I received an email yesterday requesting a meeting with the Integration and Retail manager at First Great Western - Andy Saunders. He was keen to meet up with me as soon as possible, so I managed to squeeze him in today and was eager to find out what was SO important. To be fair he had outlined what he was hoping to discuss - but I'm just adding to the suspense!First Great Western are putting in for a 1 million pound grant from Cycling England and DFT - apparently there are huge money pots to be given out for rail/cycle integration to 3 lucky rail operators and the runners up stand to gain a considerable amount too. Andy was keen to see if CTC would be keen to work in partnership and ran passed some potential ideas that he had for Reading:
- Upgrading the Sheffield stands to compound cycle parking with swipe cards and CCTV's
- A retail unit offering cycle maintenance, accessories
- Folding bike hire/purchase scheme
The application is due in 2 weeks and the result will be known at the beginning of July. I am going to help with the application as much as I can and one of my colleagues has already advised on the infrastructure. I'll let you know the outcome, as soon as I do.
Have a great evening......
1 comment:
It'll be really good if FGW is able to secure this funding for cycle facilities at the station. World Transport Policy and Practice Volume 13, Number 3 shows some of the ideas implemented at leading cycling cities in the Netherlands, Denmark and Germany. I quite like the idea of the major cycle route that leads right through the bike parking facility next to the train station (see p.24).
Meanwhile, in Reading, another challenge awaits: the development of the area outside the station is proposing to turn Station Hill into a two-level system with no route for vehicles between the two. It would seem the existing road will become two cul-de-sacs (culs-de-sac?). The developer's website proclaims "a seemless connection at two levels to the proposed new station".
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