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Stroud District Cycling Strategy

We have had some excellent news about the prospects for a District Council Cycling Strategy.

As you may know the District Council's Environment Strategy published in January 2007 committed the District Council to supporting the Cycling Forum in the development of a Cycle Strategy. The Cycle Campaign has been pushing for this for some time, and particularly since 2005 when the District Council felt unable to require the developers to provide a cycle route through the housing development on the west side of the Stroud College site because there was no planning requirement that they should do so. We surveyed all the District's Parish Councils in late 2005, and had an overwhelmingly positive response that a cycling strategy is needed.

Local Plans now have to fit within a 'New Development Framework' and this Framework is built from consultation with the public, or from ideas emanating from the public and then consulted upon. The Framework is informed by two levels of guidance; the highest and most stringent is a Supplementary Planning Document which contains requirements for the council and planners when a development submission is made; the second level is Supplementary Planning Advice/Guidance, which advises but does not require stated actions/outcomes. We were aiming for the second because even working with the District and County Councils we would not have had the resources to meet all the requirements for the former.

The good news is that the District Council is now positively exploring whether the production of a Planning Document is possible. Cycle England, a newish body set up by the government, can provide up to five days of consultation 'free' to local authorities and Krista Harris of SDC applied for this. Their consultant is meeting with members of the Pedestrian and Cycle Forum, District Council and County Council Officers at the end of October, and will subsequently draw up a document about the possibilities for the development of a Planning Document. If it goes ahead then the consultation etc will be managed by someone with knowledge of the New Development Framework and we will have an advisory role.