Travelling back from Potters Bar (just north of London) to Worcester tomorrow this afternoon, I’m after a flat, well surfaced, traffic free route – either a circuit between 1 mile and 5 miles long, or an out and back route at least 2 miles each way. Not a shared use path where I have to give way to pedestrians, though either a bike path or very quiet roads will do. I want a continuous route though, not something with junctions I have to slow down for every half a mile. Preferably pan flat, very good surface.

Lots of options for locations – normal route is the whole length of the M40, with M25 and M42 at either end. Though M1/M6 is a reasonable alternative – which takes me right past MK with its bike paths, would there be anything there suitable where I don’t get lots of junctions I have to slow down for? Any suggestions?

Bump, in case anyone has suggestions – gonna try MK I think

Too late I know, but had you used the wrongly named Railway Walk in the north of MK you’d have found exactly what you wanted. I’ve answered this here for future reference.

I have replied on your other thread

Are there any cycle routes that aren’t shared use paths?

The Millennium Forest Loop in Marston Vale is close to this, but is a shared use path. But fairly quite during the working day

http://marstonvale.org/millennium-country-park/

Shared use turned out to be one of the things that wasn’t a problem, as the paths I found were mostly wide (and those that weren’t I met nobody on), I didn’t come across any groups walking across the whole width of the path, and most importantly no doggists. I actually went through a bit by Willen Lake which had lots of pedestrians, but so much space I didn’t really need to slow down much (I’m only doing 14-15mph so not that fast anyway, but don’t accelerate that fast up to speed, so it’s really irritating having to slow down). I actually wish I’d just gone up and down the bit past the lake as that was good quality, just not all that long – everything I found heading away from there was a bit rubbish.

I suppose there’s shared use and shared use – just wanted to avoid anything dominated by peds, which is the case for the otherwise nice paths around here. Was being a bit economical with info because I wasn’t sure anybody would understand or it would add anything – was riding a geared unicycle which I can cruise at 15mph on, but bumps slow me down a lot as they upset the balance and I have to concentrate on that rather than being able to cruise. The trouble is I’m a bit stuck between, as it feels slow on roads with cars, but too fast when mixing with peds.

Thanks for the info anyway – should have asked sooner, as next week is likely to be the last time I go that way and I won’t be riding as I pulled my hamstring coming off on a bump at speed.