Talk:List of cycle routes in London

Cycle Superhighways
Given the large costs, promised benefits, and criticisms/compliments on the CS scheme, can someone with some sources look in to expanding the section, which at the moment is little more than a list. I did see a very good review of the existing CS's, by a respected cyclist lobby/campaign group, but can't seem to track it down. 2.25.164.22 (talk) 13:54, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

I've added some criticism and a link to a photo review, hope people add and improve more of the same, not just remove it--86.151.156.83 (talk) 14:26, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Why does "cycle superhighway" redirect to this page about London bike paths.. Copenhagen, Denmark also has "cycle superhighway" — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.112.177.218 (talk) 14:57, 30 October 2021 (UTC)

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EuroVelo routes
I can see that the European Cyclists' Federation has *designated* some of their "EuroVelo" routes as passing through London, but in reality, are any of these actually sign posted on the ground? As far as I can tell, these EuroVelo routes just share existing Sustrans "National Cycle Network" routes and all the on-road signage is for Sustrans, there's nothing saying EV anywhere?--feline1 (talk) 17:27, 8 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Looking further into this, I see that EV5_Via_Romea_Francigena's own website states it only goes to Cantebury, not to London. So I've amended the article. --feline1 (talk) 10:10, 19 June 2018 (UTC)
 * EuroVelo routes aren't formally signposted in London. Feline1 is right that EV5_Via_Romea_Francigena does not terminate in London - it only runs to Canterbury. That said, EV12 The North Sea Cycle Route passes through London following the route of National Cycle Route 1 north of Greenwich. I'm not sure to what extent these are well used, so I'd be cautious to add them. It depends on what everyone else thinks. The website for EV12 in the UK is: https://en.eurovelo.com/ev12/united-kingdom.London cyclist (talk) 14:54, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Info on proposed TfL CS/ Quietway Routes
The article seems rather burdened with info on "proposed" routes to me. It's interesting up to a point, but "wikipedia is not a crystal ball", and when TfL announce a "proposed" route, that means they launch a public consultation which takes a couple of years and means endless details change, things get cancelled, local borough councils fiddle with the implementation... I tend to feel that the article should concentrate on listing the *actual* current signed routes, rather than 30 proposed ones that may never exist...  Thoughts?--feline1 (talk) 13:29, 11 April 2018 (UTC)


 * I've removed the (very long!) list of proposed Quietway routes for now, and just retained the dozen routes currently listed on TfL's site (all of which are in various stages of completion/consultation). In practical terms, none of these proposed routes can be followed on the ground as numbered Quietways - instead someone cycling down those streets will still see LCN signs, which are all already listed later in the article. --feline1 (talk) 12:26, 28 May 2018 (UTC)

Unnumbered Quietways

 * The latest phenomenon on the streets seems to be local councils unveiling new unnumbered Quietways that aren't mentioned anywhere on TfL's public pages. These are usually upgrades of older LCN routes. For instance, within the past couple of weeks, in Greenwich borough, I've found LCN17 has had "Q" painted on the carriageways between Elverson Road DLR and the Cutty Sark (but with its LCN street signage retained)... and leading north from the Oval, LCN 3 has it's "3"s removed from the carriage way, and replaced with "Q"s... with some new "Q" signage (but some old LCN3 signage still up).... this new unnumbered quietway runs north-ish until it collides with the actual Q5. Hard to find a rhyme or reason to this in a way that can be listed in an wikipedia article ;)

