Welwyn Garden City cycling improvements consultation by Hertfordshire County council

By | 21st February 2021

Hertfordshire County Council (HCC) have launched a consultation on the next steps for the two new cycle routes in WGC, the bollarding of Digswell Park Road and the cycle lanes on Hunters Bridge. Please can all WelHatCycling supporters reply to this consultation so HCC hear your voices?

What we’d like to see and suggest you add to your responses:

  • Digswell Park Road (map): This needs extending at the north end with a safe crossing of Hertford Road and link to Welwyn North station.
  • Hunters Bridge (map): This needs extending around the corner at Osborn Way and linking in to Stonehills and through the town centre to Longcroft Lane. It also should be extended across The Campus to both Oaklands College and Campus West so as to create safe links to all the major town centre facilities. At the Broadwater Road end the traffic lights need pedestrian and cycle phases rather than guess and run.
Cycle path on Hunters Bridge ending too soon at waitrose
The Hunters Bridge cycle lane which ends too soon at Waitrose and needs extending

We also think you can point out the benefits of both routes, including the much safer crossing of Bessemer Road to Digswell Park Road and the crossing of Bridge Road at the Broadwater Road traffic lights.

You can find full details of the consultation here. Closing date is the 15th March 2021. You can also comment to us with your views on this page or to chair@welhatcycling.org.uk

You can also comment on the existing cycle routes including those in Hatfield via this page.

Category: Cycle routes Wewlyn Garden City

About Adam Edwards

Adam Edwards is the current chair of WelHatCycling. As a parent of two what matters most to him is utility cycling: getting to school, work, the shops, etc. He is particularly keen on group rides which involve cake. With his youngest child, he's ridden all the way from Hatfield to Edinburgh on a tandem.

14 thoughts on “Welwyn Garden City cycling improvements consultation by Hertfordshire County council

  1. Mark Whittle

    The improvements to Digswell Park Rd and Hunters Bridge are ok but they are improvements to existing routes that already have adequate surface. I would like you to spend the money on making new cycle routes. A good example would be to upgrade the footpath along the A1000 to be a cycleway so Welwyn Village is then connected to WGC and Welwyn North Station.

    Reply
    1. Adam Edwards Post author

      Completely agree with you on that one. A safe cycle route from Welwyn is one of our repeated suggesting whenever there is a consultation. Note that in both cases this is an opportunity to ask for additional bits where there are no cycle routes, not just keeping what is already there.

      Your county councillor is Richard Smith richard.smith@hertfordshire.gov.uk so I would recommend sending him this request. Our county councillors tend to get lots of negative emails about anything to do with people who cycle, so asking for improvements and saying cycle routes are good is a big help.

      You can also see this on Widen my Path: Do please vote up the things you like as Hertfordshire are using this info in their decision making. This link should take you direct to Welwyn: https://www.widenmypath.com/suggest/#13/51.8372/-0.1978

      Best wishes

      Adam

      Adam Edwards

      Chair – WelHatCycling
      chair@welhatcycling.org.uk

      Reply
  2. Lena Cresci

    We need a cycle path linking Cuffley to the A1000 as The Ridgeway Isn’t a safe road to cycle on.

    I agree that the Hunters Bridge path Is ok but It wasn’t the most needed.

    Reply
    1. Adam Edwards Post author

      You can add to the votes on Widen my Path https://www.widenmypath.com/suggest/#13/51.7166/-0.2024 where this road is flagged as needing a cycle path.

      The other thing to do is write to your county councillor and ask them for this. The more people who do the more they are likely to do something. Sadly far too many councillors only hear negative things about people on cycles and so assume there are no votes in cycling. Your county councillor is:

      Stephen Boulton stephen.boulton@hertfordshire.gov.uk
      https://democracy.hertfordshire.gov.uk/mgUserInfo.aspx?UID=144

      There’s an election in May 2021, so he will be wanting to please the voters.

