Note : News items will be archived off-line after a year unless they are still helpful.
October 2022 : Frodsham's BIG GREEN Day
Climate Action Frodsham (CAF) put on a very successful BIG Green Day in early October as part of a national week of action. CNC supported the event and we attracted a wide variety of people to our stand which Steve, Frank & I enjoyed. Here Frank is carrying out a bike check whilst Mark Warren’s route maps simply flew off the tables. Off camera, Steve is successfully recycling an old bike which will he plans to donate to charity and Partick Eakin also brought along his impressive eBIke which attracted quite a lot of interest. In the back ground PCSO Neil Flanagan and two colleagues offered bike marking and had a good uptake. Several excellent talks on saving money by saving energy unsurprisingly attracted packed attendances and at the final Q&A session with Cllr. Paul Bowers & MP, Mike Amesbury, Mike reinforced the value of the new cycle track as a proven way of enabling more young people to cycle safely to school. Factoid : Cycling uses 25x less carbon than cars for the school run. CAF’s Ruth Basden is to be congratulated on organising the event and so is CNC’s Allan Arthur for hosting to event on the day.
Posted by : Ashley McCraight
February 2022 - The Revised Highway Code
You will have seen headlines about changes which have upset some motorists. What are they?
The basic change is placing “road users most at risk in the event of a collision”, at the top of the hierarchy requiring the most protection.
This will challenge many of our current motoring behaviours and will take time to bed in. A concise summary of the changes is available @
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/the-highway-code-8-changes-you-need-to-know-from-29-january-2022
Cycling UK, which campaigned many years for these changes, has published a 2.5 minute YouTube video which visualises many of the key changes really well. https://youtu.be/MhWi-9NrJeU
How can we as cyclists help?
How about : As most of us are also motorists we can take a lead by learning the new rules and putting them into practice.
For example:
Consider the driver in the blue car intending to turn left this junction.
A question. You know what most drivers would probably do now but what should he/she do in future?
Answer: See H2 - Rule for drivers, motorcyclists, horse drawn vehicles, horse riders and cyclists.
At a junction you should give way to pedestrians crossing or waiting to cross a road into which or from which you are turning.
Advert : By joining Cycling UK will help support their future campaigning.
Posted by Ashley McCraight
November 2021 Cheshire Police's Close Pass operation
Cheshire Police are taking the safety of cyclists seriously and a few weeks ago PC Lee Spencer ran a ‘Close Pass’ educational operation locally. PC Mike Henry rode the ‘unmarked’ bike’ around Frodsham, Helsby & Kingsley supported by five other officers including local PCSO’s Neil Flanagan & Lauren Davies and & a fireman. I observed an extremely well managed operation as a result of which quite a number of motorists were stopped and invited back to Frodsham Fire Station, where it was explained when a pass was ‘too close’ i.e. less than 1.5 m. The photo shows the marked mat.
Importantly Cheshire Police has limited resources to carry out these ‘resource hungry’ operations but their commitment is clear as they have run a similar operation in Winsford with a horse & rider and two cycle versions in Saughall & Congleton.
If you want to see plenty of other near misses just explore this website showing ‘Near Miss of the day’. Check out No. 656 as a great example.
https://road.cc/show/tags/near-miss-day/143145
Posted by Ashley McCraight. 21st November 2021
4th October 2021 : 'Ditching the car'
This is an extract from Dr Patrick Eakin's story on how he ‘ditched his car’ and loved it!