Go Dutch 2024 - Part 4: Intercity

When I visit the Netherlands, one of the things I enjoy doing is cycling between towns and cities because it is a great way to experience just how the cycle network operates separately to the motoring network.

I don't actually mean cycling and motoring take place in complete isolation and separation from each other, I mean that getting from A to B by each mode will often take different routes designed for those modes, even where they run next to each other. 

On one of our days for our last trip, we cycled 35km between Breda and Dordrecht which was a perfect example of how this all works. Here's a map of the route we took for those wanting to delve in a little more closely. The video at the end of this post covers the route, but I want to have a look at some of the locations along the route to point out how the Dutch system works. 

First, we actually stayed on the outskirts of Breda because it was cheaper, safe in the knowledge that it would be easy to cycle into the city during our stay and as you can see below, we were well catered for on the arterial roads such as Tilburgseweg.

In terms of the cycling and motoring networks, this is an example of a main cycling route and a main motoring route (the N282) which both link Breda and Tilburg and which share the same corridor. There is also the A58 motorway to the south but that's purely a motoring corridor.

Of course, there comes a point where the cycling and motoring networks cross each other and in a situation like this, there will be some kind of traffic management such as traffic signals (above) where the cycle track crosses one of the A27 motorway slip roads, but it is still separated provision which shares a corridor.

Further in towards Breda, we lose the multi-lane highway in favour of a pretty common layout of a road with a pair of one-way cycle tracks and separate footways and in the example above, a nice example of a buffer. 

The carriageway here is 6 metres in width which helps control driver speed and it is also a bus route. The buffer has car parking, the hedgerow provides greenery in the street, and every so often, the buffer contains a bus stop (above) or a pedestrian crossing point. For this section, the cycling and motoring networks are integrated in their design. 

You'll see the centre of Breda in the video where the city centre is car-light and available for selected access because there is car parking on the edge of the centre, but there is also rail, bus and of course cycle access giving lots of options, but I'm skipping the low traffic centre to get us on the way to Dordrecht.

The photo above is where Terheijdenstraat goes below the railway to the east of the station and is where again the cycling and motoring networks coincide and are integrated in their design.

A bit further north (above) and we're starting to return to the model where cycling and motoring are on the same corridor, but the only design integration is where they occasionally cross. The cycle track above has a buffer to the road, but equally, it could be 100 metres away for all the user cares. This section of Terheijdenstraat is interesting as there is a central tidal bus lane in operation along the N285.

The main cycle route peels away from the N285 south of the village of Terheijden and so is unravelled from the main motoring network. In fact the N285 is solely for motoring and it soon meets the A59 motorway. The road into Terheijden carries local motor traffic, but it still has cycle separation on Bredaseweg (above) as the speed limit is 50kph (30 mph). In reality, the one-way cycle tracks here are shared-use paths, but few people are walking in the low density outskirts of the village.

As we get closer to the village core the cycle tracks become cycle lanes with footways appearing and some traffic calming. In the central section, the cycle lanes give way to more of a cycle street treatment on Hoofdstraat (above) with a speed limit of 30 kph (20mph). It's a space compromise because some drivers didn't leave enough space when passing, but it never felt too busy to mix with traffic. 

On leaving Terheijden, the cycle lanes reappeared with a familiar Dutch treatment that has no centre line, and despite a bit of traffic calming on the outskirts, the 60kph (40mph) speed limit felt uncomfortable on Moerdijkseweg (above), even though traffic was fairly light. This is not the main motoring network as the N285 provides that with a higher speed limit, but it still felt like somewhere that needed a two-way cycle track.

We turned off and skirted the village of Wagenberg to access a completely different bit of the road network which was still 60 kph (40mph), but it was narrow and pretty much just served farms (above).

We hardly saw anyone else for ages and of the few people we did see, most were cycling rather than driving. Luckily for us, the wind was light because sometimes this open land can be very hard work if the wind is against you. We did find some interest on Honderdroedeweg where we crossed a single track railway which serves a logistics complex to the east.

As we carried on north, we rejoined a cycle track along another road which provided access to the A16 motorway, but we soon turned off it onto Ketelpolder Oost (above) which provides very local access to farms, farmland and wind turbines running parallel to the motorway. The only car we saw was someone picking up a friend who had suffered a mechanical problem on his racing bike!

