Hello 2026, time to get to work on changing this before the March deadline? Two minutes of your time for a personal objection. Could really use some wider publicity, please do anything you can!

Note that a now seemingly annual mega noisy tractor parade is happening today looping through High Lane, Marple, Strines, New Mills, Hayfield, Disley. Organised for the great cause that is The Christie cancer care. Embrace it or go elsewhere! And here is an unrelated article.

It’s not every day that a path near my home makes a major political announcement and national news… but the “Mersey Valley Way” has that honour this Boxing Day. /1 www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Tea towels for all the Cheshire towns at the Treacle Market today.

⚠️ Canal & River Trust have confirmed to me that the Peak Forest Canal towpath between Marple and Disley will now remain closed right through to 30th January 2025. Wholly understandable, the work is vital, but it remains a huge inconvenience to those of us who rely on the path as a transport route.

Heard the canal towpath at Strines Aqueduct may be open? But the CRT stoppage page also states due to towpath side walls being in far worse state work will now continue to 30th January (half expected would happen 🙁): canalrivertrust.org.uk/notices/0196... Anyone been along lately?

Not again, New Mills! 🎄🚲 (Fond memories of the Christmas I got verbally abused by former local cllr on Twitter for daring to suggest putting pointless metal barriers around the only cycle stands when local businesses need supporting is A Bit Bloody Stupid. These are unfixed and can be moved, but…🤷‍♂️)

A new addition to the Peak District cycle parking map! Brill work and thank you - perfect coffee stop on the Cheshire Mountains of Macclesfield now.

Crowden Clough to Ringing Roger refreshing the soul today.

One person can’t oppose £1 billion’s worth of destructive roadbuilding. Surely this isn’t the future we want. Please do all you can to raise awareness and respond!

🚨🚗💨 Thanks to Andy Burnham’s Greater Manchester, foothills and valleys of the Peak District fringe face the gravest threat of our lifetimes from huge new roadbuilding. Two severely harmful old road proposals have been dug up for TfGM’s 2050 transport plan. But you can choose a different way. 🌳👇

🚨🚗💨 Thanks to Andy Burnham’s Greater Manchester, foothills and valleys of the Peak District fringe face the gravest threat of our lifetimes from huge new roadbuilding. Two severely harmful old road proposals have been dug up for TfGM’s 2050 transport plan. But you can choose a different way. 🌳👇

Pivot! The Greater Manchester Transport 2050 consultation is now finally live and in the Delivery Plan doc an A6 High Lane and Disley bypass is no longer “promoted by Cheshire East.” 🤭 *Of course* it was only ever a Stockport Council Highways pipe dream. www.gmconsult.org/transport/tr...

TfGM‘s Head of Strategic Planning has confirmed to me the surprisingly defined line of a High Lane and Disley bypass will be updated to a vague arrow in their final Transport Plan Draft. Consultation - and the fight against such ridiculously counterproductive roadbuilding plans - now begins Monday.

Oh good, another Transport Plan. Seems to lack any specific targets and vague on whether ever-increasing private car journeys are actually bad. “Road transport is an important part of our mix. 62% of journeys to work under 6 miles are done by car.” www.eastmidlands-cca.gov.uk/mayors-trans...

Compare and contrast the Government language. £3,750 EV grant on a £35k car: ‘helping families’. Cycle to Work: ‘subsidising leisure’. And yet cycling delivers TEN TIMES the impact of electric cars for reaching net zero. It’s almost like narrative, not data, is driving policy.

Why is Greater Manchester putting two hugely destructive greenbelt road building projects back on the agenda, ploughing even more traffic into the Peak? Let’s call it Andy Burnham’s Big Greenbelt Roadbuilding Plan. Down with the Clean Air Zone signs, in with the diggers. @andyburnham.bsky.social

⚠️ Strines, Disley, Newtown, New Mills, Furness Vale: Greater Manchester is looking to resurrect the long-dead A6 High Lane and Disley bypass which would utterly trash the Goyt valley and only make traffic worse and more harmful to this area.

Remember the trail alongside Fernilee Reservoir with the rogue ‘no cycling’ signs? Brought to my attention someone has now started a petition to make the 3-4m wide route a footpath only to prevent cycling, not permissive bridleway as Peak National Park are pursuing. The petition has… 13 signatures.

⛔️ Don’t forget, a small section of Middlewood Way north of Bollington is now closed to next Wednesday 26th November for resurfacing. Cheshire East have put an alert online saying bikes can be pushed along the top path. Last redone 2020, photo from 2022. www.cheshireeast.gov.uk/leisure,_cul...

I FOI'd English councils whether they use legal land purchase powers to create traffic-free paths. Just 1% said they have successfully. Why is something that's so common for roads almost never done for cycle routes? And what does it mean for cycling? lauralaker.substack.com/p/cycleways-...

Our green and industrious Peak borderlands featured in the Guardian! And if you’d like to explore by bike instead, that’s where peaksandpuddles.com/cycle-routes comes in handy.

Back in 2020, Stockport Council consulted on a walking and cycling scheme along (or occasionally parallel to) the A34. It was a mixed bag, but local campaigners supported it with several caveats. It’s back for another consultation – because part of the scheme is being dropped.

