Blaze broke out at Croydon building Friday morning, with firefighters highlighting risks from lithium batteries
An e-bike workshop has been destroyed in an early morning fire in Sydney’s inner west, causing road closures along the suburb’s shopping strip.
Residents were woken just before 5am on Friday after the fire broke out at the building on Elizabeth Street in Croydon.
Continue reading...Residents of Queens Avenue in Caulfield East are ramping up the fight against the 1km path and vow to ‘fight until the bulldozers come’
For 30 years, Tamara de Silva has woken up to the sound of birds chirping in the trees across the road from her home in Melbourne’s south-east.
“Listening to the magpies and the lorikeets in the mornings, watching them playing around – it lifts your spirits,” she said.
Continue reading...Anna Meares among athletes paying tribute to former track cyclist who competed at world championships and Olympics
• Rohan Dennis charged over death of wife Melissa
Melissa Dennis is being remembered as a popular and talented competitor as Australian cycling reels from her death.
Olympic gold medallist Anna Meares paid tribute to Dennis on Monday morning, while AusCycling also released a statement.
Continue reading...Reports name Melissa as woman who died after being hit by car in Adelaide and Rohan as the driver
Two-time Olympian and Two-time Olympiancyclist Melissa Dennis has died after she was struck by a car in Adelaide’s inner north.
Dennis’s husband and fellow Australian Olympic cyclist, Rohan Dennis, has reportedly been charged in relation to her death.
Continue reading...Authorities say lithium-ion battery fires happen every week across Australia and poorly built buys could lead to new wave of damage
Choosing the wrong electric bike or scooter could be a fatal mistake this Christmas, experts have warned, amid a rising number of house fires caused by faulty batteries.
Authorities have warned that lithium-ion battery fires are happening every week and a new wave of damage could be unleashed early next year due to poorly built Christmas purchases.
Continue reading...Maastricht clamps down on cyclists who illegally secure their two-wheelers to lamp-posts or railings
Officials in the Netherlands, a country with more bicycles than people, are tackling a plague of “wild parking” by confiscating illegally stationed bikes and increasing the penalties to get them back.
This year the southern city of Maastricht – beloved of international students – banned people from “orphaning” their bikes by deserting them on the street. Now it is doubling the fines it charges people who want to reclaim impounded bicycles.
Continue reading...Coroner says Harry Colledge, 84, would probably be alive if council had acted on warnings about 87-metre-long crack in the road
A council has been severely criticised by a coroner over the death of a cyclist who suffered fatal head injuries after hitting a pothole that had been visible on Google Street View for 14 years.
The Lancashire area coroner, Kate Bisset, concluded that Harry Colledge, 84, would probably not have died last January if Lancashire county council had acted on warnings to fix the 87-metre-long crack on Island Lane near the village of Winmarleigh.
Continue reading...Road infrastructure campaign has been launched in honour of designer Emma Burke Newman, who was killed in lorry collision
On the long and busy stretch of road where Glasgow’s riverside meets its city centre, hundreds of commuters and visitors travel into and out of town each day. Since January this year, many will have spotted a new addition to their route: a white “ghost bike”, adorned with flowers and messages, parked at a busy junction where 22-year-old French-American architecture student and experienced cyclist Emma Burke Newman was killed in a collision with a lorry, just six months after moving to the city.
Now, former colleagues at architectural firm New Practice, where she worked as a designer while studying at Glasgow School of Art, have launched a road infrastructure campaign in her honour. Focusing on three specific junctions along the riverside, including the one where Burke Newman lost her life, the Waiting To Happen campaign aims to gather data about road users’ experiences of these locations with a view to creating a set of possible improvements.
Continue reading...Low-traffic neighbourhoods and fines also face clampdown under plans condemned by active travel groups
Rishi Sunak has pledged to end “anti-car measures” as he set out a series of ideas to prioritise the needs of drivers at the likely expense of other road users such as bus passengers, cyclists and pedestrians.
Outlining what he called a “long-term plan to back drivers”, the prime minister unveiled a clampdown on 20mph limits, bus lanes, low-traffic neighbourhoods (LTNs), and the ability of councils to fine drivers who commit offences.
Continue reading...Riding most popular in Victoria and the Northern Territory with Tasmania at the bottom of the pile, new survey suggests
A pandemic bicycle boom has faded, with the latest statistics showing many people feel it is too dangerous to ride on Australian roads.
There has been a steady decline in people cycling at least once during a 12-month period over the past decade, from about 40% in 2011 down to 34.2% in 2017.
