A Department for Transport consultation has been released, and unsurprisingly motorcycles and motorcyclists do not feature anywhere in the document.
Let’s face it, this isn’t the first, or even second time, bikes and the people that ride them have been ignored by the government and local authorities, although the fact that this report includes the needs of horse riders, while not mentioning motorcycles at all is frustrating, to say the least.
The National Networks National Policy Statement (NNNPS) is a wide-ranging look at road and rail travel in the UK. It’s part of the framework that sets out how the government will improve its major roads and rail routes and helps to define what policies are needed. And it’s not like the omission of bikes from the document can be taken lightly, the second paragraph down on the page outlines how the document has been honed and reviewed so that it ‘ensure that it remains fit for purpose in supporting the government’s commitments for appropriate development of infrastructure for road, rail, and strategic rail freight interchanges.’.
It’s a point that the British Motorcyclists Federation (BMF) has picked up on, and its political & Technical Services Director, Anna Zee, has jumped at the chance to highlight the Department for Transport’s error. In her response, Zee highlighted the various areas of the consultation where motorcycles and motorcyclists could (and rightly should) be included and also highlighted the government's blinkered view of decarbonisation which results in it only seeming to want to push on with electrification when other options are available.
The response from the BMF to the consultation comes an embarrassingly short time after the lobby had a “very positive” meeting with Transport Minister Richard Holden MP, one of the men now in charge of transport policy and legislation.
You can read the full NNNPS consultation here.
