Active Travel Policy in Greater Manchester

How it works and what to do about it

This guide explains how active travel is governed in Greater Manchester, so you can contact authorities with knowledge and confidence in what you’re saying.

We’ll update it from time to time – if you spot any mistakes, omissions, or have any questions, please leave a comment or drop us an e-mail

“The Big Three” key design standards
Local Authorities
The Mayor, GMCA and TfGM
National Government

The Big Three

If you take nothing else away from this, the three documents most useful for our campaigners to familiarise themselves with are:

The Streets For All Design Guide published by TfGM. Any new highways scheme, anywhere in the city region, should be planned in line with this guidance which all ten GM boroughs have approved at committee.
LTN 1/20 published by the Department for Transport. This guidance sets standards for cycling infrastructure.
Inclusive Mobility published by the Department for Transport. This is about accessible transport, particularly for disabled pedestrians.

Some authorities will say these documents are “just guidance” and they aren’t legally obliged to comply with them. This is essentially true, but if someone is injured, or discriminated against under the Equality Act, as a result of an authority not following the guidance, the authority may find it very difficult to defend themselves against legal action.

Who builds and maintains walking & cycling routes?

Most walking, wheeling and cycling happens on Highways i.e. publicly maintained roads. The term “Highway” usually means the entire width of the road including cycle lanes and pavements.

Pretty much everything on our Highways (except “Strategic Roads” like motorways, managed by Highways England) is planned and controlled by councils, also known as Local Authorities (LAs). In Greater Manchester this means the ten borough councils: Bolton, Bury, Manchester, Oldham, Rochdale, Salford, Stockport, Tameside, Trafford & Wigan.

The day-to-day work of planning, maintaining and designing infrastructure is done by officers employed in each council’s Highways team. The council’s elected members – your local councillors – don’t design anything themselves but they can influence what parts of the network are prioritised. Significant projects generally have to be approved by a committee of councillors before going ahead; committees are usually led by councillors from the party holding the most elected seats.

This means one of the best things you can do as a campaigner – apart from directly encouraging family and friends to try walking, wheeling and cycling their short journeys – is speak to your elected local councillors. Meet with them in person if possible, and try to be friendly & positive about working together to enable better transport options for residents.

You probably also walk or cycle on Public Rights of Way (PRoWs) e.g. footpaths and bridleways, which are often on private land and maintained by the landowner. PRoWs are recorded by the council on a Definitive Map, showing where they are and what type. Problems should be reported to the local authority’s PRoW officer(s). You might also use permissive paths, which are open to the public at the discretion of the landowner – unlike a PRoW, their permission can in theory be revoked at any time.

Your local authority may have published active travel / walking and cycling / accessible infrastructure policies which it is worth getting familiar with. If you can point councils to their own local policy that might be more effective than quoting regional or national guidance.

So what does Andy Burnham do?

Andy Burnham is the elected Mayor of Greater Manchester. Along with the leaders of the 10 councils (including Salford’s City Mayor), he jointly leads Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA). GMCA has strategic responsibility for transport across Greater Manchester and manages and makes decisions about how national funding for active travel is allocated between schemes proposed by councils. However, they do not have any direct control of what happens in each borough once funding is allocated.

GMCA is set to agree a new Trailblazer devolution deal with the government. This deal means, instead of “ringfenced” funding for active travel, Greater Manchester will receive all its transport funding in one big pot which the Mayor/GMCA can allocate as they see fit between active travel, buses, Metrolink, etc. We will be campaigning for a healthy proportion of this pot to be spent on active travel.

Dame Sarah Storey is Andy Burnham’s appointed Active Travel Commissioner in charge of leading GMCA’s Active Travel strategy and policies. This role was previously filled by Chris Boardman who coined the term “Bee Network” for a proposed walking & cycling network connecting all of Greater Manchester.

Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) is the executive arm of GMCA and is responsible for running GM’s transport services including promoting and supporting a shift to active travel. They are also a key partner in Rail North and Transport for the North. TfGM control:

Travel planning and timetables
Bus stations and transport interchanges
Traffic lights and crossing signals
Hired Starling bikes (aka Beryl Bikes or Bee Bikes)
Metrolink trams
Some buses – GMCA are in the process of taking over management of GM’s buses, which are still operated by private companies but now franchised under yellow Bee Network branding. All buses across GM will be refranchised by January 2025.

TfGM have rebranded as “Bee Network” and use this name to refer to the entire public transport network under their control, as well as active travel.

GMCA are quite good on active travel policy. A member of the Walk Ride GM Steering Group is invited to their Walking And Cycling Committee Advisory Group (WACCAG) which take place several times a year.

The Bee Network Committee is a joint committee of GMCA, the GM Mayor and the 10 GM local authorities and was established to scrutinise and make decisions about transport policy across GM. It is responsible for monitoring Bee Network performance and providing oversight of TfGM. The Bee Network is Greater Manchester’s vision for the delivery of the emerging fully-integrated, London-style transport system – including buses, trams, cycling and walking infrastructure and cycle hire.

Signal and crossing timings
TfGM operate the central signalling and traffic management centre, controlling all lights and signals to keep traffic flowing.

Note: In highways terminology, “traffic” refers to all road users: pedestrians, horses, and vehicles including cycles. Highways engineers’ main duties are to guard public safety and facilitate the flow of traffic – some of them forget this doesn’t mean only motor traffic!

This means if you find yourself waiting unreasonably long at any signalised crossing or junction in Greater Manchester – report it here and there’s a good chance it will get fixed with no need to contact your local authority.

Among other things, GMCA are also responsible for overseeing Greater Manchester Police (GMP).

GMCA Links
Dame Sarah Storey’s Refreshed Active Travel Vision, 2023
GM Transport Strategy 2040 & Five Year Delivery Plan (update due soon)
Streets for All Strategy, 2021 and Streets For All Design Guide, 2024

National Government

The government are responsible for setting national policy, published and controlled via the Department for Transport.

The national vision/strategy for active travel was set by Prime Minister Boris Johnson in a 2020 document called Gear Change. A lot has happened since then and neither the government nor opposition currently appear willing to promote policies which could be seen as “anti-motorist”.

Nevertheless, Boris’ government successfully oversaw the creation of Active Travel England, a new body within the DfT led by Chris Boardman and Brian Deegan (who previously worked together in Greater Manchester to create the original Bee Network).

UK transport funding is allocated to authorities in part based on documents they must produce called a Local Transport Plan (LTP) and Local Implementation Plan (LIP).

The Greater Manchester boroughs’ collective LTP is called the GM Transport Strategy 2040. TfGM are working on a new update of this strategy and Walk Ride have been asked to contribute feedback – please join our Discord if you’d like to be part of this.

The Strategic Roads Network (all motorways and some large A-roads) are nationally planned, maintained and managed by Highways England.

National Policy Links
Active travel:
Inclusive Mobility
Gear Change, 2020
Gear Change – One Year On, 2021
LTN 1/20, 2020
Scheme review tools, Active Travel England, 2024

Highways generally:
Manual for Streets 1 (for residential streets)
Manual for Streets 2 (for busy streets)
Design Manual for Roads and Bridges (for Strategic Roads like motorways and dual carriageways)
The Traffic Signs Regulations and General Directions, 2016 (for signage and road markings)

Bad news:
👎 “Plan for Drivers”, 2024 👎

Coming Soon:

TfGM design review, and Road Safety Audits – who enforces quality of highways schemes?
Barriers and accessibility – if it can stop a motorbike, it will also unlawfully restrict disabled people’s access
Legality of vehicles obstructing cycle lanes
Non-government entities – Sustrans, Cycling UK, British Cycling, Ramblers, RNIB and other groups representing disabled people

Last updated:

28/04/2024

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