Sarah Dewar, Merseyside TravelWise
What is your job or other main activity that involves cycling?
I work for the Merseyside Local Transport Partnership Co-ordinating the TravelWise campaign to encourage more sustainable travel.
How long have you done that?
8 years
Where do you live?
Sunny Liverpool
What most encourages you about cycling where you live?
Riverside paths, big coast skies, taking my bike free on the trains and ferries, greeting early morning people, checking up on the swans, herons and goldfinches in Toxteth’s Princess Park every morning and a traffic free route home from the pub!
What most discourages you about cycling where you live?
While I’m lucky enough to be fit and healthy nothing, but a city centre cycle shop would be good!
How would you describe yourself as a cyclist?
Happy
What is you earliest cycling memory?
Getting too close and scratching a scary neighbour’s car when I was learning.
Where is the best place you have ever cycled?
Island and ferry hopping round the Outer Hebrides was blissful, but Wales and the Lake District are tough to beat for forest, fell and pub combinations and big freewheeling moments.
What is your greatest achievement, in terms of encouraging more people to cycle?
Helping to set up my brilliant team so we can join up everything we do as a TravelWise partnership working with schools and companies, and marketing campaigns and setting up our joint Cycle Training Scheme, Merseybike, with Cycling Solutions, now the biggest in the country!
What single thing do you think would do most to encourage more cycling in the UK?
Peak oil – the end of oil reserves - coming sooner rather than later, so supplies of petrol are scarce and expensive.
What has been your favourite cycling experience?
The sun is shining, I’ve just got off the train, with my tent on the back of my bike, the hills to one side and the sea to the other.
What was your worst cycling experience?
An altercation with an HGV in Salford - but it was 12 years ago now.
What is it about using your bike that you like the most?
It makes me happy.
The answers given are the opinion of the individual and do not necessarily reflect those of any organisation they may represent.
