are spending money on with regards to our roads and that is rainbow zebra Crossing I knew you going to say lgbtq Plus+ plus Crossings well thank you much and thank you too to Elliot kek head of campaigns at the taxpayers alliance