Ketelpolder Oost (and it's twin on the other side of the motorway, Ketelpolder West) has a slip road with a height limit that becomes a cycle track. There are also little access tracks right from the motorway which means there is the potential for emergency access via the local access roads here. But in reality, the cycling network which has been using local access roads arrives next to the motorway (and the main motoring network) in order to make use of Moerdijk bridges crossing of the Hollands Diep river. It doesn't interact with the motoring network, it just shares the corridor once more.

Once across and into South Holland (having left North Brabant), we again found ourselves on a road that is part of what is essentially an elongated motorway junction for the A16 as we crossed the motorway itself at Beerpolderweg (above) and a route which took us north towards Dordrecht.

2km north, and we cycled by the edge of an industrial park extension which is the other end of the motorway junction for the A16 and where cycle traffic gives way to motor traffic (above). The cycle route here accesses Rijksstraatweg (below) which has become a long cul-de-sac as new industrial roads have been built in parallel.

This is another lesson in the Dutch continually adjusting its network as in this area, the industrial area is given its own motorway access which keeps that traffic away from the residential areas on the edge of Dordrecht. From a cycling point of view, there is of course access to the industrial area and for longer distance cycle travellers, we got a direct route to the city.

The next section of the journey remained very simple from a cycling perspective as we cycled on the road through a strip of residential development that was separated from the commercial area behind it (but accessible on foot, cycle and local traffic) and then there was more cycle tracks to use to the north of that (above). 

The next kilometre was complex as there was ongoing works with everything pushing through a narrow corridor. Cycling ended up on painted lanes once more and this felt old fashioned compared with the edge of Breda, as cycling was bolted onto motoring space here. 

We crossed the canal and ended our journey on Wijnstraat in the older part of Dordrecht (above) and while there is motor access, it was quiet enough that cycling felt safe and comfortable (apart from the surface perhaps!). This is not the cycling network though, just a street that's fine to cycle along.

As with Breda, we actually had to get out of the centre again for our hotel and we found some more interest. Spuiweg (above) is a shopping street to the south of Dordrecht which provides direct cycle access to and from a large residential area to the south of the city. At first look, a two-way cycle track on a shopping street with one-way for general traffic might look odd, but the main motoring network runs elsewhere and this being a key cycle route to the centre means the layout makes perfect sense.

So, as I said above, here's a video of the route - speeded up for time, but mainly because I set my camera to time-lapse by mistake! If you flick through it, you'll see some of the locations I have covered in this post, but you should also be able to see where the cycling and motoring networks are integrated, are in the same corridors and are separate.

Go Dutch 2024 - Part 1: The Hovenring

Go Dutch 2024 - Part 2: The Double Floating Bus Stop

Go Dutch 2024 - Part 3: Football and Fietsers

Go Dutch 2024 - Part 3: Football And Fietsers

Ostensibly, my trips to the Netherlands are meant to be holidays, but of course, it's impossible to switch off completely and besides, travelling is about finding out about how other people live isn't it?

Over the last few years the trips have included little detours to things for me to geek out on, but there has to be balance and for my son who was with me for this trip, he wanted to go and see some football in Eindhoven. Unfortunately for him PSV Eindhoven weren't playing at home for our visit and so we booked tickets to go and see the slightly smaller and lower division FC Eindhoven.

I'm not especially a sports fan, but fair's fair and the agreement was that we would of course cycle there, and so we did from our hotel in the city centre to the Jan Louwers Stadion in the south of the south of the city, a distance of 4km or about 20 minutes relaxed cycling. The trip was easy and made on cycleways such as Stratumsedijk (above) which is a multimodal corridor sporting a central two-way bus road.

Of course, the junctions we cycled through were fully protected such as the junction of Stratumsedijk with Elzentlaan (above) and even at dusk, we felt safe and protected from drivers.

As we approached the large park and recreation complex in which the stadium sits, we still had protected space which allowed us to enjoy the sunset on Antoon Coolenlaan (above), although some local roadworks did make access down to the stadium a little awkward. However, there were so many people walking and cycling at this point, the odd car driving into the site was treated very much as a guest.

As the light faded and as my phone camera quality got worse, I managed to snap the cycle street style treatment on Charles Roelslaan as we approached the stadium (above).

Because I had checked out our the destination before travelling, I knew that there was cycle parking right outside the 4,200 seater stadium (above) and we arrived about half-an-hour before kick-off which meant there was plenty of space. When we left to head back into the city after the match, it was all taken up with lots of people just using their wheel locks leaving their cycles where they could.

