Get on Your Bike

This summer's holiday in South West France with the family saw us enjoying the incredible cycle path network. Miles and miles of superb, wide, flat cycle paths, made cycling a real pleasure for all ages and a result we piled on the miles and rather than the pounds as we kept active enough to relax and enjoy the delicious french food on offer.

It was with more interest that usual then that attended a session on 'Active Transport' at the BASES Annual Conference last week. Professor Jim McKenna, Adrian Davies, Dr Ashley Cooper and Andy Smith gave an enlightening summary of why our nation is so poor when it comes to travelling anywhere by bike and what's being done in some areas to combat this.

Dr Cooper gave some frightening statistics for the UK in comparison to other European nations. A tiny proportion of British school children cycle to school, yet in Denmark over 65% of 15 year old boys cycle.

His PEACH Project analyses children's activty patterns on the way to and from school. It turns out that Year 10 Girls that cycle to and from school are SIX times more likely to meet the government's daily activity targets. Other research from Derby seems to be indicating the same - it's not just the cycling, but once kids or adults have been active on their journey, they are more likely to be active at other times in the day too.

The UK government in the 1960's chose to mirror the US and focus on car ownership as am indication of 'progress', with massive investment in building roads and motorways. Elsewhere in Europe it seems there was a more balanced approach and the infrastructure for cycling was established.

It appears the habits of decades will be incredibly tough to reverse as experts and charities in this area desperately try to encourage the car loving British public to jump on a bike rather than getting in the car for even the shortest of journeys.