Active Travel England (ATE), the government’s new cycling and walking executive agency, launched today [24 January] with Olympic gold medallist Chris Boardman as interim commissioner.
ATE will be responsible for driving up the standards of cycling and walking infrastructure and managing the national active travel budget. This includes £5.5m investment in cycling and walking schemes, including £300,000 top-up to e-cargo bike initiatives, £3m to improve cycling infrastructure around train stations and grants to explore active travel on prescription
It will inspect finished schemes and ask for funds to be returned for any that have not been completed as promised or have not started or finished by the stipulated times.
ATE will also begin to inspect, and publish reports on, highway authorities’ active travel performance, and identify particularly dangerous failings in highways for cyclists and pedestrians.
As well as approving and inspecting schemes, ATE aims to help local authorities to train staff in spreading good practice in design, implementation and public engagement. It will be a statutory consultee on major planning applications to ensure that the largest new developments properly cater for pedestrians and cyclists.
Boardman will be closely involved in the full set-up of ATE, including the recruitment of the chief executive and management team. He has been appointed on an interim basis, while the Department for Transport (DfT) conducts a full and open competition for the permanent commissioner role.
According to the DfT, Boardman is the country’s leading figurehead for active travel and delivered the first phase of Manchester’s public transport system known as the Bee Network.
He will now lead the ATE team in its work to raise the standards of cycling and walking infrastructure, in line with the principles set out in the government’s Gear Change: a bold new vision for walking and cycling.
Boardman said: “The positive effects of high levels of cycling and walking are clearly visible in pockets around the country where people have been given easy and safe alternatives to driving. Perhaps most important of all, though, it makes for better places to live while helping both the NHS and our mission to decarbonise.
“The time has come to build on those pockets of best practice and enable the whole nation to travel easily and safely around their neighbourhoods without feeling compelled to rely on cars. I’m honoured to be asked to lead on this and help deliver the ambitious vision laid out in the government’s Gear Change strategy and other local transport policies.
“This will be a legacy we will be proud to leave for our children and for future generations. It’s time to make it a reality – it’s time for a quiet revolution.”
ATE will be headquartered in York from this summer, preliminary work is already underway, scrutinising councils’ plans for active travel.
