1

V i s T r a v ’s F i r s t Wo r k s h o p

Pa g e 1

A s u c c e s s f u l Cy c l i n g Pr o j e c t i n Po r t u g a l

Pa g e 2 -4

E l e c t r i c c a r s f o r t o u r i s t s i n Co r n w a l l

Pa g e 5 -6

Ro b B r o c k

Pa g e 6

M o o r s b u s

Pa g e 7

Eu r o s t a r N e w s

N e w s i n B r i e f

Pa g e 8

S U S T A I N A B L E L E I S U R E T R A V E L N E T W O R K

Summer 2009 Issue 1

New Good Practice Guide for Attractions

‘Widen the Choice’ Transport Partnership has produced a good practice Guide for doing a green travel audit for tourist attractions. The Guide gives easy-to-understand instructions about how to find out about non-car travel to the destina-tion and promote it to visitors.

Good Practice Guide Available on website

Welcome to the First

VisTrav’s First Workshop

She also spelt out the consequences of global warming to the Lake District’s fauna and flora. In the afternoon the discussion ranged wide. Partici-pants said they would like further workshops on packaging experiences such as a public transport itinerary, walks, food and drink and possibly ac-commodation, integrating transport offerings and promoting them and car-free leisure travel for the less able.

Workshop notes available on website.

Thirty Participants came to Staverley in Cumbria for VisTrav’s first workshop to discuss whether low carbon tourist travel can be eco-nomically viable. The morn-ing’s presentations by Jo Guiver, Alistair Kirkbride and Rebecca Willis covered a recent survey of bus users in the Lake District, the cal-culations about whether to continue supporting a lei-sure bus service and the op-portunities for reducing the carbon emitted in the Lake District.

Rebecca Willis made the point that changes in life-styles often follow a life change such as the birth of baby, new job or change of house. Holidays are also times when people are out of their routines and more open to new ways of doing things. A trip to the Lake District offers the opportu-nity to encourage people to travel more sustainably.

Participants at VisTrav’s First Workshop

VisTrav

VisTrav has been set up by Natural England and the Institute of Transport and Tourism (University of Central Lancashire) to support people working to make travel to and in the countryside and natu-ral environments more sustainable.

Sustainable Leisure Travel Network (VisTrav) www.vistrav.org.uk info@VisTrav.org.uk Institute of Transport and Tourism, University of Central Lancashire Preston PR1 2HE

Co-ordinator Jo Guiver Tel 01772 894923

The views expressed in this newsletter are those of the authors, not of the organisations they repre-sent.

2

By Jose Carlos Mota and Gonçalo Santinha,

lecturers at the University of Aveiro

Large number of municipalities in Portu-gal see ‘leisure cycling’ as an opportunity to enhance Rural Sustainable Develop-ment strategies. Traditionally cycling is viewed in terms of infrastructure (the de-sign of cycle paths), but now some mu-nicipalities are beginning to consider cy-cling as an opportunity for designing spa-tial and economic development strategies, especially in rural areas.

The Project

The municipality of Murtosa, located in Portugal’s Central Region (in the heart of the Aveiro Lagoon country), is experi-menting with the University of Aveiro in the design and implementation of a spa-tial cycling network targeted at leisure use to bring economic and spatial devel-opment called ‘Cycling Murtosa’. It was designed to investigate, “the relevance of applying sustainable mobility as a chal-lenge for local development (especially in rural areas), valuing natural resources, supporting local culture and identity, pro-moting environmental friendly trans-port (cycling) and exploring economic opportunities”.

This project was launched under a broader national programme on sustain-able mobility, promoted by the Portu-guese Environmental Protection Agency (Agência Portuguesa do Ambiente) a) to provide local government with an instrument that could help the design of more sustainable mobility policies and develop a global and integrated vision of territory and mobility and b) to develop a Good Practice Guide for Sustainable Mo-bility, reporting successful national and international cases.

