LEWES LOCAL GROUP

Lewes Local Group Logo

Lewes - a beautiful town to live and stroll around in. We want Lewes to be an attractive pedestrian and bicycle friendly town where streets are shared and cars do not dominate.

We want to make walking and cycling in and around Lewes easier, safer and more enjoyable. We want people to secure the health benefits of walking and cycling (and from less pollution from motor vehicles). For us it is not just about reducing accidents/collisions on our roads it is about improving the quality of life for residents and making Lewes more attractive to visitors.

OUR WORK
  • We campaigned for and helped secure 20mph speed limits across most of Lewes. We want to extend this and instal gateway signs coming into Lewes.
  • We set up and continue to support a Community Speedwatch group which works with the Police to educate drivers to get them to stick to the speed limit.
group of people holding up 20 mile an hour zone placards
  • We support pedestrian crossings at key sites (e.g. at the Piggy steps in Offham Road) and want to see informal crossings (zebras without beacons) where people want them.
  • We want to improve our often narrow pavements, stop pavement parking, keep them clean and well maintained and free of signs and clutter.
  • We want to redesign road junctions to force drivers to slow down and make them easier to cross.
  • We campaigned with Southover School to secure our first School Street in 2025 limiting traffic on Potters Lane and surrounding streets at key times.
  • We want to revitalise Lewes High Street and surrounding roads by making it more attractive for people to walk and cycle to and around.
A mocked up image of potential regeneration on Lewes high street. It shows a section where car parking bays have been removed to make way for a pedestrian parklet with greenery, benches, and bicycle locking facilities.

We continue to work with Cycle Lewes to reduce through traffic on Lewes High Street. Together (with support from Lewes Town Council) we commissioned a camera survey in November 2021 which showed that 50% of the traffic was driving straight through. See the report here.

Together, in 2021 we also commissioned a survey of visitors to Lewes High Street looking at where they come from, how they get here and their views on possible improvements to the High Street. See report here.

In 2025/6 we came together with a range of organisations to come up with a master plan for Lewes to be incorporated into the South Downs National Park Local Plan for Lewes.

This includes new low car housing, improved infrastructure to enable the town to thrive, public car parks on the edge of the town centre so that people visiting will park and stride and more buses particularly in the evening.