Another local council chooses to overlook motorcycles in transport policy
In news that is becoming all too familiar, Leeds City Council fails to recognise motorcycles in its future transport policy
WITH a steady drip down of ignorance of the two-wheeled world flowing from the top, it’s hardly surprising that local councils continue to ignore motorcycles as a viable and sustainable form of urban transport.
The latest instance comes from Leeds City Council, who have drawn up a city-wide vision of the future, where cars are not necessary, and everyone has access to affordable carbon-zero transport. Presumably, everyone will be zooming around in flying cars like the Jetsons, as part of the draft includes finding new mobility solutions. Or on the other hand, they could be referring to e-scooters…
BMW R1250 GS vs Multistrada V4
What the report fails to do, again, is to realise that there is already a safer, cheaper to implement and low-carbon form of transport already in use. In fact, the word motorcycles is only found in the document twice while ‘motorcyclist’ is not found at all.
According to the Yorkshire evening post, the word bus registers 113 times in the 35-page report, while reference to trains is picked up 74 times, and bike or cycling 71 times. It is important to remember that the disproportionate number of people using the bus will skew the numbers slightly, but it seems there is more at work here than that.
MAG member and rep for Leeds, Richard Manton, claims there might be more to this than simply not realising the benefits of motorcycles.
“We’ve been trying to get Leeds City Council to meaningfully engage with us for some time, but at best they’ve done the bare minimum for motorcycles and at worst they have been outright hostile to the suggestion of incorporating powered two-wheelers into the transport strategy.”
Indeed, the transport strategy itself provides readers with misinformation around motorcycles, with one part of the document claiming that while motorcycles take up less space on the road they ‘still emit similar levels of CO2 to private cars.’!
The transport strategy is currently up for public consultation, with the views of the public welcomed. The full document can be found here, and comments can be submitted until March 26th.
Simon (AKA Toad) has been working within the motorcycle industry for more than twelve years, and a member of the motorcyclist family since birth. Growing up around British-built single and twins, it was inevitable that a life on two wheels was on the cards, from a very early age!
