We thought it might be helpful and informative to put a top ten of the videos we think are most helpful in understanding why we believe that the bicycle is the urban transport solution that both Britain and Tunbridge Wells needs. The bicycle can help to reduce congestion, air and noise pollution, improve our health, get ourselves and our children active, become more social, improve our local economy and simply make our town a nicer place to live with less road accidents and injuries… We hope you’ll start to feel the same way (if you don’t already) after watching some of these videos. If you have any suggestions of your own or any questions, please get in touch or follow our Facebook page for more and more examples www.facebook.com/rtwbug
1) Chris Boardman on how we need to be focussing on making the UK road environment better for cyclists:
http://youtu.be/T7Nc82kgpow
2) Bicycle Culture by Design: A fantastic video on making our cities and towns much nicer to live in and the failure of transport planning including the enormous loss of lives from motor vehicle accidents:
3) Who else benefits from bicycle infrastructure: It’s not just cyclists who benefit from great bike provision. Children, the elderly, people in mobility scooters and many others – bicycle infrastructure is the most socially inclusive infrastructure you can provide:
4) How the Dutch got their cycle paths: You might think they’ve always had them, but it’s not true. In the 50’s to 70’s they ripped them all out and prioritised car traffic but were horrified by how many people are killed in car accidents, particularly children and pedestrians. This is a great story:
5) The Green Lane Project: This is part of the USA installing cycling infrastructure. The land of the car is changing as they’ve reached a tipping point where car use is starting to fall and more cities are embracing the bicycle as a better urban transport solution
6) Direct cycling routes: This is a great video from the Netherlands to show how cars being made to take longer to drive around town than bikes is the key to getting more bicycle use. Do watch the film, it’s a much better way to arrange urban road usage and Tunbridge Wells could benefit greatly from this approach:
7) Cycling for everyone: A video from the Dutch Cycling Embassy explaining how the Dutch became world leaders and how everybody young and old, rich and poor rides a bike in the Netherlands. Riding a bike should be as normal as brushing your teeth and already is in the Netherlands and Denmark:
8) Cycling Copenhagen through North American eyes: A film that shows the journey the USA is going through to begin to create their own world class cycling infrastructure based on European best practice – fantastic for such a car centric society
9) A lovely short animated film from Brasil showing a vision of how much nicer the world could be if we fully embraced the bicycle:
10) Perhaps one of the films that started this journey for the Tunbridge Wells Bicycle User Group. Jason Roberts talking passionately about how if you want to make your town a better place to live – you had better take some responsibility for it and get involved. An inspiring and funny film that we highly commend to you.
We hope you’ve found this interesting and informative. People on bikes can make Tunbridge Wells a truly exceptional town to visit and live in. Please join us in making this happen….