A POPULAR and unique cycling festival is coming back to Southend this weekend after a two-year break.

ForwardMotion is reviving the Tweed Ride festival which sees riders in their best tweed outfits come together for a community cycle.

The event returns this Saturday (June 25) with cyclists pedalling off at 11am from Southchurch Park, before finishing at about 1pm at Belfairs Nature Reserve.

When the riders reach Belfairs Park, a range of activities will be on offer to visitors as part of the main festival.

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The Active Travel Festival will feature a range of activities, including a pop-up cycle track, treasure hunts both on wheels and by foot and live music performances.

There will also be talks about introducing new ways to travel, helping people to learn new skills and celebrating the cycle community.

Festival-goers can get drinks from artisan trade stalls.

Steven Wakefield, councillor responsible for highways, transport, and parking, said: “It is an honour to be invited to the revival of the Tweed Ride to welcome this year’s cyclists.

“We should be celebrating cycling and active travel methods a lot more, and events like this show cycling isn’t just a healthy, and eco-friendly method of transport, it can also be great fun and there is a wonderful, friendly community to be part of.”

Iain Banks, programme manager for ForwardMotion, said the festival is coming back bigger than ever with more of a focus on active travel in general.

He added: “We have got lots lined up this year for people of all abilities to take part in, and we hope that as many residents as possible will join us for our first big event since Southend was granted city status.”

The full cycle route is as follows:

  • Leave Southchurch Park and head for the seafront cycle path
  • Following the cycle path, riders will head towards the Sealife Centre, and continue to the shared space at Marine Parade
  • Crossing Marine Parade, the ride will head up Hartington Road towards Queensway where cyclists use the shared space all the way to Victoria Station
  • They then use the Victoria Avenue cycle path and shared space path until Priory Park
  • At Priory Park riders join the Prittlebrook Greenway shared space
  • Following the Prittlebrook Greenway all the way to Eastwood Road
  • At Eastwood Road the ride will cross over and enter Belfairs Park
  • Cyclists make the way up the park playing fields and at the top turn left joining the path to the Cycling and Active Travel Festival by the Belfairs Woodland Centre