In May 2021, a group of families took to the streets of Bath for the very first Kidical Mass ride. Over 150 adults and children came together to celebrate cycling and to make a simple demand: safer streets for our children. Five years on, we’re still riding, still chanting, and still waiting.

The five and six-year-olds who wobbled along on their bikes at that first ride have grown up. This September, they head to secondary school, old enough now to cycle independently, if only our streets were safe enough to let them. That gap between where we are and where we need to be is exactly why Kidical Mass Bath exists.

In those five years, we’ve held 20 Kidical Mass rides, bringing together families, children and cycling supporters from across the city. Last September, two Kidical Mass parents took another step forward, launching a Bike Bus in Bathampton, giving children a safe, sociable, and sustainable way to travel to school together. These are grassroots initiatives, built on volunteer energy and community spirit, filling a gap that infrastructure and policy have yet to close.

Our rides are led by the children themselves, older kids at the front behind volunteer marshals, coming up with their own chants. One has become a firm all-time favourite: “What do we want? Safer streets! When do we want them? Now!” It never fails to raise a smile, and it never fails to remind us why we’re here.

For me personally, these five years have been transformative. Kidical Mass led me to become Bicycle Mayor of Bath in 2021, a voluntary, unelected role focused on championing cycling across the city. That work, and the conversations it opened up, inspired me to stand as a councillor in May 2023. I was elected to represent Lambridge, and once in the council chamber, I brought forward a motion calling on B&NES to commit to Vision Zero: the goal of eliminating deaths and serious injuries on our roads by 2030. That motion passed unanimously.

But motions and ambitions only matter if they translate into action on the ground. Children are still being driven to school because parents don’t feel safe letting them cycle. Key routes still lack protection. We’ve seen funding bids lost, plans weakened on delivery, and too many strategies that never make it off the page.

Five years of Kidical Mass Bath is worth celebrating. The community, the rides, the Bike Bus, the children’s voices: all of it matters. But the anniversary that would really mean something is the day we no longer need to chant for safer streets, because we finally have them.

Saskia Heijltjes, Chair of Kidical Mass Bath and Councillor for Lambridge