The next Cycle Ipswich meeting will be on Thursday 8th January 2014 at 6:30pm at the ITO World offices, 2nd Floor, 25 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich, IP4 1AQ. The meeting is an hour earlier than normal, as a couple have a train to catch.
If there is anything that you would like to add to or change on the agenda, please get in touch on our mailing list.
The next Cycle Ipswich meeting will be on 11th December 2014 at 7:30pm in the ITO World office at 25 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich IP4 1AQ.
Our next meeting in November 2014 will be back to our normal venue of Board Room, ITO World office, 2nd Floor, 25 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich, IP4 1AQ. The meeting will start at 7:30pm prompt, with the aim to be finished about 9pm.
Ben Gummer MP will be attending. We will have a draft of the Cycle Ipswich manifesto, which has come out of the items written down at the previous meeting.
If there are further items to be added please drop a note on to the mailing list, or otherwise let Shaun know so that it can be added.
There will be a short bike ride from Ipswich Station led by Ian Seeley starting at 6:30pm. More info on the mailing list post.
First of all Cycle Ipswich would like to thank all 20 people who came along to our open meeting on the 9th October 2014. It was wonderful to see so many new people, who we will hopefully meet or hear from again in the future. The ideas that you wrote on the post-its and the maps were fantastic, and will help to prioritise our campaigning and the creation of some documents to present to the council.
Second, we would like to thank both Ipswich Community Radio, and BBC Radio Suffolk for having us on their breakfast shows. We had several people come along due to the features on the shows.
I’ll give a quick summary of what happened at the meeting for those who couldn’t attend:
First Shaun gave a quick introduction to the Cycle Ipswich organisation, and the meeting.
Second, attendees split into groups to discuss and write on post-its about the problems with cycling in Ipswich, and write down possible solutions or things they would like to see. This evening (Sunday), a few of the key organisers of the group have sat down to summarise the the information written down. The main general topics that were written down and will be taken forward in campaigning were in no particular order:
Third, a set of maps were handed out to the groups to draw on where they believe there should be improvements, and what they should be. We will be soon be taking a closer look at these and adding these items to Cyclescape. Everyone is welcome to add more items to Cyclescape to be tracked.
The Fourth and final part of the meeting was a closing discussion with some of the highlights of the discussion. The most memorable remark at the end of the discussion was when someone said it was extremely difficult to know where to start with the drawing on the maps exercise as there are so many roads that have problems for cyclists, and need improvement.
Going forward we have a working group working on a few documents with this information to respond to the Suffolk Cycling Strategy, which lacks key elements expected in a strategy or much ambition; and to produce a 30 year vision similar to Leeds Cycling Campaign. We will be presenting the drafts at the next meeting on Thursday 13th November 2014 at 19:30.
October 2014’s Cycle Ipswich meeting will be a little different to normal. After Suffolk County Council came up with a Cycling Strategy that tell you why people should cycle, and why it’s great; however it relegates the how, to a single page appendix. Thus we are going to follow the lead of Leeds cycle campaign and produce a 30 year vision, with the hope that Suffolk County Council and Ipswich Borough Council will adopt it.
We would like people from Ipswich and the surrounding area to come and help define the Ipswich which will make them happy to cycle in and around Ipswich. If you don’t currently cycle, or don’t like cycling for transport as opposed to off road leisure cycling, we would especially like to hear from you.
Please bring ideas of what you think the cycle routes in Ipswich should be like. Also bring ideas of cycle infrastructure that you would like to see. Photos of the good, bad, and ugly would also be appreciated.
The meeting will be held in the Collinson Room, Friends Meeting House, 39 Fonnereau Road, Ipswich, to the west of Christchurch Park on 9th October 2014 at 7:30pm. Plan your journey to Friends Meeting House with CycleStreets.
Before the meeting there will be an optional short bike ride starting at 6:30pm from outside Ipswich Railway Station to finish at the Friends Meeting House in time for the meeting. Plan your journey to Ipswich Railway Station with CycleStreets.
You can also suggest infrastructure improvements in our Cyclescape group.
On Thursday 11th September 2014 we’ll have our next monthly meeting at ITO World’s office in 25 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich IP4 1AQ. Phone 01473272225 or 07879610632 if you have a problem getting in. The meeting is due to start at 7:30pm and finish at 9pm.
Agenda items include:
If there are any further items to be added please drop a note on to the mailing list, or otherwise let Shaun know so that it can be added.
On Thursday 8th August 2014 we’ll have our next monthly meeting at ITO World’s office in 25 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich IP4 1AQ. Phone 01473272225 or 07879610632 if you have a problem getting in. The meeting is due to start at 7:30pm and finish at 9pm.
Agenda items include:
If there are any further items to be added please drop a note on to the mailing list, or otherwise let Shaun know so that it can be added.
The next Cycle Ipswich meeting will be held on Thursday 8th May 2014 at 19:30. The location as usual will be ITO World, 2nd Floor, 25 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich IP4 1AQ.
There will be a debate between Shaun McDonald and Alex Oldman arguing for and against segregated cycle infrastructure, for about 45 minutes. There will be initially a 10 minute presentation putting forward the arguments for and against. Then there will be a debate, which the audience can participate in.
If there is anything you’d like on the agenda please contact Shaun, Alex, Kevin, or post on the mailing list.
Suffolk Council currently have a consultation for the Nacton Road and Ransomes Way corridors “to meet the projected increase in traffic associated with development in this corridor”. However they haven’t considered cycle traffic. Cycle traffic currently has narrow cycle lanes, or shared use pavement cycling. See our discussion on our Cyclescape group and on our Google group.
The nearby Ravenswood estate (just to the south of the Nacton Road) has one of the highest cycle to school rates in the UK, yet the people who live there don’t cycle to the nearby shopping area due to the inconvenient and scary cycle journey that you have to take. The new plans make this even worse.
Please can everyone write to Suffolk County by emailing Suffolk.LTP@suffolk.gov.uk before the end of Wednesday 5th March 2014, highlighting the problems that their plans pose for cyclists and pedestrians. Here are some general things that you can mention:
Shaun McDonald has published a blog post containing his response, which you can use as further inspiration.
Please fill in survey to support Queen St/Princes St/St Nicholas St Travel Ipswich improvements
Currently Travel Ipswich have a consultation running on the Queen Street, Princes Street, and St Nicholas Street area to extend the current pedestrian zone, including allowing cycling. Loading bays are provided. We would like as many people as possible to support the proposals. We would thoroughly encourage you to support the additional cycle parking and the zebra crossing at Friars Street. There is an example response available on Cyclescape.
The consultation will run be available to view in the Town Hall until Saturday 1st March, so you only have a couple of days to respond view it there. The consultation survey is available until Saturday 15th March. It is a fairly simple survey, which only takes 5 minutes to fill in, so please do so. The more people who write in supporting the proposals, will help with the implementation. The full plans and the link to the survey are available on the Travel Ipswich website.
There are more consultations coming up, watch this space.
