Following a meeting of the Finance and Assets Committee, East Cambridgeshire District Council has adopted its new cycling and walking routes strategy.

The strategy follows on from a survey which took place in 2020 to gather views from residents as to how the Council could prioritise routes to encourage more people to cycle or walk to work, school, public transport links or other essential services – rather than opt for the car.

More than 1,100 residents took part in the survey and recommendations for the strategy were made based on these findings.

In creating its new strategy, the Council has focused on routes which:

• link villages to market towns
• link villages with no public transport to larger villages
• link with public transport to enable busses and trains to replace cars
• link in with existing or proposed paths such as Greenways, created by the Greater Cambridgeshire Partnership which will link the Swaffhams and Bottisham with Cambridge
• focus on plans included in Cambridgeshire’s Local Cycling and Walking Infrastructure Plan (LCWIP), which are more likely to attract Government funding

When making recommendations, the Council also considered the number of times a route was suggested via the public consultation, the potential number of users the route could serve and the number of specified journey purposes it serves.

In total 309 cycle routes and 126 walking routes were suggested by residents and from these, 23 priority routes were identified with feasibility studies being conducted for certain routes by walking and cycling charity, Sustrans.

Councillor David Brown, Chairman of the Finance and Assets Committee, said: “I am absolutely thrilled that we have been able to approve the cycling and walking routes strategy here in East Cambridgeshire.

“As a Council, we are committed to improving cycling and walking routes for all residents not only in the bigger towns but the smaller and more rural villages as well and the approval of this strategy will allow us to meet this goal.

“I would like to take this opportunity to thank every resident who got involved in our bus, cycle, walk consultation last year, the responses gained from this were vital in the creation of this strategy and I look forward to seeing this hard work come to fruition.”

The strategy also forms part of the Council’s plan to encourage people to adopt more healthy lifestyles and support it in its pledge to become net carbon zero.

You can find the cycling and walking strategy on the Council’s website.