The stadium does have a very small car park, but the wider complex has very little car parking generally which means most people travelling to a match will walk, cycle and use buses. In the event, FC Eindhoven were beaten 3-0 by northern club SC Cambuur in a match with plenty of controversy. 

The most amusing thing of for me was even though I know very little Dutch (about as much as I do football), it was very clear the home crowd was full of football experts shouting at their team and the referee. Like their drivers, the Dutch really aren't that different from the British!

The return cycle was a little quicker and we parked up at a city sports bar and ended up seeing the highlights of the match we had just seen!

Go Dutch 2024 - Part 1: The Hovenring

Go Dutch 2024 - Part 2: The Double Floating Bus Stop

Go Dutch 2024 - Part 2: The Double Floating Bus Stop

I like collecting traffic engineering curiosities and the Netherlands can always be relied on for providing them; so after refuelling near the Hovenring, we headed into the edge of Veldhoven to tick something else off my list. 

It had been a long day of travelling by train and cycle, but we pushed on and cycled just five minutes into the edge of the town that essentially merges into Eindhoven in search of a curious double floating bus stop.

It didn't take long to find it on Blaarthemseweg (above) and yes, it was an odd thing to see, but what made it odder was that it was on a street which really had too much traffic and where cycling was only "protected" by painted lanes. 

The location was on a much longer distributor style which runs parallel to a main through route, both of which run to the town centre. The route the bus stops are on is residential, quite suburban and although traffic calmed, it felt more like a British rat-run that a quiet Dutch street.

The bus route using the street is the number 14 between the centres of Eindhoven and Veldhoven which runs every 30 minutes in each direction and give that none of the other stops are floating, it seems really odd to do so here. So why? If it was for safety then maybe all of the other bus stops would have been treated, but for two buses an hour the risk of conflict with cycle traffic is practically non-existent.

Well I think it performs two functions, but before I get to those, I think we have some clues to help guide us. The double bus stop is outside Zeelsterhof Primary School which you can see in the photograph above and also a block of apartments on the other side of the street which appears to be a sheltered and supported living complex for older people - two demographics which might use the bus.

The first function is traffic calming. If we forget the buses completely, the layout is give-and-take single lane working and as there is no indication on who has priority, drivers have to negotiate with each other. The lane is narrow and there is a speed hump. Although not formally marked (at least with any tactile indicators), the speed hump provides a flat surface for crossing the road.

It's worth having a look at the layout in 2008 (above) because the layout was still give and take, but the central area was one long speed hump which helps me conclude that this was traffic calming by the school foremost, with the bus layout coming later (it looks very new in 2016), although there was still a bus route here in 2008. 

The cycle bypasses are consistent with traffic calming elsewhere in the area because those cycling can continue in safety and don't have to get into having to interact with drivers in situations where drivers will try and assert priority. I found the design layout in my 1998 copy of "Recommendations for Traffic Provisions in Built-up Areas" a Dutch design manual that has lots of interesting things in it.

Maybe there was an upgrade of the bus stop facilities along the route and the designer took the opportunity to reuse the extant piece of traffic calming to provide a pair of stops to serve the school and the apartments and in doing so retained the bypasses for cycling because that's the standard approach from a traffic calming point of view. 

Of course, I hadn't realised or thought about all of this until I sat down to write this post, but you can't help be impressed at the subtle creativity of Dutch engineers, although in fairness, the whole thing could be rendered obsolete if the area is ever redesigned at the network level with bus gates that stop driving through, but retain bus access. Maybe that will be the next iteration that allows the clutter to be taken away.

Oh and one other thing, given a similar context, there is absolutely no reason why we could not provide a layout like this in the UK. I'll leave you with a clip of drivers using this piece of curious Dutch traffic engineering.

Go Dutch 2024 - Part 1: The Hovenring

My latest trip to the Netherlands took me to Eindhoven and so I simply had to go and have a look at the Hovenring, an often celebrated piece of cycling infrastructure.

The trip to the Hovenring was on the first day of a tour with my son which had started with a ferry landing at Hoek van Holland (the town square shown below), and taking our cycles on the Rotterdam Metro (after 9am on a weekday).

My plan had been to get the metro to Schiedam Centraal, the main station in Schiedam which is still overground before the line dives underground. We would then cycle to Rotterdam Centraal and then pick up the Intercity to Eindhoven. However, I also had an alternative idea to go to 's-Hertogenbosch and then to cycle the 40km south to Eindhoven and that's just what we did as we were able to pick up the Sprinter train from Schiedam Centraal.

