Walkers and Cyclists to Welcome £6m Investment in Surrey’s Streets

Published on: 17 Nov, 2020
Updated on: 22 Nov, 2020

Image of interactive map on the SCC website. It shows ideas proposed for the Active Travel Fund for roads and pavements. Click on image to link.

The county council has been allocated £6,445,750 of government funding to invest in improved footpaths and cycleways.

In June this year, Surrey was granted £848,000 which the council upped to £1.69 million to support the roll-out of 10 active travel schemes. First to be installed was in Farnham, where town centre pavements were widened to help shoppers maintain social distancing.

So far, consultation on these improvement proposals has generated more than 3,000 comments. Residents can continue to have their say about what schemes could work in their area by using interactive maps via the council’s website: www.surreycc.gov.uk/activetravelfund.

More information about the schemes will be announced after further consultation.

Cllr Matt Furniss

Matt Furniss (Con, Shalford), cabinet member for Highways, said: “We’re delighted the government has recognised our ambitious programme to support walking and cycling safely by allocating us the third-highest amount of local authority funding.

“The pandemic has encouraged our residents to walk and cycle more. We want to keep our residents moving across the county and ensure they continue to reap the benefits of outdoor activities on both their mental and physical health.

“With transportation responsible for 46% of Surrey’s carbon emissions, we are also committed to encouraging more active travel to help our environment. By using our cars less, we can reduce congestion across our network and improve air quality.”

Cllr John Rigg

Borough Cllr John Rigg (R4GV, Holy Trinity), lead for Infrastructure, said: “The award follows the county council’s bid to the second part of the government’s Emergency Active Travel Fund this summer.

“The bid includes two schemes in Guildford. These are, as Scheme One, a £1.651m Guildford to Burpham cycle route consisting of a proposed separate on-road cycle tracks with a length of 1.1 miles, and as Scheme Two, the improvement of Dagley Lane which connects part of the town centre to Shalford.

“The bid references the Guildford Cycle Route Assessment report (2020), which was prepared for us, in making the case for the London Road scheme. We shared this report with our partners at the county council.

“We have also worked with them in making the case for the Dagley Lane scheme and this is on a path managed by us. The Dagley Lane scheme … has also been promoted strongly by local cycling groups.”

Surrey County Council’s bid is available to view here.

Responses to Walkers and Cyclists to Welcome £6m Investment in Surrey’s Streets

Jim Allen Reply

November 17, 2020 at 5:53 pm

Sadly, there has been no consultation on this subject with the people of Burpham, instead it has been presented as a fait accompli with comments collected later.

The imposition of Aldi traffic problems followed the same pattern: decide and then ask for comments later with no intention of making changes. This is contrary to the Cabinet code of practice on public consultations.
Maurice Bethell Reply

November 18, 2020 at 5:52 pm

Regrettably, we all know that the money allocated is far too little to repair all the damage to highways and footpaths in Surrey. It is a drop in the ocean. I complained to SCC about dangerous trees on a main road within the county two years ago. Their has been no response or action.
Nigel Burke Reply

November 24, 2020 at 11:19 am

It is excellent that Surrey has received this funding. However, the SCC bid for Tranche 2 of the EATF [Emergency Transfer Access Fund] was for £7.8m for 10 projects, but they have received ‘only’ £6.4m. Presumably, some of the projects will not go ahead, or SCC will make up the £1.4m shortfall as they did with Tranche 1.

As Cllr Rigg points out, the (two) projects for Guildford are already defined, hence projects suggested by the public on the interactive map will require additional funding.

In any event, it seems SCC has already published a map of the additional projects they have down-selected from those suggested (https://surreycovidsouthwest.commonplace.is/schemes/proposals/possible-future-schemes-in-guildford-and-waverley/details). Thus it is difficult to see what purpose adding additional suggestions will serve.