Cycling obstacles must be overcome

Chris Carter IT MIGHT not have looked like it to those who saw me at the Movers and Shakers event on Saturday, but I love cycling. Since I was a lad of around eight I have had a bike. When Santa brought my first machine – a second hand blue Raleigh – I ignored the sno

Chris Carter

IT MIGHT not have looked like it to those who saw me at the Movers and Shakers event on Saturday, but I love cycling.

Since I was a lad of around eight I have had a bike. When Santa brought my first machine - a second hand blue Raleigh - I ignored the snow on the ground to try to perfect the art.

For years afterwards I'd head off to Epping Forest with my brother for some off-road riding. In those days we didn't have mountain bikes so ours struggled on the rutted pathways and too often bits fell off.

Everything is against today's children from taking to two-wheels. Traffic, pollution, fears of parents to let them out alone, take your pick.

These obstacles must be overcome, though, if we are to build a sustainable future for those children. And the powers-that-be, some of whom were at Saturday's event at the cycling centre, must help them.

Cycling would give those youngsters a freedom they crave, improve their fitness and maybe encourage a less polluting form of transport.

It is to be hoped the words of council leader Keith Prince are not hollow and that London Mayor Boris is not playing politics with his pledges on cycling.

And if all else fails, there always the Redbridge Bikeathon.