“If Newcastle goes for something, it really goes for it”, a born and raised Geordie once told me. In the 1960s the city built numerous massive motorways, making way for the car. In the early 1980s the city’s metro system opened, which made Newcastle one of the smallest cities in the world to boast a complete metro system at the time. Now Newcastle has the ambition to become a cycling city. A number of determined schemes are being developed and many plans for new bicycle infrastructural projects are on the drawing board. The spirit seems to be there, but what is the current state of cycling in Newcastle upon Tyne?
Exploring Newcastle by bike
As part of my master’s research project I got the opportunity to live, study and do research (on the development of cycle space) in Newcastle. Staying true to my Dutch roots, I decided to take the ferry from IJmuiden to the beautiful north of England, so that I could bring my bicycle with me. Of course, not my rusty Amsterdam bike, but my road bike. The topography of Newcastle is pretty hilly and as such, I would not have come very far with my almost-falling-apart Amsterdam city bicycle.
First things first, I visited Newcastle’s Cycle Hub – a cycle café offering cycle workshops and information – on the iconic Tyne River bank (see featured image). A friendly guy with a beard introduced me to cycling in Newcastle and provided me with some handy cycle route maps. During my first weeks of cycling in England I depended heavily on these maps. I noted the lack of proper cycle infrastructure in the city centre of the town, so I started exploring the more recreational routes first to give myself some time to grow into Newcastle’s cycle culture. Some of the recreational routes are fantastic. Spanning from England’s west coast to the east coast, the stretch of Route 72 going through Newcastle takes you from the inner city Quayside to the coast at Tynemouth. Most of the route is completely separated from cars, and very well signposted. Tip: Treat yourself to a pint of beer in one of the seaside pubs or some delicious food from the market that is held every weekend in the Tynemouth metro station.
Car vs. bicycle
Next, when I ran some errands in the city centre by bike for the first time, I came to understand the real state of cycling in Newcastle: poor. For a city that is well known for its friendliness, this does not go so much for bicycles. I noticed myself adopting so-called vehicular cycling strategies where cycle lanes were non-existent. Also I was, like everyone else, cycling on roads, on pavements, in parks, on squares, in dodgy back alleys. Since cycle infrastructure is, up until now, very fragmented and incoherent, cyclists in Newcastle just have to forge their own routes across town.
Fragmented cycle infrastructure: Probably Newcastle’s shortest cycle track (Picture by author)
Cyclists take in a minority position on Newcastle’s roads. The car still very much seems to be the norm here, and the same goes for the wider United Kingdom context. Sometimes this creates tensions between the different road users, also because the idea that cycling is a ‘real’ mode of transport is not so much engrained in the mind-set of British drivers yet. For instance, I often came across parked cars on one of the city’s newly developed cycle lanes, reflecting the common attitudes of drivers towards cycling.
Parked cars on a newly constructed cycle lane in Newcastle (Pictures by author)
Newcastle: a bright cycling future
Nonetheless, improvements are advancing. Newcastle is one of eight UK cities that have been awarded Cycling Ambition Funding from the national government. The city’s proposed Cycle Superhighway – that is, a stretch of cycle infrastructure totalling a few 100 meters – is already well underway, and the network approach to cycling that the city has adopted looks promising. A number of strategic routes around the city are being developed, initially coined by Newcastle’s Cycling Campaign. Moreover, improvements will be made around the campuses of Newcastle University and Northumbria University, and new north-south routes are in the consultation phase.
Some silly solutions will still exist, as the design and development of cycle infrastructure is a relatively new thing in Newcastle. However, with substantial new bicycle infrastructure being constructed over the next few years, it is likely that the numbers of cyclists will increase, cycling will become more comfortable, and norms and values about the car and the bicycle will change. Given Newcastle’s relatively low levels of car ownership already, it’s large student population, and high ambitions to become a cycling city, it would not surprise me to come back to Newcastle in a few years and be blown away by its cycle-friendliness.
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