Councillors’ Infrastructure Safari—September 2026

A group of people on bicycles talking about a freshly-opened protected junction: Jonathan, Shameem, Richard, and Karen from Newham Cyclists; also Cllr John Morris, Cllr Ren Tilbury, Cllr Nate Higgins, Cllr Mehmood Mirza, and others in the background.

We were pleased to lead six councillors from across Newham’s political spectrum (+1 councillor acting as a marshal) for a Cycling Infrastructure Safari, to see some of the best (and worst) cycling in Newham has to offer.

Cllrs Nate Higgins (Green), Zahra Kheyre (Green), Mehmood Mirza (Newham Independents) and Ren Tilbury (Green) all joined us from the View Tube.1 Cllr Kelly Drake (Green) joined us in Maryland, and Cllr John Gray (Labour) joined us briefly from Canarvon Road/Keogh Road to West Ham Park.

The last time we had a ride like this was in 2019—at that time, exploring the considerably more developed cycle network in Waltham Forest. Now we have some very high-quality infrastructure in Newham to showcase. Our ride took us to:

  • magnificent new protected cycleways
  • transformative low-traffic zones, including the site of a pre-LTN crash on Keogh Road, and the extraordinary West Ham Park—where we spoke to Karl from the Park Primary bike bus about its transformative effects
  • the dangerous Plaistow Road which is the only viable alternative to the Greenway – we hope the upcoming emergency safety scheme will build a protected cycleway here
  • the sketchy backstreet cycle route on Bridge Road
  • the dangerous unprotected junctions on Stratford High Street—where Shameem spoke powerfully about the risks she has to face every day using it as a commuter, and how even one death (as sadly happened in January 2025) is too many

Huge thanks to Cllrs Drake, Gray, Higgins, Kheyre, Mirza, and Tilbury for joining us! Even though not everyone was able to stay to the end, even seeing a little bit from the saddle changes how people see urban planning and car dependency.

Our thanks also to marshals/ride leaders Richard S, Reetta V, Karen F, Robin S, Shameem D, Ben M, John M, and to Karl, Farah, and Ethan for their contributions—and to Nigel King from View Tube Bikes for supplying bikes to those who needed one.

We hope to run another ride next year so even more councillors can see the kind of infrastructure we feel everyone in Newham should be able to access!

Group photo from left to right: Karen (marshal); Cllr Zahra Kehyre; Shameem (marshal); Reetta (marshal); John (marshal); Ben (marshal); Jonathan (marshal); Cllr Nate Higgins; Cllr Ren Tilbury; Cllr Mehmood Mirza; Richard (ride leader); Cllr Mirza's social media person.
  1. Cllr John Morris (Labour) also joined us, but in the capacity of a marshal and a Newham Cyclists member. ↩︎