Places to Ride
Havering is a large green outer London Borough with many places where people of all ages can ride off road. The following are a few of the local facilities
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Ingrebourne Valley is a short 4 mile family friendly ride. It starts from Ingrebourne Hill and heads along the Ingrebourne valley, through Hornchurch Country Park and Finishes at Upminster Park.
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Ingrebourne Hill has around five miles of walking, cycling and horse-riding trails, as well as a picnic site and two play areas. Catering for cyclists of all abilities, there are leisurely routes as well as quicker trails with jumps.
- Thames Chase at Broadfields Farm provides 6.5km of shared use pathways which are easy and flat surfaces for families and young learners to develop their cycling skills and explore the forest.
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Rainham Marshes provides a flat 6 mile route which runs from Rainham Station to the RSPB Centre at Purfleet.
- Pages Wood is the Forestry Commission’s largest site in Thames Chase and home to 100,000 trees. The wood offers 6.5km of walking and cycling paths and is located on Hall Lane just North of the A127.
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There are over 100 miles of canals and rivers to cycle along in London, find out more at the Canal and River Trust web site.
Cycling Centres
There are two cycling centres in nearby areas that have a variety of cycle tracks for training or practice with coaching and cycle hire available.
- Redbridge Cycle Centre at Hogg Hill
- The Cyclopark at Gravesend
Routes
Havering has its very own National Cycle Route – NCN136 which runs from Noak Hill, through Harold Hill, Upminster and Rainham to the River Thames.
London cycle planning has an online route planner here.
The sustainable transport organisation Sustrans has national routes on its website.
Here are some local routes using quieter roads.
Maps
Havering Council has an on-line borough map from which cycle routes can be viewed by selecting the “cycling” checkbox. With the cycling option selected, the page looks like this. The on-line map is here.
Group Rides
Below are a number organisations which invite people to join them on their rides. Any Havering Cyclists are shown on our news section.
- Here is the Hubbub list of events.
- The local Havering group of Cycling UK
- The Essex B Group of the Forty Plus Cycling Club have runs every Thursday starting to the North of the borough.
- Hornchurch Cycle Club ride on Saturday and Sunday through the year and Wednesday evenings from Spring to Autumn. Check out their website for more details.
- The LCC forum, rides and local page has news on what’s available across London.
- There are many charity rides going on each week these can be found by going to the home page of each charity but a good starting place is Bike Events
- Evans Cycles organise off-road and on-road events across the country you can find more info on their Ride-It Page
- Letsride organised by British cycling and sponsored by HSBC run a range of cycle rides for all abilities and ages across the country. They run a variety of rides including City Rides, Guided Rides, Social Rides, and Breeze ride which are women only. They also have numerous social groups which organise their own social rides. By registering it gives you access to all these rides. And it’s all free.
- Romford Cycling Club cater for a range of abilities. Check out their website for more details.