Borne out of a desire for more inclusivity and equality, Wheels for Wellbeing was established in 2007, starting out as a ‘wheels for all’ inclusive cycling hub. Today, it has three centres in London, providing cycling for disabled people in safe venues that are traffic-free, some of which are in parks and others in outdoor velodromes.

But that is only part of the story, as Wheels for Wellbeing’s Kate Ball, explains. “We're a disabled people's organisation, run by – and for – disabled people. And we want to be able to cycle utility journeys and to partake in active travel,” she says. “We are campaigning for disabled people to learn to cycle and also for those who do cycle to be able to do it more safely. Lots of disabled people need to use cycles to make standard journeys, whether that’s the school run, going to the shop commuting to work or travel to and from appointments.”

The biggest issue the charity finds is a barrier to active travel for disabled people is the infrastructure itself, explains Ball. “Firstly, it’s the routes and secondly, the parking. That means wondering where you are going to put your cycle, whether there is anywhere accessible, and accessibility of the routes themselves.

“We see organisations such as CIHT and highways design as really, really critical in helping us achieve our goals. From our side, we provide publicity, design, publications, guidance sheets, consultation and speak at a lot of events to improve the knowledge among professionals on how to create routes that are much more accessible and how to make spaces that work for a greater proportion of people.”

Image: Kate Ball, Campaigns and Policy Officer at Wheels for Wellbeing; credit: Loud Mobility.

How transport professionals can help

The road network include hundreds of disabled cyclists, confirms Ball, adding that the proportion of disabled people who cycle is not that much lower than non-disabled people. “However, access to suitable cycles and opportunities to learn to cycle, especially if you're somebody who's been disabled since early childhood or all your life, are very much more limited,” she reasons.

“That situation restricts how much cycling people have been able to do historically, because often our streets aren't safe enough to learn. And if off-road cycle paths have barriers on them, you can't get onto them to learn either. There is also the issue of finding cycles that are suitable to your body and for your capacity, if you have impairments, can be a little bit more complex.”

Fortunately, there are measures that transport professionals can take to help make a difference. “Make sure you are sticking to the national guidance and also make sure there's inclusive local consultation going on,” pleads Ball. “So, the baseline is hitting national guidance standards such as LTN1/20 (designing high-quality, safe cycle infrastructure), BS 8300 (design of an accessible and inclusive built environment) and inclusive mobility.

“The next bit is using local consultation to ensure that specific factors are taken into account. That might be knowing that the minimum path width isn't going to be enough, because it's a really busy spot, or maybe a turning circle is difficult in different weather conditions.” 

Ball adds that these measures would be beneficial for those outside the disabled cycling community too. “Many things that we're saying improve accessibility for disabled people apply to a lot of other people with protected characteristics.”

Ball and others spoke at a recent CIHT Interchange roundtable in Manchester about the digitalisation and decarbonisation of the transport industry.