Recent Cycling Levels in Lancaster

The recent review of the Bay Gateway by the County Council included information on the levels of cycling in Lancaster that were of significant interest to Cycling UK. This information would also have been expected to be of interest to anybody with an interest in the availability and accessibility of cycling as a cheap and sustainable mode of transport for local people.

The most notable monitoring point is at Millennium Bridge, where there were over 1600 recorded trips per day in 2013. Following the opening of Lancaster’s Northern Relief Road the number of daily cycle trips recorded had fallen by about 20% to about 1300. This might reasonably be expected given that driving in the area had been made much easier, but nothing had been done to improve conditions for cycling. The 20% reduction might well be people choosing to drive for relatively short local journeys that could be cycled.

Walking and Cycling Levels in Lancaster

Rather more alarmingly, in the 5 years since 2018 there has been a further 60% reduction in the number of cycle trips recorded on Millennium Bridge to 535 trips per day. This level of cycling is only one third of the levels seen in 2013, and should be a significant cause for concern for anybody wishing to promote sustainable transport.

Millennium Bridge had, and still has, the majority of trips recorded to the locations included in the monitoring, but declines were observed at all locations between 2018 and 2023. This certainly rises serious questions about who has been representing active travel to the council in recent years.