CW has a story of a Wandsworth school which participated in the Cycling Road Show which was masterminded by a London cop. He has a folding bike which he put on the train for part of his journey.
Anyway - the school in question is a Girls' school in Tooting. 1760 students on the roll - but hardly any cycle to school
Apparently the school is situated on a road which has chicanes and a cycle lane which cuts though the "build-outs"
#Typically CW writes
Quote:
The drivers treat the build-outs like race track chicanes. Huge lorries lurch from side to side as they drive through these. How can kids be expected to deal with this?
Th "lurch" in fairness would not be down to "speed" - but more to "heavy load" as they negotiate the pinch points here. Perhaps an answer would be not to allow the huge lorries down the road - if a residential with narrow pinch points. I am sure that a diversionary and more suitable route would be possible .. especially at this school's peak times.
The article describes this area as being where
Quote:
the well off and the deprived live cheek by jowl
I am not sure of the relevance. :roll;
Anyway - the show took place on a rare sunny day on thei school's tennis/netball courts - and offered the schoolgirls a skills test, advice on safe cycling and a BMX stunt biker "strutted his stuff".
There then allegedly followed a talk on the rudiments of safe cycling, of what the LAW
requires .. of the need to have lights on the bike at night.. both brakes to be working ..
(A cyclist who fails to maintain the bicycle ain't a cyclist
) and the tyres to be pumped up.
The girls apparently were very attentive and all managed to fix a puncture
There was then a quiz as what they had learned - and the winner won a mountain bike.
A decent hybrid would have been better
in my opinion . Ah well.
The next project for the London Inspector will be doing the same show with children wioth "learning difficulties" only.
The show is intended to foster an interest in cycling - to get the schools, kids and their parents to think about cycling more.
The Inspector does worry that many families cannot afford bicycles nor have somewhere to house them. At the moment his main aim per CW is to get more schools to subscribe to the cycle training scheme which the local council is offering and does have the funds to offer. He wants schools to start teaching the basics and then he can return to drill them properly in road safety and HOW to behave on a bicycle on the road.
The Inspector is a former time triallist and sportive participator. He still had to pass the Police Bicycle Training Courses though
The headteacher of the school says her school will offer some cyclle road safety training as a result of this Show. She says her sturdents do not cycle for a number of reasons
1. Parental fear for their children on the roads.
2. Many of her students live in flats - and have thus no storage for bicycles
3. Some have never ridden a bicycle before and some just do not want to.
She says she will not be forcing children to cycle - as there are a lot of "creases to iron out" first.
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