Don't drag cyclists into phoney culture wars, say campaigners

London Cycling Campaign issue warning to London mayoral candidates

Mayoral candidates were on Wednesday urged to avoid dragging London cyclists into “phoney culture wars”.

The London Cycling Campaign took a barely disguised swipe at Tory mayoral candidate Susan Hall after she vowed to target cycle lanes that “cause havoc” and end the so-called “war on the motorist”.

It launched a “London loves cycling” campaign that seeks to highlight the growing popularity of cycling, and urged Londoners to use social media to celebrate the joys of travelling across the city by bike.

The LCC, which has more than 12,000 members, said cycling in London was now “mainstream”, with 1.26m weekday journeys by bike – about a third of Tube journeys.

On an average day, cycling accounts for 4.5 per cent of all journeys made in the capital, up from 3.6 per cent pre-pandemic, according to Transport for London.

About 10m of the 25m journeys a day in London – about 40 per cent of the total - are made by private transport.

The LCC said progress had been made in recent years by both the Tory and Labour mayors, Boris Johnson and Sadiq Khan, in encouraging cycling and attempting to improve air quality. It said an approach that ended a “decade of progress” would be “unpopular and futile”.

A cycling festival is planned for the weekend prior to the May 2 elections.

Tom Fyans, LCC chief executive, said: "Cycling is an everyday way of getting about London for so many people now. So it'd be a short-sighted politician indeed to scrap schemes that have resulted in huge growth in this clean, heathy and congestion-busting way to travel.  

“We're asking London's mayoral candidates to help unlock the capital's potential by making it truly safe, funding it appropriately and rolling out more high-quality cycle routes, rather than try to make Londoners fearful of a simply joyous, healthy mode of transport.

“The blunt fearmongering is a bit like asking Londoners to fear ice cream, a night out or birdsong – and about as likely to work as that.”

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