This road improvement scheme forms part of our district-wide strategy to make it safer and more convenient for you to take short journeys by walking, cycling or wheeling (using a wheelchair or mobility aid).
This strategy aims to help residents, businesses and visitors to our area live healthier lives by reducing traffic congestion and improving air quality.
The scheme will be paid for by grant funding from the government's Active Travel Fund, which offers time-limited grants for specific projects that promote active ways of travelling. The Department for Transport initially set the completion date for these projects as March 2022, but has extended it to July 2022 for this scheme.
Project aims
The Beckford Road scheme will provide a safe and convenient cycle facility, and improved pedestrian routes, as part of a first phase of putting in place wider cycling infrastructure linking the city centre to the canal towpath cycle route, the University of Bath and Claverton Down. This aims to achieve the following:
- Encouraging and enabling more journeys by bike and on foot
- Improving the confidence of people to cycle and walk
- Giving greater priority to cyclists and pedestrians on the road
- Improving the health and wellbeing of residents
- Supporting our wider work to address the Climate Emergency
A strategic cycle network
The provision of a high quality network of safe, direct, and continuous cycle routes is central to encouraging more people to take up cycling, both for leisure and as a primary mode of transport. The Beckford Road scheme will be an important part of our plan to develop this network.
During 2021/22 we will implement further 20mph speed limits in a number of city centre roads following a separate consultation last year, which will help make our roads safer places for people who are walking and cycling.
We are constantly working to create this cycling network and will continue to plan new improvements every year.
Bath's Cycle Network (south and east)
National policy
The government’s walking and cycling policy, Gear Change, has set a target for half of all journeys in towns and cities to be taken by walking or cycling by 2030. The government has also updated local authorities’ Network Management Duty (our legal obligation to efficiently manage foot, cycle, wheeling and motor traffic), telling us to reallocate more road space to walking and cycling.
In July 2020, the government published new national design standards on cycle infrastructure. The government has made it clear that it will not fund schemes if they are not built in accordance with these standards of quality and design, and that it will reduce funding to local authorities who do not intend to provide such infrastructure.
We will build our cycle infrastructure in accordance with these standards. The historic nature of many of our streets in Bath means they are often narrower and more congested than many other towns and cities, which will present challenges in building to these standards.
However, to tackle the Climate Emergency, improve air quality, and help people lead healthier lives, we need to make our roads more accessible for journeys by bike, scooter, and on foot.