It is a Sherlock Holmes evening in south Manchester. There is a deep fog on an already black night, perfect for tail-coated villains to dart between the wheelie bins. But in a primary school hall the lights are on and a public meeting is taking place about a proposed local cycle route. There are a couple of councillors, engineers, 180 or so members of the public – the irate and the enthusiastic – and a world-record breaking and Olympic winning cyclist: Chris Boardman.

The microphone does not work, there are tetchy complaints about a phone vote and low-level tension plonks down in the corner. Boardman, here in his role as Manchester’s cycling and walking tsar seems unfazed. He perches on the table, sticks a hand in his pocket and starts to speak. He is confident, blunt – and hackles visibly settle.

It is all a long way from Lycra-clad time trials. Boardman, 50 and who in 1994 became only the second British cyclist to wear the Tour de France’s yellow jersey, retired from cycling in 2000 with the aim of doing “sod all”. He and his wife had scaled their life down and Boardman was able to pick and choose jobs – before being sucked back in 2004 when asked to help a couple of coaches with “some problematic athletes” – including Bradley Wiggins. He then became head of British Cycling’s Secret Squirrel Club – in charge of research and development – for the next two Olympics. He set up his own bike company and did TV commentary.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Chris Boardman (left) on his way to pursuit goal at the Barcelona Olympics in 1992. Photograph: Vandystadt/Allsport

But it is this new role that has him up at night. “It’s the only thing in 20 years to do that because it’s important,” he says, earlier the same day, in a living room round the corner from the Co-op. “People say do you enjoy it? No! I just feel this massive burden not to screw it up.”

Manchester’s mayor, Andy Burnham, aims to turn the city into one of the greenest in Europe, and a place of mostly haphazard, sometime pot-holed cycle lanes, into the cycling capital of the country with 1,000 miles of network. Boardman has been given 10 years and £1.5bn of ringfenced money.

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He is confident he can change behaviour in this rainy city, where there are 250 million car journeys of less than 1km every year, where life expectancy is among the lowest in the country, where air pollution is too high, where people eat, drink and smoke too much and do not do enough exercise. It is also the first place in the world where Mobike, the Chinese cycle-sharing operator, withdrew because of antisocial behaviour. But Boardman sees only potential.

“I enjoy talking about this because it has absolutely nothing to do with cyclists. They might benefit but this is for people who drive because they’re the ones who are going to want to change if it’s going to work.”

His criteria for success: doubling and doubling again cycling in Greater Manchester. Walking routes with space enough for a double buggy, a cycle network that can be handled by competent 12-year-olds and be trusted by their parents. His secret weapons: democracy, letting local communities plot their own routes, a joined-up network including, critically, junctions and “telling people if you don’t want to do it, we won’t do it. Then people say: ‘Oh, we do’, and you’ve got a proper conversation on your hands.”

The bike is a simple, cheap solution to so many of the problems we face, so why the hell aren't we doing it? Chris Boardman

Boardman is no fanatic. He has two cars and spends lots of time on the M6, journeying from the Wirral, where he has lived most of his life. Nor was he a massive advocate for public cycling in his professional years. “It’s a very self-centred existence being an athlete. You’re incredibly selfish and encouraged to be so,” he admits.

But he always had a thing for the outdoors – camping, scuba-diving – and he likes problem solving and logic. “I realised the bike is a simple, cheap solution to so many of the problems we face, so why the hell aren’t we doing it? Three hundred miles away from here 50% of kids ride to school every day, 30% of all journeys are by bike – in the Netherlands, in parts of Germany, in Denmark. Take anyone from here and stand them there and they’ll say: ‘I prefer this.’ So it is such a sturdy soap box to stand on.

“People think the Netherlands have always been about bikes but they haven’t. In the 1970s, because of child deaths on the streets and a looming oil crisis, they said: stop. They decided to change the way they used streets and put people first. Their spend went into public transport. They’ve got a higher tax rate than we have but it is wonderfully civilised. We invested in private transport. We’re not unusual, we just do the easy thing – and the car has always been easy until there’s so many of them that it’s not, and the consequences are becoming more and more apparent.”

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Boardman’s mother, Carol, was killed in a cycling accident in July 2016. Last month Liam Rosney admitted causing death by careless driving. “It’s just horrifically ironic,” Boardman says. “I can’t think about it because it would just destroy me. It’s not just taking away someone’s life. It’s everything that’s left behind. And we don’t treat it as a crime. We say: ‘Oh, what a shame.’” He sighs.

“This, this is the biggest race I’ve ever had. If we can change something as big as a city region and prove that it works, you have to believe the rest of the country will follow.”