Women’s safety Scotland: InfraSisters mass night ride for safer cycling lights up Edinburgh

Campaigners say female riders should not have to choose between dark, isolated paths or busy roads

The slow-moving line of white light accompanied by the tinkle of bells helped enhance Edinburgh’s festive atmosphere on a chilly winter’s night.

But the 100 cyclists adding extra sparkle to the capital as they circled the Old Town to the bemusement of revellers were no pre-Christmas attraction.

They were the InfraSisters – female campaigners and their male supporters, whose colourfully-illuminated bikes formed part of the latest of a series of mobile lobbies for safe night-time cycle routes for women and girls.

A gathering at the end of the ride opposite the City Chambers in the Royal Mile. (Photo by: Dan Milligan/InfraSisters)

As Kirsty, one of the group’s founders, put it as the riders gathered in The Meadows: "We are a group of women that organise a couple of rides a year through Edinburgh city centre to campaign for cycling infrastructure that’s safe and comfortable at night for women and girls.

"The city council has got big plans, but we know that quite a few councillors don’t support them, so the message to get out to them is that it is really important that women and girls have safe cycling 24/7.”

Accompanied by a peal of bells and music pumping out from a loudspeaker strapped to a cargo bike, the peloton moved off into the night, cycles festooned with flashing coloured and white lights, some of their riders sporting illuminated headgear and others with several young children aboard.

The procession snaked its way down South Bridge and the Royal Mile as InfraSisters marshalls in light blue tabards held up the traffic so it could pass through junctions safely, most drivers good-naturedly accepting the delay apart from one who drove along the wrong side of Cowgate in an attempt to get past before being “kettled” by riders.

The ride was from The Meadows to the Royal Mile via Holyrood and Cowgate (Photo by Dan Milligan/InfraSisters)

It illustrates the dilemma facing those who want to cycle safely at night, as Julie, who helps with the rides’ safety planning, explained.

She said: “There is a lot of great infrastructure in Edinburgh that’s on the old railway lines, for example, which is great for getting around in the day, but it’s isolated and some of it is dark.

"Particularly as a woman, that’s not a choice you want to have to make, of going somewhere that’s that isolated, or making a choice of ‘well then, do I go on the busy roads where I’m competing with drivers, who may be unreliable?’

“Which risk do I want to take? And I shouldn’t have to make that choice. If you can make it safe for me, then it’s going to be safe for men, women, children – everybody.

InfraSisters riders head down the Royal Mile in Edinburgh on Friday December 1. (Photo by Alastair Dalton/The Scotsman)

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"We want to be able to use our bikes 24 hours a day. Our theme is Light up the Night because that's what we want to be able to do – we want to have women able to go out all day, every day, whenever they want to."

Among those on the ride joining the calls for improvements is Charlotte, a mother. She said: "I want to take my kids safely to school and places in Edinburgh. I have to do it because it’s my only way of getting around.”

She felt “not terribly safe” cycling in the city and has suffered aggressive drivers. Charlotte said: "Driver behaviour is pretty bad, especially in the rain and the cold, [when] it gets an awful lot worse.

InfraSisters riders on Cowgate pass under George IV Bridge. (Photo by Alastair Dalton/The Scotsman)

“I have had incidents with vehicles that I have had to report to the police. I run a camera now because the police advised me to after a couple of incidents.”

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Julie from InfraSisters said: "Everything seems to be a battle just to make stuff happen. The City of Edinburgh Council has got great aspirations – there’s a lot we see that’s good from the likes of transport convener Scott Arthur and the transport committee.

"But they get frustrated so often, where you’re seeing certain councillors saying ‘you mustn’t take anything away from motorists, people can’t park’.

"You see things like the safe route down to Silverknowes, to the prom, being voted out to be removed. That was a great route to one of the best leisure facilities Edinburgh has got, this beach out on the sea, which is packed on a nice summer’s day and busy even on a winter’s day – and now there’s no longer going to be that safe route down there."

Mr Arthur, part of the council’s Labour administration, was joined by several Green councillors on the InfraSisters’ ride, on Friday, December 1. He said: “In Edinburgh, there is a real need to improve active travel [cycling, wheeling and walking], so it was really important to come along and listen and show support for their campaign.

Riders ascending Johnston Terrace past Edinburgh Castle. (Photo by InfraSisters)

"We have got significant plans and have got quite a lot of active projects right now, which hopefully will meet the objectives of this campaign. But I do accept the city has to move faster on this."

Such projects include the City Centre West to East Link between Roseburn and Leith Walk, a route between The Meadows and George Street, and another along George Street. Mr Arthur said: “These are all about being well lit and having lots of passive surveillance [from others in the vicinity], so people feel safe and use them round the clock.”

The transport convener said many existing routes were no longer fit for purpose. He said: "A lot of the cycle paths are along routes such as the Water of Leith and the Roseburn path, which are fantastic during the day, but at night time they are not well lit, and women and girls – and even men – don’t feel safe on them, so it is something we have to address.

"For some of these paths, if we were creating them today we wouldn’t have gone down that route because they are just not suitable for the kind of city we want to be now.”