⛔️ Peak Forest Canal: vital towpath cycle route closed for many weeks south of Marple Maps, tips, problems, end date. 👇

Another fantastic Farming in Protected Landscapes #FiPL funded project. 👏 These lovely new gates at Ringstones Clough & Stoneheads are now in place which will make things much easier for walkers, runners, mountain bikers & horse riders who use this ancient route between Whaley & Furness Vale. 🥾🚲🐴

Small but positive change to Lyme Park’s winter opening hours which are extended this year from 4.30 to 5pm. I risked a longer loop avoiding the canal closure to get back across the borders, and met the friendly ranger coming down to lock up at gone 4.50. (They always lock West gate first.)

⛔️ Peak Forest Canal towpath completely blocked at Turf Lea/Strines for major works. Solid metal fence going up now. No good route Marple-Disley. Preferable to a collapsed canal but an *unbelievably* inconvenient stretch to close with seemingly little publicity or thought to cycle & wheel diversion.

⛔️ Middlewood Way closed north of Bollington 17th-26th November. Where it often gets wet, so very welcome, but awkward to avoid! Provided you can use steps, the best diversion would be via Macc Canal from Holehouse Ln to Hawthorn Rd. Canal and return to trail is step-free at least and no hills.

Want to stop at the Post Office? Thank God for the one single Sheffield cycle stand in Hayfield village. (It’s beside the church.) More helpful finds like this on my Peak District Cycle Parking Map: www.peaksandpuddles.com/tips/cycle-p...

🚲 Get 10% off your bike hire when you book online this half term with code HALFTERM10 at checkout! 👉 Book now! https://www.peakdistrict.gov.uk/bikehire Valid for all of our Bike Hire Centres at #Ashbourne, #Derwent, and #ParsleyHay with advanced online booking from 18 October until 2 November.

Thought I’d try requesting a local 20mph limit with Derbyshire Council. Received a reply from Philip Braisby, ‘Senior Technician - Traffic and Safety’ which basically reads as a copy-paste response that the council will not be implementing 20mph anywhere. They do not believe in it as a concept.

Imagining Cheshire East’s active travel photo library. Alt text: A person cycling on the A6 at Disley, teeth gritted, eyes filled with terror, as the unprotected painted lane ends at a pointless traffic island and the speed limit increases to 40mph, an HGV about to swerve into their path.

Good news that Cheshire Wildlife Trust has acquired land between Jenkin Chapel and Lamaload for a second nature reserve in the area. Such a lovely undiscovered part of the Peak but where management has previously failed nature and flood resistance. www.cheshirewildlifetrust.org.uk/nature-reser...

Here comes the colour to light up the dull, grey weather. Thank you, trees.

It would be great if we could take a whole country and change the default speed limit to 20mph and then compare it to one left at 30mph. What if it reduced casualties by 25% and with lower risk reduced insurance premiums by £45 a year? Well it did! bit.ly/4gIBPlJ

United Utilties have replied: “We believe that the no cycling signs may have also been installed at the same time [as the new gates], by the [Peak District National Park] staff. The message conveyed by the signs is correct, as the path has never been an official cycle path, as aforementioned.”

Your favourite bench on Middlewood Way could soon be just a view of massive greenbelt housing sprawl, under proposals for a new town at Adlington. Dire implications for surrounding lanes and National Park landscape, especially the Brickworks which would fully become a major east-west traffic route.

Headstone, Cressbrook and Litton tunnels on the Monsal Trail will be closed this Wednesday 17th September from 9am to 1pm, due to National Grid works cutting the power supply.

September skies over Lyme. Don’t forget you can still get completely free entry to the house and garden when cycling or using public transport until the end of this month! www.peaksandpuddles.com/cycle-routes...

Winding roads to Windgather

Fed up with pavement parking? We're supporting @livingstreets.bsky.social to show where pavements are used as car parks to the detriment of all who walk/wheel. Go & take photos (make sure you cover over reg numbers) & upload them to the Living Streets map: lnkd.in/ekEmPn3q Contribute by 22 Nov

These Steel Cotton Rail Trail walking guides are superbly good! Sheffield to Manchester station to station with so much local interest and stunning scenery.

Fernilee reservoir old railway trail. If like me you thought the battle for this to be a defacto bridleway was won when the kissing gates were replaced by easy open bridleway gates: no. The saga continues and we must fight this absolute nonsense from United Utilities and @peakdistrict.bsky.social.

Safety and space at risk as SUVs reach 30% of car market in English cities, researchers warn

Main route into Lyme East gate now totally closed. Apparently the wooden bridge and steps are life expired too. Do we need to push for the old bridge to actually be repaired or any new crossing being cycle friendly?

Errwood Reservoir last week compared with late August 2021. Being the upper reservoir, water is always let down to keep Fernilee topped up, but the difference is still startling.

The Cage is in a cage.

The figures on lifesaving 20mph limits are astonishing. So why is the Labour government ignoring for English regions what their own colleagues in Wales and London have achieved and proven? Where is the funding and resolve to make national policy and save lives? @jon4highpeak.bsky.social

Love the farcical size of these temporary speed limit signs on the road past Windgather Rocks! Maybe most Cheshire roads could do with similar? I assume due to the no-end-in-sight B5470 closure, though thankfully I haven’t felt much new rat running the few times I’ve been there this year.

FAO anyone who cycles through Lyme Park. Step-free route between East gate and Mudhurst Lane is blocked, as the bridge over the brook is a bit crumbly. @peaksandpuddles.com