Highland Heroes win for 'Green Hero' striving to make Inverness streets safer for cyclists
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Highland Heroes awardee Emily Williams has hailed the cycling campaigning community as her inspiration after being named as this year's 'Green Hero'.
The Inverness cycling advocate was announced as the winner of the award at a special celebration held by Highland News and Media at the Drumossie Hotel on Friday night.
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The 45-year-old, who is the CEO of the Velocity Café & Bicycle Workshop, was named as Scotland’s first ‘bicycle mayor’ last April.
The Inverness mum has since been on a mission to revolutionise our roads by mobilising a “silent majority” who she believes favour calmer, more family-friendly streets.
Reflecting on her first year as bicycle mayor of Inverness, Ms Williams says she is especially proud of her engagement with councillors and members of the public on initiatives to make streets safer.
She said: "It's been a really positive experience. I've had some really good engagement from the council, both with the active travel team and councillors. That has definitely been helped by the title. Many councillors will now get in touch for my opinion on cycling matters as a spokesperson for the cycling community.
"A lot of what I do is encouraging people to give their views when there is a consultation opportunity. If you support something, it's really important to engage with that process.
"The thing I'm most proud of in the past year is the Play Streets trial. We had our first one in September, and we are working with the active travel team at the moment to introduce a 12-month trial on one street, and we can use the data from that to design a scheme that can be rolled out across the Highlands in the following year."
The Play Streets initiative, first introduced by Ms Williams and Rebecca Robertson of community charity Crown Connects, saw Charles Street in Inverness closed for two hours to allow children to play safely without the concern of cars or other traffic.
If the proposed trial is successful, the scheme would become the first of its kind in Scotland.
Ms Williams added: "I'm a passionate believer in the benefits of living somewhere that has less traffic. But that is something that is really difficult to communicate. For most people, they see the inconvenience and communicating the benefits can be challenging.
"If you have confidence as a cyclist, Inverness is not a bad place to cycle, but if you don't already have experience or you are a little nervous, then sharing that space, which is perceived as being for cars, can be quite difficult.
"At the moment there are so many barriers to active travel. Everywhere is designed for cars – and anybody who is too young, too old, sick, disabled or doesn't have enough money to drive, are excluded as the streets are not designed for them.
"I really believe we have to change the system we operate in so that an independent nine-year-old, for example, can make a local cycle journey on their own. At the moment, a small minority of children will be allowed to do that – but it should be the majority.
"This is part of the reason why I am so keen on Play Streets. It is temporary. A street is closed for a couple of hours to allow children to play out on their own street. It doesn't cause the fear or anxiety and the atmosphere is creates is really beautiful."
Ms Williams was nominated for the 'Green Hero' award – sponsored by Pentland Ferries – alongside George Livingstone, development manager of Grantown's Remakery and Catrina Attwood, driver of Incredible Edible Inverness.
On winning the award, she said: "The award is a lovely surprise. Sometimes campaigning can be really tiring and can feel really futile, but people saying – 'we have noticed what you are doing and we really appreciate it' – that is something that keeps you going on the days when you don't maybe feel quite so much like doing it.
"My thanks go to everybody in the cycle campaigning community, such as Kidical Mass, Critical Mass and Highland Cycle Campaign. I draw a lot of support from other people who are campaigning in that space.
"I definitely wouldn't be here without Kidical Mass. Our next bike ride will| coincide with the Safer Streets Now national day of action on April 20, which starts at Bellfield Park from 1.30pm."
