It is going to be a rough year ahead for drivers in central London — including taxis and buses — as work starts on the larger of two new cycle superhighways.

Transport for London has warned that there will be increased congestion in areas from Knightsbridge to Canary Wharf, east to west, and from Oxford Street to Elephant and Castle, north to south, and delays nearer to the route itself. The work itself should be completed next May. Credit is due to London’s black-cab drivers, who decided against calling for a judicial review of the route, not least because they recognise that it is likely to save cyclists’ lives.

And that is the crux of the matter, the reason why we should put the best face we can on the vexations caused by the project in the year ahead. Any infrastructure project on this scale causes unavoidable inconvenience but the end result is worth it. Segregated cycle super-highways will not make cycling absolutely risk-free in London but it should be safer than before. This paper will, we hope, carry fewer tragic stories of cyclists dragged to their deaths. On these grounds alone the east-west superhighway is welcome. But it is also important in encouraging a clean and effective mode of transport in the city.

We should be careful, however, of delegating responsibility for cycling safety to superhighways. The majority of London cyclists will still be cycling elsewhere, and there is no substitute for universal caution and mutual courtesy on our roads. Yet cyclists should feel safer this time next year, when the new route is complete. Anyone driving in central London, especially during peak hours, may find the next year a trial of patience but, as with Crossrail, that patience will be rewarded.

A more diverse Met

It is disquieting to learn that the proportion of new recruits to the Metropolitan Police from ethnic minorities has actually decreased over the past year. Some 16 per cent of police officers recruited last year were from non-white backgrounds, compared with 21 per cent the year before. To put these figures in perspective, more than 40 per cent of Londoners are from black and ethnic minority groups. There are good reasons to find this troubling. The Mayor has promised that the police will reflect the capital’s ethnic diversity. If the Met is seen to be more representative, it will attract greater support from all parts of the community. Obviously, excellence in the job is not dependent on race or background, but recruits from minority groups offer insights which help increase the effectiveness of policing.

Met Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe has called for a change in the law to allow the Met to use positive discrimination over five years to re-balance the make-up of the force. This is not an attractive option, in that no police officer would wish to be seen as appointed on the basis of race rather than personal merit. But there is every reason for the Met to redouble its efforts to recruit from under-represented groups, and to make far greater efforts to retain them.

Veterans to the rescue

A group of 10 British Army veterans, half former Gurkhas, has been doing heroic relief in a cut-off area of Nepal. It demonstrates that veterans are an invaluable resource in relief work: efforts are under way to make this a permanent organisation. It also goes to show that in this crisis, there is no one better than the Nepalese Gurkhas.