Southport & Ainsdale
With a population of just 90,000, Southport is a popular coastal resort and shopping centre that attracts 4.5 million visitors per year. Its compact and largely flat topography makes Southport ideal for cycling, and the number of people commuting by bike is much higher than other parts of Merseyside.
Southport’s programme priorities lie in three areas - encouraging tourism and leisure cycling, creating opportunities for regeneration in the area, and significantly increasing cycling to school.
Since the start of the programme, Southport has refreshed existing cycling infrastructure, built new cycle tracks, and developed the seafront and lakeside leisure routes. Southport has also improved signage on routes, as well as access for pupils cycling to school. The town’s Eco Centre has installed bike storage and 40 cycle stands thanks to support from the Southport Cycle Town team.
To help boost the amount of leisure trips taken by bike, improving the town’s seafront routes and facilities was a priority early on. This includes a circular route around the seafront area and a link to the town centre. All leisure routes are now clearly signposted, including the Seafront Loop, which will form the focal point for a number of signed leisure routes to the north and south noting key destinations and journey times. More cycle stands are being installed across the seafront area, district centres, shopping area, libraries, health centres, and schools.
In May 2009 the Southport team launched an innovative cycle hire scheme. This involves a partnership with local hotels, tourist agencies and the Eco Centre Park-and-Ride, making over 100 bikes available to visitors for day trips. Visitors are able to borrow bikes from these sites and then discover Southport’s scenic coastal trails - getting a taste for cycling in the resort that sits at the start of the Trans Pennine Trail. Through this scheme the team hope to introduce leisure cycling to families who may not previously have considered it. The scheme will be expanded in May 2010 with the introduction of a Cycle Hub at Southport train station – giving people the opportunity to hire a bike as soon as they arrive in the area.
As part of its regeneration focus, in 2008 and 2009 Southport’s infrastructure priorities concentrated on creating an East to West cycle link to better connect the town centre and seafront areas to the development areas to the east of the town. The team also plans to improve cycle access along Wennington Road, a 2.7 kilometre route linking highly populated residential areas to the schools, college, hospital and employment sites at Kew. Work on these routes aims to be completed in 2010.
Bikeability level 2 has been provided to a total of 630 children in Southport, and Bikeability level 3 has been expanded into secondary schools. The schemes now cover all primary and secondary schools in Southport. Adult cycle training courses at Level 1 and 2 ran throughout the summer months in 2009 and Bike It and Bike Club will operate in all five secondary schools and a number of their linked primaries. All high schools were also invited to take part in a Go Ride programme which culminated in a series of inter-school races as part of the Tour Series event when a Cycle Festival was also held.
Visit www.southportcycletown.gov.uk for more information.
