This road improvement scheme is part of our transport improvement programme, and forms part of our district-wide strategy to move away from the idea that streets are just for cars, and to promote active travel in Bath and North East Somerset. This means making it safer and more convenient for you to take short journeys by walking, wheeling, or cycling. This strategy aims to help residents, businesses, and visitors to our area to live healthier lives, reduce traffic congestion and improve air quality.
Project aims
The Combe Down to University of Bath improvement project will create two crossings over a busy road junction at Copseland, providing a quiet, low traffic route for pedestrians and cyclists to the University of Bath main campus. This aims to do the following:
- Encourage and enable more journeys by bike and on foot
- Improve the confidence of people to cycle and walk
- Give greater priority to cyclists and pedestrians on the road
- Improve the health and wellbeing of residents
- Support our wider work to address the climate emergency
How the scheme fits into our wider plans
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. This scheme forms part of a longer ‘Scholar’s Way’ route, which will see future phases of improvements to create a cycling and pedestrian network connecting all schools, universities and centres of employment in the south of the city. Other improvements being planned, which we will consult on at a later date, include the following:
- Improvements to the path through Rainbow Wood
- An upgraded crossing at the Claverton Down Road end of the path for cyclists
We are constantly working to create this cycling network and will continue to programme new improvements every year.
