A climate campaign group is urging the council to reallocate parking into green spaces and more cycling access to reduce Manchester’s traffic crisis.
Sarah Wroe is a leading voice behind these initiatives. She said: “Manchester city centre is taken up by road, space and car parking, that’s over a third of the space in the city centre, whereas green space is less than 5%.
“We’re asking the council to do is to come up with a more progressive parking policy and we are asking for a certain amount of parking to be reallocated to green space, but also for other uses such as cycle lanes, bus lanes, and EV infrastructure.
“Biking will keep the city healthy in more ways than one – it will alleviate pressures on the road and keep the people moving.
“Manchester has some really great goals on climate change, and that it’s not on track to meet at the moment”.
Belinda Everett from Bee Pedal Ready is offering free bike services and teaching the skills of servicing in the hope of increasing cycling around the city.
“It’s definitely good to know the knowledge, which means you can recycle and definitely save yourself a lot of money,” she said.
“Just to have more spaces where people can come and can ride their bikes but actually feel safe, but also can lock their bikes up and not get nicked”.