Busy employment sites around Cambridge are to become easier to access by bike, with the construction of three new cycleways in the New Year.

The three routes, funded by the Government’s Cycle City Ambition Fund, will run:

• from Granta Park (near Babraham) towards Whittlesford station, along the A505 (map);
• from Babraham Research Campus to Wandlebury Country Park (by the Gog Magog hills), providing a continuous cycle route along the A1307 (map);
• and north of Cambridge, from Boxworth End in Swavesey to Buckingway Business Park, then over the A14 to Cambridge Services (map).

The three routes are all designed to serve hi-tech business estates, and make it easier and safer for people to commute to work by bike.

All three cycleways will be 2.5 metre shared-use paths. However, Cambridgeshire County Council admits that the Granta Park route will be compromised where the A11 crosses, with limited space under the bridge. To begin with, it plans to provide advisory on-road cycle lanes and a footway – “which, due to physical constraints, will be rather narrow”. In the longer term, the Council is considering making the slip-road one-way for motor traffic, and giving half of it over to cyclists and pedestrians.

Work will start on all three routes in February 2014, with completion between May and August.