Women have changed the world before: Now it’s time to fix our streets

At this point, you could set your watch by it: Another International Women’s Day has rolled around, and we are reminded that while women can allegedly have it all, we still can’t have a cycle lane that doesn’t abruptly vanish into multiple lanes of fast-moving traffic.

In Amsterdam this weekend, 15,000 women marched in solidarity, a stirring reminder that progress is rarely handed out willingly - it has to be demanded, loudly and in large numbers. It got us thinking about many of those same women will have been mothers of the Dutch cycling revolution; a group that refused to take no for an answer.

Back in the 1970s, Dutch roads were as car-choked and hostile as our own. Then Stop de Kindermoord happened - literally “Stop the Child Murder,” because when you’re trying to get politicians to listen, subtlety is a losing game. Women, many of them mothers, led the charge, their fury fuelled by a grim toll of child road deaths. Their first president, Martje van Putten, helped galvanise this collective grief into action, forcing the Dutch government to stop treating roads as high-speed free-for-alls. The result? The Netherlands now has the kind of cycling infrastructure we Brits look at like Victorian street urchins peering through a bakery window.

<div style="padding:56.25% 0 0 0;position:relative;"><iframe src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/394466162?badge=0&amp;autopause=0&amp;player_id=0&amp;app_id=58479" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; fullscreen; picture-in-picture; clipboard-write; encrypted-media" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;" title="Maartje van Putten"></iframe></div><script src="https://player.vimeo.com/api/player.js"></script>

The echoes with other movements are obvious. In America, mothers are at the forefront of campaigns against gun violence, which is like road harm car, only with an even better-funded lobby. Meanwhile, here in the UK, women are still underrepresented in cycling, largely because so many of our roads feel like something out of Mad Max (but with more white vans).

And yet, women are key to the future of active travel, often charged with making daily school-run calculations: Will my child get to school alive if they cycle? Or do I have to put them in the car, knowing full well that everyone else doing the same is making the problem worse?

The logic is perverse, the infrastructure is worse.

It's time to channel our inner Martje van Putten and make cycling everyone’s safe, obvious, and easy choice. Because if the Dutch could do it over 50 years ago, we’ve really got no excuse.

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If you suffer a breakdown (including punctures, or even a flat e-bike battery) while out cycling, our 24-hour Cycle Rescue team is on hand to arrange transport for you and your bicycle to a safe location. The service is included for free with ETA cycle insurance, along with:

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• Low standard excess of 5% (£50 minimum)
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