This week Liverpool City Council has opened a new public consultation on four new proposed pop-up cycles routes across the city in a £4m plan. Tony McDonough reports

People across Liverpool are being asked for their views on a the second phase of the city’s pop-up cycling network.

In June 2020, the city council’s cabinet approved a £4m fund to create the segregated pop-up cycle lanes a response to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on people’s travel plans. Routes were designed to connect to the city’s permanent cycle network.

Three routes were introduced last summer – in the east on West Derby Road, south in the vicinity of Sefton Park and on the North Liverpool Loop line to Bootle. Now a public consultation is inviting comments on a further four proposed new routes across the city to complete the 65km network. They are:

• Route 4 – East Lancs Road – Townsend Lane – Breck Road – city centre.
• Route 5 – East Prescot Road – University Hospital – London Road – city centre.
• Route 6 – (University route): Gateacre – Woolton Road – Wavertree – Lawrence Road – Crown Street – Myrtle Street – city centre.
• Route 7 – Liverpool Loop South: Hale – Speke Boulevard – Garston Village – Aigburth Road – city centre.

The public is invited to go online to see the proposals and provide their feedback by clicking here. Comments will be accepted until 5pm on Wednesday, March 24, and questions can be sent via email to cyclingwalking@liverpool.gov.uk

The results of the survey will be shared with elected members and the public and fed back to the Department for Transport. The city council will also use the feedback to shape how it improves access to cycling routes in Liverpool over the coming months and years.

Funding for the pop-up cycle lanes is to be sourced from the council’s highways investment programme, Liverpool City Region Combined Authority and bids to the Active Travel Fund established by the Department of Transport.

In addition to the pop-up lanes, the city council, which declared a Climate Emergency in 2019, is also currently overseeing a £47m upgrade to city centre connectivity and is introducing seven miles of new permanent cycle lanes. It is also exploring an expansion of the city’s 20mph areas to further improve safety and air pollution.

Simon O’Brien, Liverpool’s Cycling Commissioner, said: “The ongoing COVID pandemic means we must reassess our future travel plans to help those vulnerable people already affected by high levels of air pollution and poor health due to inactivity.

“These temporary lanes are a real start to combating all these difficult issues are city is facing. Liverpool City Council is leading from the front in the fight to improve the lives of the people of our region. Keep riding, get riding, to help make our city a better place to live. And take part in this consultation to help make that all happen.”