I think this was the best option as Sprinter trains have level boarding (above, complete with the extending gap filler to the platform) as opposed to the steps of the Intercity and my perception was that cycle space is tighter in the Intercity. 

I think it was the right decision and there was plenty of space for our cycles on the Sprinter (above) and the configuration was such that one could wheel in one door and wheel out of the next to save having to juggle the cycles round (mine is heavy and was loaded up for the trip). I would say that Dutch national railways is similar to the UK in that a cycles are tolerated rather than embraced in numbers and having to pay €7.50 per cycle for a day ticket helps with the discouragement. 

Unlike the UK, the Dutch railways make it very easy to cycle from destination stations using their integrated OV-fiets cycles which are usually quite plentifully supplied at stations across the country such as Tilburg (above). Apparently one can get access to these with a UK bank account, but I've not explored the option as it is meant to be awkward, and probably less helpful when carrying two panniers' worth of luggage.

I'll pick up on the cycle from 's-Hertogenbosch to Eindhoven another time, but as we got to the edge of Eindhoven after being battered by a headwind most of the afternoon (the Dutch hill), we thought that we may as well push on to see the Hovenring to leave a bit more time for our next day's adventure. 

We picked up the city's oddly named "Slowlane" cycle route which took us past the airport and we followed the "S" centre line markings (above) into the Grasrijk district on the very west of Eindhoven.

The Hovenring eventually swung into view as we crossed Meerhovendreef (above). I had seen plenty of photos, but what was coming up was essentially a circular bridge some 72 metres in diameter and which is suspended over a traffic junction via a single pylon with cables down to the deck and some supports underneath (below).

As we got closer, it became apparent that although not horredously steep, the ramps up to the Hovenring are less favourable than the shallower slope that drivers have to deal with going underneath. I think this really does show that the Hovenring is motoring infrastucture which takes walking, wheeling and cycling out of the picture at (just below original) ground level.

Being up above the large and really busy junction feels much safer than it would be crossing multiple traffic lanes (above), but the project was built to improve the flow of traffic and to accommodate housing development in the area. I think this is slightly glossed over in calling the Hovenring a cycling roundabout, but in the (ahem) round, there is no denying that this is an iconic landmark which does improve safety for people as well as simplifying the junction for drivers.

Up above the traffic, we can see the Hovenring is part of the Slowlane and in common with what we had cycled so far, it was wide enough for two-way cycling and there was the odd person walking over which is perfectly fine. 

The Hoventing provides plenty of local connectivity on the edge of Eidhoven such as the new housing (above) and into the adjacent town of Veldhoven.

So there, you have it, an amazing piece of engineering which is now fully part of the local cycling (and walking and wheeling network) in this developing part of Eindhoven.

We used a different ramp to leave - northeast on Noord Brabantlaan because after hours in the saddle and with faces full of headwinds, we spotted something else of interest (above). 

Our pre-midday snack in 's-Hertogenbosch had long since evaporated and the call of fast food was irresistable, but it turns out that the restaurant had its very own 60 metre walking, wheeling and cycling spur from the main network, with the latter ending in a dedicated cycle parking area (above). 

This spur crossed a left turn slip road from the main road, or to be more accurate, it was the left turn slip that crosses the spur because the traffic signals here are set up to priorise the spur with traffic getting demand-led access. It's always the details in the Netherlands! 

I shall leave you with a video of The Hovenring.

The Non-story of 20mph Enforcement In London

A few weeks ago, Times consumer affairs correspondent Andrew Ellson authored an article on 20mph speed enforcement in which he took some umbrage at how London's Metropolitan Police deals with enforcing that particular speed limit.

I'll come to what he wrote in a minute, but this comes at a time when we've had all sorts of nonsense from people decrying any measure to rein in the impact of decades of traffic growth and indeed, enforcement action taken against those behaving dangerously.

I am a supporter of 20mph as the default speed limit. This doesn't come from a political position, it is a consequence of the science which underlies part of the sustainable safety (also called safe systems) approach to highway engineering. In short, the human body can withstand certain forces in terms of being hit by a vehicle or for the occupants of a vehicle, and the relationship between driver speed and the energy of an impact is non-linear. 

