Additional funding from Active Travel England, Active Travel Fund 4, for Cambridgeshire has been given the green light today (Friday, 19 May).
A bid made by the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority earlier this year has been successful in receiving £3,896,590 of additional funding from Active Travel England. Cambridgeshire County Council, who supported the bid, will receive £910,000 of this fund towards construction and development of five new Active Travel schemes across the county.
£700,000 of this funding will be invested in the construction of two new schemes:
- Girton to Eddington - which will see a new zebra crossing and shared path on Girton Road at the junction with Huntingdon Road to provide a safer active travel connection to Eddington, the primary school and the West of Cambridge employment hub.
- Buckden to Brampton - which will see a new shared path, new toucan crossing and lower speed limits to make the walking and cycling route safer. This will improve access from Buckden to Hinchingbrooke Secondary School, the hospital and Huntingdon.
Both schemes will see work begin on site in March 2024.
The remaining funding will be invested in the modelling and design of more Active Travel routes, including:
- Alconbury (Little Stukeley – Great Stukeley – Huntingdon Business Park – Huntingdon Station) looking at options for widening the existing path along Ermine Street between the A141 and Alconbury Weald and improvements to the route through Huntingdon via Stukeley Meadows.
- Godmanchester to Huntingdon Town Centre – this will explore the option of a modal filter on the town bridge, it will involve modelling work to see what the potential effects could be and there will be a consultation on what proposals come out of this modelling work. The aim will be to reduce traffic within Godmanchester and improve the active travel route to Huntingdon Town Centre, the railway station and Hinchingbrooke Secondary School.
- A505 to Granta Park to design a safe link from the existing shared use path on the A505 to the Granta Park entrance via the existing slip road.
This design work will be completed by the end of March 2024.
These new routes will provide active and healthier travel options on routes to schools, employment sites and local facilities which will help families keen to cut costs and the carbon impact of their car travel by making Active Travel the ‘go to’ option for local journeys. Active travel enhancements are also an important step in ensuring the area reaches its ambitious target of becoming net zero county by 2045, five years ahead of central Government’s target.
The Combined Authority, supported by the County Council, has also recently been successful in securing funding from Active Travel England to create an Active Travel Centre of Excellence in Cambridgeshire. This will play a significant role in growing active travel across the county.
Cllr Alex Beckett, chair of Cambridgeshire County Council’s Highways and Transport Committee, said: “This extra funding will help us to deliver more active travel schemes across the county. This is on top of the 15 schemes we delivered last year and early this year.
“Active travel is one of our top priorities and is an integral part of our vision to ‘create a greener, fairer and more caring Cambridgeshire’. We want travel across the county to be safer and more sustainable environmentally – which is part of our ambitions. Active travel is at the heart of achieving this. By giving people options and enabling them to leave the car at home we can all feel the benefits of safer streets, more interactive communities, cleaner air and better health.”
The County Council recently adopted a new strategy to enhance walking and cycling routes across Cambridgeshire, an Active Travel Toolkit for New Developments which will ensure walking and cycling provision is properly considered in all new developments in Cambridgeshire. Finally, alongside the strategy, an Active Travel Design Guide has been created which will help address the challenges of providing new active travel routes whilst protecting the qualities of existing public rights of way for all non-motorised users, particularly in rural areas.
Active Travel England made their announcement today.
