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Unsilenced Cycle Event Sceptic
I still feel very strongly that this event has been handled appallingly by P&KC’s Ken MacDonald and his Economic Development Department. I still question whether the event will bring the benefits suggested, and it will be interesting to see if the consultants come up with the £1/2 million that has been suggested.
As most cyclists nowadays seem unable ‘to get on their bike’ without first getting in their car and driving at least 50 miles, I think that the vast majority of entrants will come from the Central Belt, and the north of England. The ones that can find accommodation locally, will stay for 1 or 2 days at the most, which is not that much value to the accommodation providers in the area, and also dubious from an environmental perspective.
As a keen cyclist, I fail to see why people have to have an organised event like this to get them on their bikes - there’s nothing to stop people doing this course (or any other route in Highland Perthshire) on any day of the year - the back-roads are not that busy with traffic. Personally, I would rather have the freedom of the road/hill-track rather than be surrounded by 2000 lycra-clad roadies, but each to his/her own.
I am astonished that some Pitlochry business people are unhappy at Comment raising very valid questions about the way the event has been mishandled by Ken Macdonald’s department. Besides, I always thought business people liked griping about bungling bureaucrats in the public sector.
Queen's Highway
The fact is that the event will cause significant disruption to very many local residents, visitors, church congregations, and businesses, and it will benefit relatively few. But the main reason I am still against this event taking place on 24 June is that if 100 miles of public roads are to be closed for up to 5 or 6 hours, on a very busy weekend in Highland Perthshire, and there are effectively no other alternative routes open to the public, there has to be:
1. a very good reason for the closure (it is, after all, the ‘Queen’s Highway’);
2. genuine advance public consultation (at least one year) about the proposed date and route of the event;
3. the public consultation and road closure process has to be seen as fair and democratic.
As far as I can see none of these criteria have been met. As Comment has correctly pointed out, the cycle race is being organised by a private company in London, whose losses PKC agreed to partly offset by £20,000 of pubic money, before it - or the organiser - had undertaken any public consultation whatsoever. There was no opportunity for locals to question the proposed date or route of the event, until the public meeting in Aberfeldy on 29 April, which in itself was 10 weeks after the organisers had publicly announced and promoted the race course and date in the international cycling press.
The views expressed by the majority of the people at that meeting were effectively ignored. It would also seem that PKC has effectively bounced the legal difficulty of closing the public roads onto the Chief Constable, which is questionable from a legal standpoint, and also wholly undemocratic.
On this subject, Comment’s ‘spoof article’ was absolutely correct to raise the issue of public safety - if there is a serious injury or fatality arising directly or indirectly from the bike race (for example at the junction of the B898 and the A9 at Jubilee Bridge), the legal ramifications will undoubtedly be very serious for Tayside Police and PKC.
Arrogance
There is a right way to do things and a wrong way, and unelected bureaucrats sanctioning the total closure of 100 miles of public roads on a very busy midsummer weekend, when there are no alternative routes for motorists, before undertaking any public consultation, demonstrates breathtaking arrogance and administrative incompetence.
I sincerely hope that common sense prevails and the event is postponed until 2008 by which there will have been time for the relevant people in Ken MacDonald’s department to find some maps which cover the area to the north and west of Dunkeld, and undertake a genuine public consultation exercise about the proposed event’s date and route.
Andrew Pointer
Aberfeldy (formerly of Pitlochry, and Breadalbane Academy)
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