Here you will find links to pertinent (mostly) third-party documents relating to safe routes – particularly to schools, to and from the Blackford area.
Essential Reading
- Movement by Thalia Verkade & Marco te Brömmelstroet – how to take back our streets and transform our lives
- The Miracle Pill by Peter Walker – the simple lifestyle change with such enormous health benefits that, if it was turned into a drug, would be the most valuable drug in the world? The answer is movement and the good news is that it’s free, easy and available to everyone
- Traffication by Paul F Donald – How Cars Destroy Nature and What We Can Do About It
- Death on the Streets (pdf) – understanding road danger reduction versus traditional “road safety”
One-stop shop
- Essential Evidence 4 Scotland – One-page, plain-English summaries on aspects of transport planning from robust peer reviewed studies, released fortnightly
Liveable Neighbourhoods
- Rishi Sunak’s report finds low-traffic neighbourhoods work and are popular – the Conservative government hoped the report they commissioned would strengthen the arguments against traffic-reducing measures, but instead found the opposite
- Sustrans’ guide to the evidence around low-traffic neighbourhoods, with links
- Low-traffic neighbourhoods reduce pollution in surrounding streets
- Rebutting conspiracy theories and misinformation on LTNs and 20-minute neighbourhoods – so what’s all this about a “climate lockdown”
- The truth about low traffic neighbourhoods – from “We are Possible”
- The Future of Low-Traffic Neighbourhoods – from the “Centre for London” independent think-tank
- LTNs do not push traffic to boundary roads
- Sarah Berry’s LTN resources folder
- Scottish Parliament Information Centre – Low Traffic Neigbourhoods
- Why it is such a great idea to be Filtering through-traffic from residential streets
- Low Traffic Neighbourhoods – Injecting A Little Honesty
- A quick introduction to how to design a low traffic neighbourhood. Using theory and real world examples based on a small commuter town.
- Mythbusters: eight common objections to LTNs – and why they are wrong
- I got it wrong. Since the changes it’s become more vibrant’: life in an LTN
- Low-traffic schemes halve number of road injuries, study shows
Equality
- Bike banks in the Netherlands – social enterprises providing bicycles to kids to combat the cost of living crisis
Climate
- Strong public support for sustainable transport and active travel – A Manifesto for Decarbonising Transport
- Conquering climate doomerism and eco-anxiety
- The great carbon-offsetting scam – more than 90% of rainforest carbon offsets by biggest certifier are worthless
Local
- An explanation of the backsliding and stasis currently being experienced at City of Edinburgh Council (May 2024)
- Edinburgh Council’s Active Travel Investment Programme March 2024
- Edinburgh Walking and Cycling Index 2023 (pdf) – our [the council’s] vision for walking, wheeling and cycling in Edinburgh
- Edinburgh Reporter article – Primary pupils use new Quiet Route to go to school – First day back at school for P1 – 3 after lockdown
- The City of Edinburgh Council Local Development Plan Map, showing “safeguarded” walk/cycle routes. Zoom-in to the Astley Ainsley site, the blue lines with dots, marked T7 show the hypothetical routes. A snapshot image of the LDP map
- “Liveable neighbourhood” proposals for Marchmont, Grange & Blackford (interactive map) with Whitehouse Loan as a quiet active-travel route. Links to original drawings (Marchmont, Grange and Blackford) Example of a modal-filter. Typical through-traffic & rat-running patterns.