      Do please let me know what he says.

      Best wishes,

      Adam

      Adam Edwards

      Chair – WelHatCycling
      chair@welhatcycling.org.uk

      Reply
  3. Marion Evans

    I have cycled from Hatfield on the Alban way. Also have cycled towards the Ryde. Was disappointed that the cycle path finished abruptly at the Ryde. Would like a cycle path to continue into Welwyn Garden City.

    Reply
    1. Adam Edwards Post author

      I’m sorry you had a problem at this junction. The cycle path does indeed carry on. You just have to cross the road into Park View and then that takes you to the cycle path on to Mill Green and Welwyn Garden City. There is continuous cycle path all the way to Digswell or if you turn right at Mundells, cycle path all the way to Hertford Football Club.

      I hope that means you can do this again and follow the route further north. (Mill Green Museum when it reopens is well worth a visit and they do Sunday teas in the summer.)

      If you want to meet up for me to guide you along this bit once lockdown is eased, please let me know.

      Best wishes,

      Adam

      Adam Edwards

      Chair – WelHatCycling
      chair@welhatcycling.org.uk

      Reply
      1. Dominic Cox

        If users can’t see that the cycle path continues the signage should be improved. No one should need a guide to follow a cycle route.

        Reply
        1. Adam Edwards Post author

          Agree. In the case of The Ryde junction there is a sign just before the junction pointing to Park View, but it’s a Sustrans stick on sign on a post, not an official county one. I emailed the person asking and sent them photos of what to look out for.
          Thanks
          Adam

          Reply
  4. Craig

    The Hunters Bridge “cycleway” is a joke. Just look and see how many cycles use it, an absolute waste of space that is causing traffic to build up throughout the town centre and just alienates people who are not cyclists. (I am a daily cyclist – often to the town).
    The paths either side of this road are wide enough for a shared cycle/footpath – wider than those of the adjoining Bessemer Road where this was done. Easier, less expensive, effective and doesn’t “celebrate” 100 years of a beautiful garden city with an unsightly row of (now filthy) plastic rubbish.
    Get them down!
    Use the money for imaginative new ways to encourage safer cycling. Get out of your office, get on a bike and see where the dangers are (e.g. the Campus, over the white bridge, Knightsfield). It never has been Hunters Bridge.

    Reply
    1. Adam Edwards Post author

      Thanks for this. Hunters Bridge is a temporary work and this consultation is about deciding if it stays or goes, so do let Hertfordshire know this. WelHatCycling as the local voluntary group can only encourage and lobby, we can’t decide the future of this route.

      WelHatCycling’s view is that the route will get used once it is properly connected to the town centre around the corner into Stonehills. Its that gap which stops it working as the cycle path ends where it gets most dangerous. We’d be quite happy to see a two way path on one side of the bridge so long as that’s not an issue with pedestrians. That was always the plan to be funded by the flats being built on the Shredded Wheat site. I agree it should go on to Campus West and the White Bridge.

      Best wishes,

      Adam

      Adam Edwards

      Chair – WelHatCycling
      chair@welhatcycling.org.uk

      Reply
    1. Adam Edwards Post author

      Our Secretary has now added links to the article to the locations on Google maps.
      I’ve drawn the routes in Ride with GPS which you can link to here:

      This is the Hunters Bridge route showing the proposed extension west around to Stonehills:
      https://ridewithgps.com/routes/35277825
      and this is Digswell Park Road to which I have added our request for an extension to Welwyn North station:
      https://ridewithgps.com/routes/35277844
      Thanks
      Adam Edwards

      Reply
    2. david_d

      Hi Dominic,
      The best source for cycle-friendly mapping is OpenCycleMap: https://www.opencyclemap.org/
      However this still won’t highlight some of the good but unofficial cycle routes such as Digswell Park Road – nothing beats local knowledge here! Our led rides (when we are able to run them) are a good way of discovering some of these.

      Reply

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