Maps for Quietways
The mapping for all the Quietways is a bit problematic at the moment - TfL's site has PDFs that are more diagrams than actual maps, mostly from Nov 2017, that show the entire proposed route (dashed) and the bits that are currently implemented (solid)... the OpenStreetMaps we have at the moment for them are a mixture of only the implemented bits, only the proposed bits, or both :) Q3 is a good example - I've added a link for the OpenStreetMap but it's only the proposed section, not the existing implemented one! So I've left links to both TfL's diagram and the OpenStreetMap... The situation on the street seems to change from month to month... for instance I spotted a newly opened bit of Q7 marked on the tarmac at its northern end (where it joins Q1) last week, but this isn't yet reflected in TfL's PDF map... --feline1 (talk) 09:36, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Hi there, I noticed the map link (OSM) for QW2 https://www.openstreetmap.org/relation/7268488 is actually the link for QW1 North Jim Killock (talk) 07:19, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Same error for QW3 OSM link. I'd fix this myself but I don't quite know how. Jim Killock (talk) 22:00, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Hi, feline1 I see you've been editing the page but don't seem to have noticed this problem, so I have left hidden comments pointing out the error in the wikipage Jim Killock (talk) 18:50, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks for spotting this, I'll see if I can fix it. Probably just a cut-and-paste error.feline1 (talk) 11:53, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

Greenways
I have been persuing some of the documents that TfL have available about their Greenways scheme (2009–2014) and trying to improve the accuracy of the corresponding bit of this article - still a work in progress at the moment - I think I will actually remove a lot of the detail before it's finished! Bear with me ;) Pyrococcal (talk) 18:27, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

Cycleways
In the spirit of WP:CBALL I don't really think we can have the article listing loads of 'proposed' TfL Cycleway routes. (Not least because TfL have a terrible reputation for failing to actually implement all their proposals...) However the current proposal list will extremely useful for adding in completed routes back in to the main article when they open, so I am going to put a copy of it here in this talk page.

feline1 (talk) 20:13, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

Routemaps
Hi all,

Routemap templates for Cycleway 6, and Cycle Superhighways 2, 3, 5, 7, and 8 are now on Wikipedia. Note that these reflect the current network and might be updated in the future to reflect the transition into Cycleways (this has already happened partway along Cable Street/CS3 where resurfacing has taken place. I don't think they have a place on this page.

The design is akin to those on some National Cycle Network pages. They aim to be simple-to-follow rather than reflect all of the complexities of the network. There are some complex areas which I have tried to reflect (notably around Wandsworth Town and Buckingham Palace). They are designed primarily as reference points for cyclists less familiar with key routes, especially given the renewed focus on cycling during the Covid-19 pandemic.

I've currently applied them to some road pages, including, the A11 and A201.

Links are:
 * Template:Cycleway 6 (London)
 * Template:Cycle Superhighway 2
 * Template:Cycle Superhighway 3
 * Template:Cycle Superhighway 5
 * Template:Cycle Superhighway 7
 * Template:Cycle Superhighway 8

And here's a demo:

London cyclist(talk) 15:07, 16 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Interesting work! I guess this is built using a standard wikipedia template, as I've seem similar schematic diagrams on wikipedia for canals, motorways, railway lines etc. I think if we apply this kind of diagram to cycle routes, it's useful to consider what the diagram is trying to achieve/display.  If it's just the destinations, to be honest then that is probably better understood by looking at a map such as OpenCycleMap or WaymarkedTrails (as they draw an accurate overlay of the route on top of an Open Street Map). However there some  important aspects of the usability of a cycle route that those geographical maps don't capture. One is the number of traffic lights and toucan crossings on the route: those all typically add several minutes of wait time to a journey each. (CS3 in particular - my god! Heading east from Tower Hill, there's about 7 traffic lights in the space of 2 miles ;) ). Another important thing to know is the type of cycle track: is it on a road shared with ordinary motor traffic, is it on a pavement shared with pedestrians, is it a dedicated segregated cycle track, is it just 'unpaved' or asphalt, etc. (Again, CS3 has a mixture of these along its length). Another thing to show might be whether the route has streetlighting (e.g. some 'greenway' routes in London go through parks or paths that have no lighting, so are less usable after dark). User:Pyrococcal (talk) 08:29, 19 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Oh and another thing it is very useful to show on cycle route diagrams is elevation (i.e. big hills). User:Pyrococcal


 * That's very true about the lights.


