They describe their target of 10% journeys by cycle as ambitious. It is ambitious given the paucity of the plan. But it's not ambitious by international standards.
So what are the Scottish Government actually proposing?
One measure you can't escape from is cash.
Netherlands EUR 487m/ year - so EUR 30 per head of population each year
London is spending £104m/year - some EUR 21 per head of population each year.
The Peterhead Cycle Demostration project has a total budget of £185,000 - a one off-spend of EUR 13 per head over the three year life of the project.
So what is the Scottish Government proposing in their nice new shiny CyclingAction Plan? Well it looks like there will be less than £47m over three years (part of the monies are for walking and safer streets) so that EUR 55m. Sound greats - until you remember that between a population of 5.3m and over 3 years so that comes down to a miserly EUR 3.4 per head of population each year.
If the Government are serious about cycling, perhaps a good place to start would be allocating the 10% modal share aim in terms of the transport budget to cycling. Transport Scotland has £2,000m a year. So £200m a year for cycling from that budget. Ok that's then EUR 44 per head - but have a lot of catching up to do to get the type of infrastucture that people enjoy in the Netherlands and Denmark.
Winter cycling in Copenhagen |