20mph (30kph) is the sweet spot for where people both inside and outside of vehicles are much more likely to walk away from a crash and so from a sustainable safety point of view, places where mixed modes operate will benefit from this speed limit. I wrote more about this back in 2020. Let us also be very clear here, 20mph is a limit and not a target, because in some situations it is fully appropriate for people to drive well below the limit because of what is going on around them.

I think that in some respects UK driving culture has got us to a point where some people think about the speed limit as a bit of a guideline and with well-publicised police enforcement approaches, many people realise they are very unlikely to be taken to task for being a little over the limit and in the event they do get caught, some people get very noisily upset and that's grabbed by some to stoke their silly little culture war and presumably it must also help sell newspapers or drive traffic to news websites.

So back to Ellson's piece. While he did mention police forces across the UK, I am going to stick with the Metropolitan police as he seems most upset with them.  The headline to his piece (that he won't have written) leans into the government's current culture war on anyone not driving with "Record fines for 20mph speeding despite PM’s pledge to scrap zones" and in the piece after talking about 20mph, Ellson states:

"The Met alone has issued 595,000 of the fines — the equivalent of one ticket for every four cars registered in London — amid a crackdown on speeding initiated by Sadiq Khan as mayor."

In June 2023, there were 2,608,538 cars registered in London and with Ellson's figure of 595k fines, that's a ratio of 4.38. Now according to the data provided to me by the Met around 20mph enforcement, there were 243,110 offences detected by camera and 2,637 Traffic Offence Reports (TORs) - i.e. detected by a police officer in 2023. That's a total of 245,747 which is a ratio of 10.6. In fairness, the data I have is all offences and not just cars, but it doesn't appear to be the 1 in 4 as suggested in the article.

Ellson then took to Twitter to talk more about this and we find out that just maybe, he was feeling a little sore about the subject and so I obviously couldn't resist a dig. His answer was interesting and I did ask to see his data, but reply there came none.

The 10% +2mph here refers to a commonly held belief by some drivers that they are fine to drive at that speed before they run the risk of enforcement. For 20mph, this is taken as 24mph is fine, enforcement will be from 25mph and greater. Except that's completely wrong because the Met confirmed its 20mph approach in November 2021 as follows;

"The Met threshold for enforcement of 20mph roads and issuing a speeding ticket is 10% + 2 mph. Enforcement from 24 mph and Prosecution from 35 mph."

So if they catch you driving 24mph to 34mph (officer or camera) you are more likely to be dealt with through the fixed penalty process or a speed awareness course, and from and including 35mph, that's probably you off to court.

Ellson's tweet is even more interesting because he is talking about between 21mph and 25mph. He didn't confirm if that was an inclusive figure, but anyone caught speeding at 24mph and 25mph will be subject to enforcement. But let's have a look a the actual data which shows that in 2023 from a speed camera perspective, not a single person was subject to enforcement in London for 21mph to 23mph inclusive which is in line with the 10% +2mph which starts at 24mph. 

For enforcement by an officer for 21mph to 23mph, one person was subject to enforcement and that was dealt with by a speed awareness course. There were no enforcements by an officer at 24mph and there were just four at 25mph (1 case ongoing, 2 for potential prosecution and 1 dealt with by a speed awareness course). Back with the cameras, there were 80,267 enforcement detections at 24mph and 56,764 at 25mph.

Ellson is being a bit naughty quoting the range of 21mph to 25mph because that's taking in 21, 22 and 23mph which objectively is not being enforced against, but it's good framing when you want to create criticism even though we still talking about a 20mph limit and it feeds the social media set-piece of unverifiable stories about old ladies being done for driving at 22mph in a 20mph limit.

But let us put this into perspective with the Met's total 20mph enforcement figure of 245,747. About 42% of camera detections ended up with a speed awareness course and about 13% when detected by an officer, but as officer detections are about 1% of the total, you've got to be quite "unlucky". About 17% of camera detections led to people paying their fines (and taking 3 points), less than 4% going for prosecution, about 29% remain ongoing cases and about 9% led to no further action.

In terms of mileage driven in London, in 2022, there were 19.1 billion miles driven. I don't have a breakdown of how many were on 20mph streets, but that's one 20mph enforcement detection for every 78,000 miles driven in London each year and I'd say we've actually got some good compliance out there which makes Ellson's whole story rather disproportionate in the grand scheme of things. And besides, physics and biomechanics don't care.

I've provided the Met data below, feel free to challenge by maths as I don't always get it right!