March 2013 – Newcastle Cycling Campaign

AGM 2013 – Better streets for cycling

28th March 2013 Claire Uncategorized

The Cycle Hub was packed on Tuesday 19 March 2013 to ‘talk cycling’ at our AGM. We had a lively debate on membership, cycling infrastructure design, and the campaign priorities – oh and we formed our new management committee. While Claire Prospert, Katja Leyendecker and Scott Dawson signed up for another year, three new people also joined the committee: Dorothy Craw, Roderick Joyce and Shannon Robalino. These are the key points discussed: Membership – proud to have 750 members, mixed views about re-introducing fees which would also mean a considerable admin resource to be necessary – so we decided to[…]

Gateshead Cycling Forum

27th March 2013 Scott Uncategorized

Gateshead Council Quarterly Cycling Forum. The original date was postponed, the meeting will now be held on the 23rd May.

Campaign Management Committee Meeting

26th March 2013 Claire Uncategorized

Newcastle Cycling Campaign management committee meets

Online donations made easy peasy

26th March 2013 Claire Uncategorized

If you would like to financially support the Newcastle Cycling Campaign, you can make donations online and it couldn’t be any easier. We teamed up with Localgiving.com which allows small groups like us to claim Gift Aid even when they are not registered with the Charity Commission. Go to our webpage and click on make a donation: http://localgiving.com/charity/newcycling Examples of what we may use the money for: – Running of the quarterly members’ meetings – Purchasing resources, books and DVDs – Representing the Campaign at events – Getting expert advice and assistance – Designing and printing of leaflets, posters, banners[…]

Our Priorities for 2012/13

23rd March 2013 Claire Uncategorized

With our aim to create a cycle-friendly city with a deep-rooted and flourishing cycling culture, our objectives are to improve the cycling infrastructure in and around Newcastle and champion and promote cycling. Keeping a focus on our local priorities, below, we will work with others to achieve our aims and objectives. We will lobby, influence, build relationship and trust, engage in debate and foster dialogue. We will hassle and challenge, inspire and enthuse. During our AGM in March 2012 we discussed this year’s priorities. We’ve decided on keeping last year’s priorities, and applying a ranking to them. Without further ado[…]

AGM – making campaigning priority

18th March 2013 NewCycling Uncategorized

Scores of cycling advocates will again descend on the Cycle Hub to talk shop. The Newcastle Cycling Campaign calls its members to gather once more. The AGM is to be held on 19 March 18:00 at the classy ‘The Cycle Hub’ at Ouseburn Quayside. Discussions will centre around priorities, with a draft having been announced in advance of the meeting. The proposed campaigning direction, not surprisingly, concerns working with policy and decision makers to get behind a people-friendly city with safe cycle space and better public places in Newcastle and Tyneside. The Cycle Hub has hosted all the Campaign’s members[…]

An eyetest for Gateshead

9th March 2013 Katja Uncategorized

Discussion on our sister website GatesheadCycling sometimes goes into a spin on the subject of cycling numbers in Gateshead. So it’s worth noting that recently we were reminded by the census that Gateshead is far from seeing a cycling revolution. With a meager 0.4 percentage point increase cycle commuting now has a modal share of 1.5% in Gateshead, “boosted” from 1.1% in 2001. This is almost below detection limits! And should serve as an eye opener to Gateshead. It’s fair to say that Newcastle does not fare much better on current numbers of cyclists. Yet their vision is much clearer.[…]

Heaton Road pinchpoint

8th March 2013 NewCycling Uncategorized

Council yesterday announced that the removal of a pinchpoint on Heaton Road, that saw the death of a cyclist in late 2011, is now underway. We’ve been asking Newcastle City Council, the highway authority, to act since the tragic incident happened. Immediately after the fatal incident, we wrote to all nine councillors (there are three adjoining wards), yet they were unable to speed up any investigation or help shed light on proceedings or improve transparency. We also requested information from the police to understand better the circumstances (see [3]), only to learn it was “not in the public interest” to[…]

Cycling to West Jesmond School

6th March 2013 NewCycling Uncategorized

Our local group ‘Jesmond Safe Cycling’ met with staff of West Jesmond Primary School to discuss the road environment along Tankerville Terrace, such as congestion during the “school run”, inconsiderate car parking (school drop-offs) and intimidating cycling conditions. There is a clear and general concern over drop-off points, some of which has been highlighted in the BBC documentary http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-19867797. Any future changes should benefit parents and children who wish to walk and cycle to school by alleviating traffic and managing car parking. Over the past months, ‘Jesmond Safe Cycling’ has developed a cycle plan, and has looked at safe routes[…]