A cyclist has shared her thoughts on a roundabout's revamp after cycling through it with her children.

Transport for London (TfL) has completed work on Cycleway 23 in Hackney, with new cycle lanes installed on the Lea Bridge Roundabout at Clapton to connect it with an existing route to Dalston.

The new segregated cycle lane on the roundabout has transformed it from an accident hotspot to something very safe, cyclist Kate Corden said after she rode through it with her husband and two children on Monday.

Corden, who owns a bike-fitting business, has seen how cycling in the area has changed since she moved to Hackney in 2000.

There have been at least 32 collisions involving a cyclist at Lea Bridge Roundabout since 2002, according to CycleStreets map, which uses official crash data.

Other cycling crashes near the roundabout include a fatal collision in Lea Bridge Road in 2017.

Lea Bridge Road is a “very fast moving” and “it wasn’t pleasant”, she said.

“It was very dangerous and I can see why there were so many accidents there,” she continued.

“There are some places where lots of people previously wouldn’t have been comfortable cycling.”

Before the revamp, cyclists at Lea Bridge Roundabout had to ride through or attempt to dodge a carpet of broken glass and debris on the inside lane, Corden said.

Now the fully segregated cycle lanes have turned the intimidating gyratory into “somewhere that any cyclist can go through, whether a child, an adult, whether they are confident or less familiar riding with traffic”, she explained.

But, she added, the biggest letdown was the lack of transition from the cycle lane to North Millfield Recreation Ground just east of the roundabout, where she said the entrance to the park is very small and difficult to get in and out of.

Access to the park from the cycle lane was a \let down\. Photo credit: Kate Corden

Access to the park from the cycle lane was a \"let down\". Photo credit: Kate Corden

Although the new roundabout is a “massive improvement”, she felt the lights took a long time to change and there was no button for cyclists to press.

But all in all, she said it felt "extremely safe and well-built”.

Alongside the roundabout improvements, TfL has upgraded the pedestrian crossings and signals.

Construction has also finished on Cycleway 50 between Finsbury Park and Holloway Road in Islington.

London’s walking and cycling commissioner, Will Norman, said: “The Mayor of London and I want to build on the boom in cycling we’ve seen in recent years, as our rapidly expanding cycle network enables more and more Londoners to switch to cycling for local journeys.

“The extension of these two cycleways will make cycling journeys easier and safer around Hackney and Islington and help us continue building a better, greener, safer London for everyone.”