One form of transport that has seen a significant increase across the UK in the last year is cycling and the Liverpool City Region is no exception. In 2020 the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority announced plans for 100km worth of cycling infrastructure to be rolled out across the city region.
LJMU, in partnership with Mersey Travel, Liverpool City Region Combined Authority and Local Authorities, have installed air quality, motion and weather sensors along these cycling routes.
Based on the data gathered from our six weather stations across the Liverpool City Region, the average temperature for January 2021 was 3.37 Celsius. Despite the low temperatures, an average of 1,885 daily cycling journeys were recorded across the city region.
Which region has recorded the most cycling journeys during January 2021?
Not surprisingly, Liverpool has recorded the largest number of cycling journeys, closely followed by the Wirral. To view the number of pedestrians, cyclists and number of sensors in each area of the region for January 2021, click on the link here LCR Active Travel Statistics and select the dot in each of the regions.
The sensors are located at various points across the city region and the data is fed into the LJMU SMART Green Dashboard. Most of the sensors have recently been installed during the latter part of 2020. However, some sensors have been in place longer.
Our sensors in Halton, Appleton Village Road has been in situ for over 12 months and has provided some interesting data. Our sensor here has recorded 1388 cycling journeys for the month of January 2021.
To highlight some of the most popular areas for cycling during January 2021 we have seen:-
- 4,955 cycling journeys on Liver Street and Cleveland Square, Liverpool
- 6,284 cycling journeys on New Chester Road/Sefton Road, Wirral
- 2001 cycling journeys on Chester Lane, St Helens
- 1853 cycling journeys on Cronton Lane, Knowsley
- 1441 cycling journeys on Talbot Street Road, Sefton
What has the data taught us for January?
Between the first week of January (01/01/21-07/01/21), the 26 IoT-enabled sensors captured 13,849 cycling journeys across the Liverpool City Region. Whilst cycling activity fluctuated during the month, there was an overall increase of 1,362 cycling journeys across the sensor sites during the last week of January (29/01/21-04/02/21), comparing to the first week of January (01/01/21-07/01/21).
Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool City Region Combined Authority and Liverpool City Council own the data reported in this article. For information, please contact sud@ljmu.ac.uk’