Continue reading...DfT also says bids for new £200m funding pot for England could include plans for better school routes and inclusive street designs
Council bids for a £200m funding pot to boost walking and cycling must “take women’s safety into account”, according to the Department for Transport (DfT).
A 2021 Office for National Statistics study showed half of women felt unsafe walking after dark in a quiet street near their home.
Continue reading...National Highways faces third intervention by a local authority over infilling, after burying Congham bridge in Norfolk in tonnes of concrete
A controversial practice by the government’s roads agency of burying historic railway bridges in concrete has been dealt a fresh blow after a third council intervened over another infilled structure.
King’s Lynn and West Norfolk council has told National Highways it must apply for retrospective planning permission if it wants to retain hundreds of tonnes of aggregate and concrete it used to submerge Congham bridge, a few miles east of King’s Lynn.
Continue reading...Central station is replacing its messy, overflowing cycle parking facilities with a low-cost area that’s tucked away out of sight
Beneath the clear waters and pleasure boats by Amsterdam central station is a remarkable feat of engineering: an underwater garage for 7,000 bicycles.
The garage, which opens on 26 January, is the result of a four-year, €60m (£53m) project to clear heaps of rusty bikes left by hasty commuters and install rows of clean, safe parking spaces underground, where bikes can be left free for 24 hours and then at a cost of €1.35 per 24 hours.
Continue reading...Demon young riders speeding at 40kph are making the Dutch city’s once cycle-friendly streets dangerous – and the problem is spreading
Debby Nieberg was cycling home from the dentist last October, when she was knocked to the pavement and broke her shoulder.
According to her police report, the youngster on an e-bike – overtaking Nieberg on Amsterdam’s narrow cycling lanes – got up and cycled off, a crime in itself. “This unfortunately has become a big part of my life because of the ‘need for speed’ of those on e-bikes,” says the 56-year-old freelance translator, who has just started cycling again. “The bike situation is definitely unsafe.”
Continue reading...UK company makes decision because of growing tensions between Beijing and the island
Brompton, the UK’s largest bicycle maker, has said it is planning to reduce its dependence on China and Taiwan for parts, amid fears of a growing military threat to the island from Beijing.
The company known for its folding bikes is among various western firms hoping to ensure they can source supplies from other countries, as concerns mount over rising geopolitical tensions, and even a possible future invasion of Taiwan by China, which considers the island to be a breakaway province.
Continue reading...Figures uncovered by Lib Dems show that only 1.7% of 74,421 cases over 12 months resulted in a charge
Almost 90% of all bicycle theft cases reported to police over the past year were closed without a suspect even being identified, and just 1.7% resulted in someone being charged, analysis of crime statistics shows.
The Liberal Democrats, who uncovered the data from statistics for England and Wales from July 2021 to June this year, said it was indicative of under-funded police forces being unable to properly investigate such crimes.
Continue reading...Ansbach court rules in favour of two cycling activists who had been fined €100 for breaching data protection regulation
People who notify the police of parked cars blocking pavements and bike paths will in future be able to submit photographs as evidence of offences, a court in Bavaria has ruled.
An administrative court in Ansbach has ruled in favour of two cycling activists who had been fined €100 (£87) each for breaching data protection regulation for photographing apparently illegally parked cars and emailing the images to the police.
Continue reading...Van der Poel flies out of Australia after being fined A$1,500 in local court but lawyer says his client will appeal convictions
Dutch cycling star Mathieu van der Poel will attempt to overturn a conviction for assaulting two teenage girls in a Sydney hotel the night before the men’s world championship road race.
The Tour de France stage winner was arrested hours before Sunday’s race in Wollongong where the 27-year-old was one of the favourites.
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Continue reading...Dutch cyclist retires early from Wollongong race following alleged night-time altercation with teenagers at hotel
Dutch cyclist Mathieu van der Poel, who was the favourite going into the UCI Road World Championships elite men’s road race in Wollongong, was arrested and charged with common assault on Saturday night following an incident at his hotel.
He started the race on Sunday morning but retired after less than an hour of racing.
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Continue reading...Iain Treloar says Union Cycliste International blacklisted him after he examined its links to a Turkmen autocrat and a Russian billionaire
A respected cycling journalist who was twice blocked from attending the Wollongong world cycling championships believes he has been blacklisted for reporting on the governing body’s links to a notoriously repressive regime and a Russian billionaire under sanctions.
Investigative journalist Iain Treloar’s recent reporting has posed uncomfortable questions for the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) – the powerful governing body for world cycling.
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