E D I T O R I A L

Change is in the air, new values, or old ones long over-shadowed by short-termism and economic growth at all costs, are emerging. Perversely, the eco-nomic recession may mean more people visiting the British countryside, as they downsize from holidays abroad or are attracted by the weak pound. Concerns about personal health and global climate change are also getting through to more people. So we can expect more visitors who want to enjoy the countryside with-out their car and away from the sight, noise and fumes of other people’s cars.

Enticing offers of non-car activities, such as a good cycle trail, readily available hire bikes, walks for different abilities, a handy bus between attractions, a rail-ale trip, a vintage bus, pony cart or canal boat can make leaving the car at home an attractive option. There is no end of creative thinking and expertise going into these projects, but often it is not shared.

Leisure travel has been sadly neglected by researchers, planners and policy-makers despite the fact that it accounts for over a quarter of domestic trips and a third of the distance travelled in the UK We hope that through VisTrav we can help rectify this and contribute to a better understanding of how to make leisure travel more. sustainable and en-joyable.

VisTrav (Sustainable Leisure Travel Network) has been set up by Natural England and the Institute of Transport and Tourism at the University of Central Lancashire. It aims to spread the experi-ence and ideas so they can be used to improve existing and new projects, spar-ing the need to re-invent the wheel. It can only work with your input but to-gether we can help give visitors a healthy, relaxing time in the countryside without it costing the earth.

V I S T R A V N E W S

Cycling Murtosa: Sustainable Mobility and Strategic

Spatial Planning in Portugal

3

Cycling in Murtosa

Murtosa, one of the selected municipalities for the innovative project, presented interesting and unique conditions to sustain a new mobility plan-ning approach: i) mobility patterns already based on soft modes (in Murtosa 11% cycle, 1% in Por-tugal); ii) cycling is mainly by young people (more than 50% of schoolchildren); iii) favour-able topography and environment conditions - close to the lagoon (with high tourist and leisure potential); iv) the municipality was committed to improve cycling infrastructure .(paths and park-ing).

What is being done

Some aspects of the project are already being imple-mented:

Building a circuit of river-side trails, with scientific information about the flora, fauna, culture and heritage of the lagoon and surroundings with a net-work of activities (sport, culture and nature).

A community bicycle sys-tem, with information support - GPS, Internet, itineraries, brochures

Developing specific soft-ware for GPS and Aveiro University incorporating environmental, cultural and historical information about Murtosa, involving ICT enterprises

Promoting support services (Cycle Garage, Touristic Guides, Shops, Police, Health) involving local institutions and stimulating entrepreneurship/start-up businesses.

Incorporating the project into School curricula, encouraging students to use the bike as a tool to discover their place (municipality/lagoon) supported by scientific and cultural knowledge and improving their sense of belonging and reinforcing their identity.

Based on the concept of sustainable development, which combines “the triple bottom line ” (economic, social and environment), ‘Cycling Murtosa’ opened-up new ways of seeing the problems and the concept of the project emerged as a combination of:

a network of infrastructure and service activities (cycling paths, parking, equipment, services) activities to mobilize Cycling Mobility (targeted at children and young people, enterprises, families and tourists) promotion of cycling through ‘entertainment’ (services, information, logistic) R&D activities (certification, innovation) definition of a new institutional framework (at national, regional and local level) of activities (sport, culture and nature).

4

Mobility and Spatial Planning The research group of the University of Aveiro wanted to develop strong conceptual support with the principles of spatial planning applied to the context of sustainable mobility. This involved the development of useful (and applicable) knowledge for local government and other agents involved in local strategies and nurturing the capacity to mobi-lise agents for collective action. The methodologi-cal approach was thus divided into three comple-mentary stages:

1) defining the main principals and concerns around which the sustainable mobility policy could be designed

2) designing a guiding frame of reference, able to scientifically support the concepts of sus-tainable mobility and a sustainable mobility strategy/plan

3) territorial analysis based on available infor-mation about the municipality, field work and interviews with local/regional agents in-volved in social, economic and political fields.