- Drawings of the proposed new Primary School at Canaan Lane, with proposed catchment changes and build/transition schedule
Bike buses
Infographics
Traffic evaporation and navigation apps
- Instead of dualling roads, what if we used the space for active travel instead? Also known as “one more [car] lane won’t fix it!” Here’s a thread on why it should happen, by Adam Tranter. Plus, images of the excellent A27 rural active travel path
- A dozen effective interventions to reduce car use in European cities – meta-analysis, summary:
- “Sticks” are more important and needed as well as “carrots”
- The most effective at reducing overall car use were the Congestion Charge, Parking & Traffic Control, and Limited Traffic Zone
- Brussels’ new traffic plan has reduced cars by one-fifth in the last six months
- Evaporating traffic? Impact of low-traffic neighbourhoods on main roads
- Your Navigation App Is Making Traffic Unmanageable – The proliferation of apps like Waze, Apple Maps, and Google Maps is causing chaos
Road design and modelling
- Interactive Traffic Analysis tool that uses data from Google maps (direct link to the tool)
- The UK’s first Dutch-style roundabout opens in Cambridge
- Roundabout Safety for Cyclists (experience/data from the Netherlands)
- Inclusive design at bus stops with cycle tracks (pdf) – Living Streets – an in-depth report. TLDR – well-designed “floating” bus stops with segregated cycle lanes work well in all but the most complex (i.e. crowded) environments
Transport statistics
- Scottish Transport Statistics 2019
- Transport and Travel in Scotland – Scottish Household Survey
- Railton LTN – independent traffic analysis. Summary:
- Traffic across the wider area down 27%
- Traffic down on 3 of 4 boundary roads by between 9% & 18%
- Cycling up 74% on Shakespeare Rd & 50% on Railton Rd
- Waltham Forest – Comparison of vehicle numbers before and after the scheme and during the trial. Summary:
- Traffic within the scheme down by 22 to 97% (11 streets saw a decrease, with 2 streets seeing a modest increase)
- Traffic down on 2 of 3 boundary roads by 11 to 28% (1 road increased slightly by 3%)
Road danger reduction
- ‘Motonormativity’: Britons more accepting of driving-related risk – full study. And, the cultural blind spot that makes people apply double standards when they think about driving – thread
- Death on the Streets – essential reading on understanding road danger reduction versus traditional “road safety”
- Living streets advisory report on banning traffic from school areas
Air quality
- Genuine evidence about how emissions are lower with a 20mph speed limit
The impact of 20mph limits on carbon emissions and air quality - The Clean Air Parents’ Network – network & resources for improving air quality around schools
- Pollution From Tyre Wear 1,000 Times Worse Than Exhaust Emissions
- Tiny air pollution rise linked to 11% more Covid-19 deaths – study
Public health
- Broken hearted cities – Why driving is the new smoking – Unnecessary driving of cars is major public health issue.
- The Miracle Pill by Peter Walker Key stats:
- 100,000 premature deaths per year in the UK due to inactivity
- 80% of UK kids are so inactive they risk their long term health
- Daily cycle commuting lowers the risk of heart disease by 50%, the risk of cancer by 50% and the risk of mortality from any cause by 40%
- In the Danish city of Odense, a place made hugely welcoming to cycle, 80% of children cycle to school and the streets are so safe that the official advice is that children should be able to cycle to school from age 6, on their own
- Which transport policies increase physical activity of the whole of society?
- Motornomativity: How Social Norms Hide a Major Public Health Hazard – paper by Ian Walker – the unconscious biases shown due to cultural assumptions about the role of private cars
- Health gains of low-traffic schemes up to 100 times greater than costs, study finds
Psychology / sociology
- Instead of wasting time trying to convert opponents, we should invest it in motivating passive allies to act.
- The Social Ideology of the Motorcar, by André Gorz
Disabled people
A reminder: LTNs do not prevent access by motor vehicles – all properties remain accessible. Lower traffic (less rat-running) makes it easier for those who really do need to drive.
LTNs and disabled people. Chapter 8 of this report from TfL provides some useful insights (large pdf). Summarised below:
- Walking (incl. wheeling) is the most commonly used mode of transport for disabled Londoners (8.10)
- The proportion of disabled Londoners who drive a car to get around London is 28%, compared to 45% for non-disabled Londoners. The proportion who use a car as passengers is identical between the two groups (81%)
- Disabled Londoners are less likely to hold any type of driving license than non-disabled (40% vs 68%)
- Disabled Londoners are less likely to have household access to a car than non-disabled Londoners: 52% of disabled Londoners live in car-free households vs 34% non-disabled
- 17% of disabled Londoners sometimes use a bike to get around London compared to 18% among non-disabled Londoners
Disability, Cycling and Health: Impacts and (Missed) Opportunities in Public Health – cycling is easier than walking for most people with physical disabilities and is also crucial to mobility, exercise, and health.
Planters and wood supplies
Possible sources of wooden planters
- Move On Wood supplies (Edinburgh)
- Why Aye Wood supplies (Cockenzie)
- Wooden planters for modal filters – Glasgow Wood Recycling
Legacy documents (not current)
- A preliminary proposed map of routes from the Blackford area through the Astley Ainslie site to James Gillespie’s primary school, high school, St. Peter’s school and the new school soon to be built in Canaan lane in Morningside.
Safe routes through Astley Ainslie - A response to the existing 20mph “Pedestrian and Cycle Zone” outside St.Peter’s from a parent.
Comments on the Pedestrian Zone