Reader's Letter: Pedestrian and cycle routes "constantly blocked"

Cycle lanes that only have dotted white lines rather than solid are simply "advisory" meaning vehicles can legally park across them if it's "unavoidable" ... whatever that means. They're little more than fakes and a waste of paint, giving cyclists the impression of a safe zone when in fact it's an illusion.
You will see the same thing on Manchester Road going from Wilmslow towards the Blue Bell

CEC sponsored, on demand tow away trucks are required, accompanied by off location vehicle storage for impounded vehicles plus heavy retrieval fines are necessary to stop this blight.

CEC wasted an eye watering amount of money to connect Handforth to Alderley Edge for cyclists using this tin-pot dotted white along line strategy to ensure that cyclists have the part of the road that’s crumbling, full of detritus and generally blocked by parked cars and builders vans.

In Holland they do it slightly differently. They create separated, tarmaced cycle ways alongside every road throughout the country. It costs a huge amount of money, but the health benefits would bring significant savings in the NHS budget.

The problem is, it would require joined-up thinking.

Indeed Alan. The Dutch also design their cycleways / walkways so they connect houses with town centres by the shortest direct route, while cars have to go on a far more circuitous journey to achieve the same end. This not only keeps cars away from the vulnerable cyclists and walkers, it encourages the latter, with associated health and environmental benefits.

Decades ago long before I retired I used to spend a couple of weeks at a time at a client site in Denmark. There, the properly maintained cycleways often run cross-country well away from roads, which not only makes them safe but makes them far more pleasant to use than they would be if adjacent to roads. And they were very well used; even senior managers at the client site would cycle to work. It was the normal thing to do.

It’s a mess. The general dominance of cars in the town, added to overgrown hedges, broken paving , and of course the dreaded potholes, are a nightmare , for cyclists and pedestrians. Cheshire East do nothing to fix the basics.
There was a good initiative “Park Safe” , introduced a short time ago , where the public can report illegal, nuisance, and anti social parking. Go on Cheshire East , keyword park safe, numbers to call are shown also, and photos welcome. When it first came out, one of the learned locals said he,d taken 20 pictures on day one. I guess we have to take the initiative ourselves to try and educate those who show no respect for cyclists and pedestrians. Drivers who block lanes, pathways and streets, demonstrate an overwhelming selfishness in so doing. I hope we can stop a few, or at least make them aware, that it’s not good for a parent to have to push a pram into the road to swerve around a pavement blocker, as well as to block a cycle lane, it’s not acceptable.

The writer has hit the nail on the head - disabled and young children are vulnerable and voiceless, characteristics the entitled motorist is well aware of. Until that changes, nothing changes. The Dutch culture is far superior and en pointe.

It's all down to MUPPETS.
Our lives are run by them.
They pervade every political party, in every government with the most persuasive, convincing and skilful Muppets at the very top who are actually running the show. As a result, their influence spreads outwards and downwards into the various organisations closer to running our lives and often into organisations and businesses that receive government finance to ‘get on’ with projects and infrastructure that is supposed to improve our existence.
Then there are the ‘vulture’ Muppets who take a piece of the action with advice, legality and consultations before anything gets done. Then when it’s all finished and ‘up and running’ it doesn’t work properly, was the wrong idea and choice in the first place, is poorly constructed, behind schedule and not what people want.
I mean it’s not as if blatantly there are fine examples of success dotted around the globe for these career Muppets to copy and do a good job - as mentioned by several contributors to this posting.

Care UK, in building a 60 bedroomed care home on Manchester Road, have created an incredibly dangerous situation for cyclists, pedestrians, drivers for the past 18 months by allowing construction staff to park on the road and not providing a separate parking facility. Residents around the site have had near-miss accidents on several occasions due to views being blocked by vehicles being parked all along the road on either side. This has been addressed with them on many many occasions but nothing has changed.

@Kate Newman,
Having created a specific cycle-way and having publicised it as such across a range of public media, I think that CE Council would be in a very precarious position if an accident happened and they were found to have not ensured (as far as they are able) the safe passage of cyclists and the safe policing of the cycleway by their service partners.

Yes Kate.
In my posting I forgot to add the PLANNING MUPPETS who are up there with the worse examples.