Cambridge overtakes London in safe-cycling signage

Cambridge can claim to be England's real cycling capital. It's signs like this that show why.

It's the roadworks on Hills Road railway bridge just south of the station. (Roadworks which, incidentally, are for installing bike lanes.)

The cones have narrowed things down to make overtaking unsafe, so the sign instructs motorists not to overtake cyclists.

And it works. We got no hassle from drivers. In fact, we could enjoy the view at leisure from the top, which is one of the highest points in East Anglia.

It took a bit of activism from excellent local group the Cambridge Cycling Campaign to persuade the council to put up such signs for similar works a couple of years or so ago, but this time round it went up without prompting, we're told.


Compare the Cambridge situation with Waterloo Bridge in the capital (right). There are similar works there, but no such signs - and little consideration from buses or taxis. Perhaps Cambridge could lend a couple of its signs to London once those bridge works are done.

Blowing the trumpet for Cambridge

The latest issue of Cambridge Cycle Campaign's newsletter is available as a PDF.

Cambridge (right top and middle) is the best place for real cycling in Britain. A quarter of the residents cycle to work, compared to the national average of, oh, something rubbish.

Cycling there is a fabulously enjoyable and leisurely experience if you're used to the gladiatorial combat of London. (There's a chapter in my book about how best to experience the Cambridge Thing.)


And the CCycC has an outstanding website, full of crisply-written, authoritative and well-illustrated resources on campaigning and everyday cycle stuff (including how to mend a puncture). In beta, there's also an extremely promising open-source route planning guide and photomap of cycle facilities, not just in Cambridge but nationally and internationally.

Many of the articles and issues are, of course, local to Cambridge. But the way in which they handle their campaigning and publicity – well-researched, persuasively argued, realistic but assertive – is a model to us all.

And I haven't just said that because their newsletter plugs this blog, or because of that excellent New Year's party we had at David and Jane's. But such things obviously help.


Anyway, I was taken with the newsletter's 'photo of the month' (right). You know how annoying it is to be hooted by a driver when you're right and they're wrong; this chap appears able to fight back.

I'd love to have had this yesterday for the taxis at the narrow Waterloo roadworks who thought that if they hooted enough I might vanish from in front of them.