 * Yes - it's the Template:Routemap. It's a lot simpler than I'd expected. I've seen these schematics on some of the Eurovelo and National Cycle Routes pages and thought it was time to produce something similar for some London routes. In terms of what I'm trying to achieve - it's important to show a list of destinations with some landmarks (particularly Thames-side routes). Having spoken to some people who are getting into cycling, the general feedback was that it's difficult to get to grips with network entry points, exit points, connecting cycle routes, and destinations (e.g. Tower Gateway is signposted from Beckton, but Lancaster Gate is only signposted from further on). OSM is more comprehensive, but it is a cluttered map which can look a bit complex in London. In terms of the type of road, I did consider this, but the template isn't well suited to this complexity.


 * Hills? I've not done one with a major hill yet (I'm talking Swain's Lane sort of gradient), but hills are accounted for in the BSicon trails catalogue: . Based on that, I've just uploaded to Wikimedia which might serve that purpose in future schematics. London cyclist (talk) 17:17, 3 June 2020 (UTC)


 * I really like the use of these route schematics. You've inspired me to start out learning how to possibly do one for C23. A few points I'd make for potential improvements:
 * use the official route colour for Cycleways, i.e. 'title-bg=#93d50a'
 * in this particular wiki page: when using a collapsed template on the table of routes, a 'title=CS8' version would be better than a space-occupying 'title=Cycle Superhighway 8 (CS8)'
 * for Cycleways I'd suggest using e.g. rather than  so that the Cycleway routes appear green rather than red
 * in my C23 attempt I'll be aiming to highlight the named destinations that are used on route signs (e.g. on Whipps Cross 4 minutes signs) in some way, such as in bold and/or using the C/CS colour for the text. McLondon (talk) 00:20, 6 June 2020 (UTC)


 * For sure. For CS routes, I tried and green for Cycleways but I stumbled across a few icons which were not yet in the pink catalogue and I simply didn't have the time to create them. C23 would fit well, I agree. London cyclist (talk) 22:02, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

Quietways section - update/cleanup
I am ever mindful that this article is supposed to be a 'list of actual waymarked cycle routes that one can find in London', not a 'List of TfL's unfulfilled press releases' ;) As such, I realised that the Quietway section contained a lot of un-implemented proposals from 2015, which no longer have much relevance to the reader. So I have pruned most of these out. (Let us hope they turn up in the Cycleways section instead some day ;) )--pyrococcal (talk) 13:59, 25 May 2020 (UTC) 13:59, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Route lengths
I have been thinking that listing the length of a cycle route is a useful piece of information. I have experimented with adding a column to the Cycle Superhighways table to show the approximate length. I have put the figure in miles first, as that is still the most common unit of measurement on the UK roads (although somewhat contrarily, many cycle signs give "distances" in minutes...), with kilometres second. Most of the distances I have just taken from waymarkedtrails.org. The figure there can be slightly misleading, because if the track is segregated in each direction (one on either side of the carriageway), it will effectively count it twice. This is particularly the case for CS2. As such, I have been fairly relaxed about rounding the distances to the nearest integer or half. --pyrococcal (talk) 12:08, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

I also added an 'Approximate Lengths' column to the Cycleways table. Where the route was under 1 mile, I put this distance in yards. I have also pruned out all the projected/proposed bits of routes from the 'Route' and 'Borough' columns, and instead moved that info into the 'Comments' section phrased as "There is a proposal to extend the route to...". Ideally these proposals should be given citations, as they then become reasonable factual statements (i.e. it is indeed true that the proposals exists... whether or not they ever come to fruitition is another matter ;) )--pyrococcal (talk) 11:06, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Meaning of various formatting
What do the various different formatting changes in the Route section mean? There appear to be curly brackets, round brackets, white backgrounds, small text and more? None of this is explained, and is not obvious. A legend should be provided or the information conveyed in a different manner. 90.250.11.209 (talk) 00:35, 25 June 2023 (UTC)


 * It appears that most of these changes have been added recently by McLondon; pinging so that hopefully this can be clarified. 90.250.11.209 (talk) 00:43, 25 June 2023 (UTC)