Council says ‘Danny MacAskill’ staircase cycle path is an “interim measure” as it looks to secure funding to extend scheme

While our readers were left wondering yesterday if the cycling staircase was a stairway to A&E, or commissioned by Danny MacAskill himself, Plymouth City Council has confirmed to road.cc that it is an interim measure, put in place for the time-being as they work towards securing funding for a long-term solution in place.

And breathe! For a moment I thought us roadies might have to rack up our mountain bike skills if Komoot ended up suggesting this route…

The installation of the new cyclepath in Plymouth yesterday, forming part of the Saltram Meadow roundabout to Colesdown Hill cycle path and linking to a route that runs back past Laira Bridge, didn’t go down too well with local riders.

The new 800m stretch follows the route of the old railway line but with a flight of stairs and a wheeling channel up onto Colesdown Hill.

“That’s even worse than I imagined,” wrote Alan on the Plymouth Cycling Campaign Forum Facebook group, while Pete pondered whether “the councillors would like to demonstrate how wonderful their new piece of cycling infrastructure is on the opening day”.

William also noted that Plymouth City Council had initially “boasted about how the route would benefit wheelchair users and mobility scooter users”, while others pointed out that the local authority had missed a few tricks even when implementing the stairs.

However, the council tried explaining its reasonings behind this piece of infrastructure, telling road.cc that it decided to proceed with the scheme, as turning down money would have meant that it was less likely to be offered it again.

“Yes, we know that stairs aren’t ideal but they are an interim solution before a long-term plan to further extend this route is realised,” said the council. “Not going ahead with this section would have led to more delay in delivering the longer term plan to provide the route underneath Colesdown Hill.”

People were left wondering why couldn’t the council put a ramp next to it, to which it replied: “We looked at this but given the gradients involved, it would have been too steep. A longer, graded ramp was also considered but it would have stretched to 100m and significantly more costly.”

The council also said: “Over the past few years, we’ve been working on a plan to extend this path along the route of the former railway alignment by unblocking an old tunnel that runs underneath Colesdown Hill and eventually linking the back onto Billacombe Road.

“So far, each phase of the project has been funded externally, most recently from Growth Deal Funding awarded by the Heart of the South West Local Enterprise Partnership’s Local Transport Board and developer contributions.

“When we bid for the money for this latest stretch, there wasn’t the funding or enough time to incorporate the tunnel in this phase. So we had a decision to make — do the scheme, put in the stairs and the ramp as an interim measure – or risk losing the funding and not do the scheme at all.”

In the meantime as long as it’s there, we’ll see if we can get Mr MacAskill himself to show us how to go down the route…