One-Way Streets & Cycling
Background
One-way streets are a disguised anti-cycling measure because:
- They force people to pedal further.
- They increase traffic speeds, increasing danger to cyclists and pedestrians.
- In some cases, they create multi-lane roads, which are especially cycle-unfriendly.
All London boroughs are committed, on paper, to increasing levels of cycling, but some are doing well while a few (including Croydon) have actually gone backwards to date. Boroughs that are doing well tend to concentrate not just on safety but also on permeability - making sure unnecessary obstacles to cycling are eliminated, so that journeys are direct and convenient. Removal of one-way restrictions is a key part of this.
A strategic aim for 2005 is to get all sections of the Council to recognise that one-way restrictions unfairly impact cyclists more than any other transport mode, and to formulate traffic management policies accordingly.
Related policies & references
Some more background about Croydon's transport and environmental commitments, and why unmodified one-way streets (and banned turns) are at odds with those commitments...
- Current UDP objective T36 which aims to "ensure the needs of cyclists are considered in the design and development of all highway traffic management and environmental improvement schemes". [emphasis added]
- Part One policy in the Council's draft UDP aims to give priority to people over ease of traffic movement and plan to provide more road space to pedestrians, cyclists and public transport users. This is also a PPG13 objective.
- It is both obvious and widely accepted that one-way streets increase traffic speeds unless traffic calming measures are introduced to compensate. The Council's own One Way Streets web page states that they "often lead to an increase in traffic speed". As Government campaigns have stressed, any increase in motor traffic speeds causes increased risks to people walking or cycling. Schemes that increase motor traffic speeds effectively discriminate and prioritize against walking and cycling, disregarding the Council's UDP.
- One-way streets discriminate especially against cycling by requiring people who wish to adopt this socially responsible, unmotorised mode to make the additional physical effort needed to travel additional distance.
- Local Transport Note 1/04 (draft consultation) states that "Cyclists should be exempted from point closures, turning restrictions and one-way orders and permitted to use bus gates unless there are overriding safety considerations that cannot be resolved." The Council should be heeding DfT guidance.
- Local authorities are required under Part IV of the Environment Act 1995 to review and assess air quality in their areas, and to establish Air Quality Management Areas where appropriate. Due largely to increases in motor traffic, Croydon has been forced to declare itself an Air Quality Management Area, and the Council's Pollution In Croydon Annual Report 2001/2002 suggests that up to 189 Croydon residents each year die prematurely because of poor air quality. Croydon's 2002 Air Quality Action Plan states that it is an objective to "increase the number of cycle and walking journeys in the borough". Yet one-way streets aim only to improve motor traffic flows, are known to increase risk to both pedestrians and cyclists, and actively discourage cycling by requiring people to pedal further.
- As has been shown in boroughs such as Hackney, high levels of walking and cycling are achievable through consistent adoption of measures that both increase permeability for pedestrians and cyclists, and also reduce rat-running by motorists, rather than favouring measures that, at best, do only the latter.
-
If motor traffic restrictions are required then there are alternatives
that do not breach the letter or spirit of local and national government policy.
Some alternatives include:
(a) retaining one-ways but converting streets to a 20mph zone, permitting
lane-less contraflow cycling;
(b) using a "plug no-entry" alternatives.
The latter option has already been adopted in some borough streets, and the DfT's Traffic Advisory Leaflet 06/98 describes this option in more detail. 20mph zones are usually popular with residents.
Despite cycling contraflow measures introduced in a small number of Croydon streets, nearly 200 one-way cycling restrictions remain in force. Recent years have also seen the Council adding further one-way restrictions, including an unpopular and hazardous gyratory system in Upper Norwood.
