Safe cycling: Dr Bike dates, lights, parking and more
Thursday, 17 November 2016
Winter is fast-approaching and as the dark nights begin to roll in, we hope that cyclists across the University are making the necessary adjustments to their bikes to ensure personal safety over the months ahead.
Dr Bike was on campus earlier today as part of the Green Festival, helping to assess the safety and set-up of bikes. If you miss him, fear not – he will return on Monday 21 November as part of an event to help promote cycling lights. The event is taking place from 12.00pm – 2.00pm outside of the Palmer Building.
Sustainability Services urge colleagues and students to consider the following important cycling advice:
Use your lights
Please remember to use lights to keep yourself and others safe on paths and roads. It can be very difficult for drivers and pedestrians to spot cyclists without lights, and cyclists can incur fines for cycling along roads without them.
Campus Central sell light sets for just £9.99 (as well as D-locks and other cycling equipment), making it even more convenient to set your bike up on campus.
Police officers will be on campus to provide advice over the coming weeks – do you really want to be stopped for something so easy to prevent?
Cycle parking and locking
There are hundreds of designated bike parking spaces across campus – leaving your bike elsewhere can cause obstructions and can also be targeted more easily by thieves.
For those particularly concerned about security, several gated compounds make use of additional campus card access – these can be found behind RUSU and near the Agriculture, Harborne and Chemistry Buildings. Visit the security window in Whiteknights house to register your campus card for access.
It is highly recommended that bikes are secured with a solid D-lock rather than a cable lock – all bikes reported stolen from campus have not been secured with a D-lock.
See the Cycling to the University page for future Dr Bike events, cycling advice and details of fun and free road skills training. Read about the results of the 2016 Travel Survey, and please remember to pass on any suggestions for future action to travel@reading.ac.uk.