Glasgow Councillor Tour 5, Victoria Park, Ward 12, 06 October 2017

On Friday 06 October Councillor Maggie McTernan, Labour Councillor for Ward 12, Victoria Park, toured part of her ward with GoBike committee members John Donnelly and Alasdair Macdonald and GoBike member Neil Lovelock.  Councillor McTernan doesn’t cycle so John took her, and Neil, round in the rickshaw he currently owns.  After the ride she posted her photos and a commentary on her Councillor Facebook page; she has very kindly sent us the photos and allowed us to use her words to describe the ride.  They are reproduced in bold below:

“The question you need to ask is, would you let your child cycle ahead of you?”

Thanks to Neil, Alasdair and John from Gobike for taking me on a cycle tour of my ward, Victoria Park, today – with an honourable mention for John, who powered the cycle rickshaw for non-cycling me!

If we want to cut emissions and improve health, we need to take seriously the cycle routes across the city – as John said, they should be safe enough for a child to use.

Most of us don’t just use one form of transport – we walk, cycle, drive or take public transport depending on the situation. So our infrastructure should reflect this, supporting us to share our public spaces safely.

Cycle paths don’t always have dropped kerbs – here, the entrance to the cycle path had bollards that were too close to allow the rickshaw through!

Double parking to block a cycle path, opposite a bus stop…

Some of the signage is faded, making it hard to follow cycle routes

There’s good news too – this pavement at St Paul’s Primary was widened in 2014, to improve safety for children cycling to school

The route that the group followed was devised by GoBike ride leader, Andy Preece and is given here: Councillor Ward Tour – Victoria Park map and his comments on features along the route are here: Councillor Ward Tour – Victoria Park