During the process, the community (in general) and key stakeholders (in particular) were actively in-volved, creating a network involving the High Schools and the National Association of Bicycle Manufacturers (to promote future cycling users), BIORIA (a successful project on ecotourism) and the Department of Biology from the University of Aveiro (to develop ecotourism activities) and fi-nally INOVARIA (a cluster telecom agency which will promote ICT for cycling activities).

Although this is a new and innovative experiment, results show that Murtosa demonstrates good prac-tice in the promotion of sustainable development through cycling. They include: 1) a change of attitude towards sustainable mobility

from Murtosa municipality: it is now starting a new Project called CICLORIA, promoted by three municipalities and the University of Aveiro, costing 1 million Euros, approved by national government in a national innovation programme contest.

2) the implementation of local projects: Project NaturRia (http://www.cm-murtosa.pt/naturria) a nature cycling path with scientific information; twenty miles of river cycle paths; City centre renewal projects

3) a new local authority attitude towards the mobi-lisation of local and regional stakeholders in the design of local development strategies and in establishing international and regional connec-tions: INTERREG application (project BI-CARE); National Cycling Municipal Associa-tion.

For more information see: http://murtosaciclavel.blogs.sapo.pt/ (English) http://www.cm-murtosa.pt/murtosaciclavel

C y c l i n g M u r t o s a – S u s t a i n a b l e M o b i l i t y a n d St r a t e g i c S p a t i a l P l a n n i n g i n P o r t u g a l

Friday Night Specials in Eskdale

A cyclist enjoys a drink on the train home on the Eskdale Railway in North Yorkshire. The special evening service on a Friday between Whitby and Middlesbrough is proving very popular. With a bar and live music, passengers can just go for the ride or stop off at a station in the Esk Valley for a drink and a meal.

The trains also run for Whitby Goth Weekend and on the Monday of Whitby Regatta for the fireworks. A special Transylvanian Express will un on 30th October. Beware!

5

Background

Inspired by research to buy an elec-tric moped while a student in Bath, I arranged for the University to trial an electric van. Back in Cornwall, I founded Ecodrive, with a small fleet of high-quality electric vehicles, which I demonstrated to a wide range of users including the Devon and Cornwall Constabulary who used one for six months attracting local media coverage.

It has always been a long-term goal to use these vehicles for visitors, because in Cornwall, the tourist sec-tor is so significant, and travel is re-sponsible for much of the tourist car-bon footprint.

Soon, once a site has been inspected and suitable dedicated sockets in-stalled, we will promote it on our website.

Ambassador

Eco-drive is an Ambassador busi-ness of the Cornwall Sustainable Tourism project (CoaST) and through their fantastic network we made contact with a number of ac-commodation providers (from yurt camps to luxury hotels) interested in providing re-charging facilities for their guests or day visitors. This will provide re-assurance, although with increasing daily ranges, most electric car users will not need to recharge very often. This win-win situation

The Cars

These are totally electric, no engine at all (not hybrids or city cars). They have a maximum speed of 55 mph and a range of 50 miles, although soon we want to replace older batter-ies with newer technology which will improve performance and over double the range. They can recharge in under an hour from dedicated charge points and about 5 hours from a normal socket, although this is limited by the amount of power you can safely draw.

Range and Recharging

I use the vehicles for all my local travel and can drive up to 125 miles during the course of a day, using semi-rapid charging, but less experi-enced drivers, before they learn a few eco-driving tips, may only achieve 40 miles before they need to charge up. For this reason, we have carefully planned itineraries for peo-ple trialling the cars.

means sites gain trade and users know they can recharge if necessary.

Partners

The largest holiday park in Corn-wall, Hendra at Newquay, in asso-ciation with Ecodrive, has provided the first dedicated parking and charging area for electric vehicles in Cornwall and is providing free elec-tricity for the first 5 years to encour-age the take up. Whether users are residents or visitors to the site, Hen-dra will recoup their investment since they offer a variety of enter-tainment and dining options on-site during the peak season, open to non-residents.

It will take the cooperation of local authorities to introduce and promote charging points in car parks that they operate. These ‘idle’ times are a great opportunity to recharge and the facilities also benefit local residents who may opt to switch to an electric vehicle, which I feel is an important ‘payback.’

