Walking & Cycling

Walking

Walking is a great way to get around and the best thing is that it is free! It’s also an easy way to get fitness into your daily routine. Many local facilities are within a walking distance of Hunter’s Chase, such as; the primary school, convenience stores, doctors surgery, dentist and public houses. You will find all of these within a 10-minute walk of Hunter’s Chase.

Health experts advise 150 minutes of exercise per week or 30 minutes per day over 5 days during the week. Why not include this exercise in your daily routine when travelling to work, school or the shops? There are many benefits to walking:

• Can help maintain body weight and lower the risk of obesity;

• Can lower the risk of chronic diseases and high blood pressure;

• Improvements to your mood and wellbeing; and also

• Studies show that it can also encourage and improve creativity.

Cycling

Cycling is an excellent way to get about and is a great alternative to walking as it makes more places accessible. Cycling is around three times faster than walking and in some cases, it’s quicker than driving too! Cycling has a huge number of other benefits including;

• Improving wellbeing by relieving stress;

• Helps prevent chronic and life-threatening illnesses;

• Being more cost effective than running a car – Did you know that maintaining a bike for a year costs twenty times less than maintaining and driving a car; and

• Reducing congestion and pollution on our roads.

There are many quiet residential roads and streets with little traffic that can be used to cycle around Red Lodge. Also, the close proximity of Kennett train station at just a 15-minute cycle ride from Hunter’s Chase allows for easy and more economical ‘cycle & train’ commutes. To plan cycle routes from Hunter’s Chase, visit Cyclestreets.net.

Alternatively, electric bikes are a very practical option to consider for longer commutes. More environmentally friendly and economical than driving, they can also work out cheaper than annual bus passes. With Mildenhall only 15 minutes cycle away and 30 minutes to Newmarket, switching some of your commutes to e-pedal power could be the best way to avoid the morning traffic while adding exercise to your daily routine.

Cycle to Work Schemes

Is your employer part of the Cyclescheme? This allows you to save 25-39% of the cost of a new bike & accessories whilst also spreading the cost. Find out more information on how this works and how to sign up on the Cyclescheme website.

Free Cycle Training

The Suffolk Road Safe Team are now delivering sessions for families who want to cycle more regularly, whether to keep fit, to commute to work or school, or to go and visit friends!

The session will be about 3 hours long and free of charge. They will come to you, chat about what you are trying to achieve, and then work on your route or specific challenges that you have.

Some of the things you’ll learn include:

• how to ride with your children so that you can help them gain confidence;
• a simple system for remembering how to deal with different road scenarios;
• how to improve your safety at any junctions you use;
• how you can use your road position to control other road users and enhance your safety.

Find out more here.