10 cities where pop-up bike lanes could benefit millions: explore the maps

As part of Cycling UK’s campaign for space for social distancing, we’ve worked with academics from the Propensity to Cycle project to identify where 10 English authorities, including Manchester and Birmingham, could place pop-up cycle lanes that will allow the most people to cycle safely to work while also maintaining social distancing.​

The research is by Dr Robin Lovelace, Dr Joey Talbot, Dr Malcolm Morgan at the University of Leeds Institute for Transport Studies and Martin Lucas-Smith of CycleStreets.

It identifies potential locations where temporary cycle lanes could be quickly created using traffic cones and signs, including dual carriageway roads and roads with high cycling potential as identified by the Department for Transport funded projects the Propensity to Cycle Tool (PCT) and the Cycling Infrastructure Prioritisation Toolkit (CyIPT).

Use our draft emails to ask your council for safe space for social distancing

You can see the suggested pop-up cycle lanes for the 10 cities included in the initial pilot study below (dark blue lines indicate best potential for pop-up lanes). Local campaigners and groups in these cities can use this information as they consider which specific proposals to take to the local authority:

• Birmingham
• Bristol
• Cambridge
• Leeds
• Leicester
• Liverpool
• London
• Manchester
• Newcastle
• Sheffield

More detailed information on the breakdown is available online. Currently, the PCT and CyIPT have access only to data on England, and so although it is not possible to use this tool to identify potential locations for pop-up bike lanes in Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland, Cycling UK is working to develop similar suggestions in those nations.

The team is in discussion with the DfT on expanding the pop up bike lane dataset to cover all local authorities in England

If you would like to provide feedback on any of the highlighted road sections, email us or or use the CyIPT issue tracker (requires a GitHub account). Please note that the team may make alterations to the underlying map(s) in response to local feedback.