Last year, I drove 680 miles in an electric Peugeot 106 around Den-mark, Sweden and Norway in 6 days. Although Scandinavia lacks genuine charging points having high-power sockets at garages and rest-stops and the generosity of the people to let us use them (often for free!) meant that we could charge quickly whilst having a meal or even just a coffee.

The Future The ultimate aim is to encourage the visitors to arrive by public transport and then to use an electric car for their transport whilst they are here, which would appeal to visitors touring locally or for short break. Larger accommodation providers might station a car or more on-site

We liaised with accommodation pro-viders to ensure they had could pro-vide an over-night source of electric-ity, and, on some days, with their day-time stops.

After initial curiosity, intrigue and worries about the cost (no more than £1 to recharge), providers are nor-mally happy to oblige and arrange the most convenient place to park with access to a socket. Although it would take too long to plan in this detail for every customer, as the scheme grows in popularity, it be-comes less of an issue as site-operators become familiar with what is needed.

Electric Cars for Tourists in Cornwall

One of the fully electric powered Peugeot 106 cars

By Matthew Trevaskis of Eco-Drive

6

might station a car or more on-site that the guests can use on a per-day basis - as a supplement to walking and cycling. Of course, this will depend on the geography of each particular site, what other locations and activities are within easy reach on foot or by bike and the ‘demographic’ of the guest that the accommodation attracts. It is hoped to offer the cars to local residents to use off-season for car clubs (shared usage, billed per hour or half-day unit).

We have also had interest from site operators for operational vehicles. Hendra now regularly use a range of electric vehicles for on- and off-site use. They are easy to drive and qui-eter so night-time patrols do not dis-turb campers.

Ecodrive is now involved with the development of Electric Vehicle technology and recharging infra-structure and is supplying a diverse range of vehicles, including those powered by natural gas (bio-gas from farm waste) as a supplement to the other low carbon vehicles. Inter-est in replicating the scheme of tour-ist rental of EVs (and other tourism sector applications) has been re-ceived from as far away as the Cairngorms, reinforcing that its time is coming!

For more information: Matthew Trevaskis matthew@eco-drive.co.uk

Rob Brock

In March we were saddened to hear of the untimely death of Rob Brock. Rob had worked in sustainable travel for many years. In the nineties, he and his brother developed a bike for goods de-liveries called the Brox. When talking about it on Blue Peter he said "This is the vehicle for our small planet. It runs on milk and cornflakes!".

In 2003, he was appointed Empty Roads Co-ordinator by the Youth Hostels Association to help reduce the emissions and en-vironmental damage caused by travel to youth hostels. He brought in a range of measures including better directions to hostels, hos-tels giving out public transport information and hire bikes at some hostels. He recruited Andy Bickerstaffe as his assistant and over a year Andy visited every hostel in England and Wales using pub-lic transport. With the information gathered they designed an in-spired diagrammatic map showing times and modes for getting to each hostel.

Rob was a great supporter of the Car-Free Leisure Network and known for his wacky humour and helpfulness. Larger than life, with a heart to match, he will be greatly missed, but never forgotten.

Electric Cars in Cornwall (continued from page 5)

7

Moorsbus Review On June 1st about 30 experts gath-ered at the invite of the North York Moors National Park Authority to share their views about the future of the Moorsbus. This complex bus network runs between the week be-fore Easter and the end of October on Sundays and Bank Holidays and daily during the school summer holidays.

Although widely acknowledged as one of the best National Park bus services, after 28 years, the organis-ers were wondering what they could do better with the same amount of money. The invitees were keen to point out the major success of the Moorsbus, in the number of people it is carrying, its extensive network and strong branding. One feature which appears to contribute to the high passenger satisfaction is the presences of co-ordinators on the buses and major interchanges. As well as advising passengers, they can co-ordinate the services when there are problems such as a road closure, which had happened the day before the review.

