All these councils saying “we had no time to consult” on active travel schemes are really missing the point. Councils should be consistently consulting on issues and be ready to design up schemes when time comes. They shouldn’t be scrabbling around for ideas at call for funding.

If you are on top of issues, you can identify the locations best suited to temporary schemes, drop them in and then consult - all in the knowledge that broadly you are likely to have hit the spot.

But it seems so many councils have no active direct connection with their communities on issues. And so they’re generally like when asked if this will get support. To compound issue they often then rely on a small number of individuals to speak for the community.

It’s no surprise we are then seeing so many active travel schemes fail when the community and people on the ground can’t trace the issues they have to the schemes they see before them. It really just gets a lot of people backs up.

But on the flip side if you do consult regularly with community on issues, when you do drop in your experimental scheme you know you have the support to push back against potential vocal minority against the scheme. Knowing community views reinforces a councils position.

This councils should have an inventory of schemes based on analysis and feedback waiting to be released by funding. Calls for funding shouldn’t come as a surprise but simply an issue of how many schemes can you launch within the funding and timetabling made available. END