Moorsbus Co-ordinator helps passengers and checks bus

running at Helmsley

Ireland’s Rural Tourism hit by Cheap Flights

According to Prof Gary Prosser, Director of Development and Aca-demic Affairs at the Tipperary In-stitute, Ireland’s rural tourism economy has been hit hard by cheap flights to Ireland. An in-creasing proportion of visitors now tend to visit Dublin for a short break and far fewer are touring the rural areas in their cars, which has resulted in falling numbers staying in rural areas, causing B&Bs and other rural outlets to close. http://www.trbdi.ie

V I S T R A V N E W S

Diagram used to tell visitors about distances, intercepting roads, bus

routes and parking along the northern reaches of Lancaster Canal Designed

by David Currington

New Bridge at Worcester

Worcestershire County Council have unveiled the design for a new bridge across the River Sev-ern at Worcester for cyclists and pedestrians. The bridge, part of Sustrans’s Connect2 project funded by lottery money, is scheduled to be completed for June 2010.

www.sustransconnect2.org.uk/news/news_detail.php?item=New+Diglis+Bridge+for+walkers+and+cyclists +unveiled&dm_i=6EB,15A0,O50TM,33RC,1

8

A new system for booking and carry-ing cycles on Eurostar has resulted in a 300% increase in the number of cycles carried. Before the system was changed cyclists could not book their cycle onto the same train as themselves but had to send it as registered bag-gage.

Now, for £20, a bike can travel on the same train, bike owners just need to ring 08705 186 186 once they have their reservation for their own seat and book their cycle into the train’s hold,

The number of bikes carried increased from 347 between April and August 2007 to 1,377 between the same months in 2008. There is no indication how many of the cyclists would not have travelled by Eurostar without the new system.

Dave Holladay, the CTC’s public trans-port advisor said the change was a result of Eurostar’s willingness to listen and institute a pragmatic solution. He hoped other train companies would take no-tice.

300% Increase for Eurostar

V I S T R A V N E W S

News in Brief

New Forest Boss Resigns Lyndsay Cornish has resigned as Chief Executive of the New Forest National Park Authority after a letter, purport-edly from Park officers, was sent to DEFRA complaining about her man-agement style. The Park Authority had angered some residents by recom-mending dog-free car parks, curbs on horse keeping and considering road tolls. http://www.bournemouthecho.co.uk/news/ 4460133 .http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/hampshire/8118443.stm

Rural Road Safety The Council to Protect Rural England is urging people to respond to the Govern-ment’s consultation on road safety be-fore 14th July. They want it to be made easier to put speed limits on rural roads. http://www.cpre.org.uk/campaigns/transport/rural-transport/safer-roads

Website for Car-Free Walks A group of keen walkers, concerned about the impact of cars on the global and local environment, have started a website for finding and listing car-free walks. They list the many advan-tages of getting into the countryside without a car. See: http://www.carfreewalks.org/

Motor Ban Overturned The High Court has quashed Traffic Regulation Orders to ban recreational motor vehicles from using green lanes in the Yorkshire Dales National Park. They were challenged by the Land Access Recreational Associa-tion, which promotes motor sports and recreation. http://www.lro.com/news.php?sid=297&page=1 http://www.cravenherald.co.uk/news/4456836.High_Court_quashes____green_lanes____decisions/

‘Widen the Choice’ Hibernates The well-known Partnership, ‘Widen the Choice’ responsible for a number of sustainable leisure travel projects in the East of England has ceased its work for the time being. At a seminar organised by the Partnership in Nor-wich on 1st July, Richard Powell of the RSPB, thanked Chris Wood, the co-ordinator of Widen the Choice for his hard work over the last seven years. Although funding has not been currently renewed, he hoped that the Partnership would resume its work in the future. Chris Wood launched their Good Practice Guide for green access audits to Visitor attractions, before the delegates enjoyed a boat trip on the River Wensum, looking at the plans for cycle routes and bridges.

The Kentmere Rambler from Staveley, Cumbria will not run this summer as Friends of the Lake District have withdrawn their support.

What is happening in your area? Please let us know! We would also like your views and news. Contact us on info@VisTrav.org.uk