Transport for the Lake District is an initiative set up to provide a fresh, independent perspective on the Lake District’s transport system. It aims to be

  • Visionary – about how things could be. Why not World class?
  • Constructive and pragmatic – making sure that ideas are deliverable under existing legislation and systems
  • Inclusive – deliberately include a wide variety of voices in shaping ideas.

It is initially steered by a small group of organisations who are already active in these areas:

Alistair established Low Carbon Destinations CIC as a place where European best practice on access and transport is applied to the UK. This follows a 2023 Churchill Fellowship that involved visiting 12 European rural destinations to work out how to develop and deliver world-class access and transport. The focus for these is decarbonisation, but the work showed that low carbon visitor access and travel is world class standard.

Alistair has previously worked for Friends of the Lake District, the Lake District National Park Authority (establishing the £5.7m GoLakes Travel programme 2011 – 2015), Cumbria County Council and was Executive Director of CoMoUK – the national charity for shared transport. Since 2018, he has worked freelance on rural transport with a focus on rural visitor destinations and shared transport.

He lives in Staveley where he is involved in local volunteer groups, including the establishment of the Staveley community ebikes and the I Get Around initiative.

Alistair Kirkbride

Lorrainne Smyth

Lorrainne is the CEO of Action with Communities in Cumbria (https://www.cumbriaaction.org.uk/) – where she has been working for the past 35+ year, promoting community voices and supporting local solutions and policy change for rural communities. Originally from London, Lorrainne now lives in Endmoor has been involved with rural transport initiatives for many years. ACT does not run transport, but supports many partnerships and projects that do, from informal car sharing to organised community transport groups. She Co-Chairs the Enhanced Bus Partnership for Cumbria and has been an active chair of the Lake District National Park Partnership Sustainable Transport Key Outcome Group. Lorrainne has also been involved in Outdoor Mobility, a Cumbria charity, making amazing places accessible to people and families with limited mobility. https://www.outdoormobility.org/

Michael is a resident of Ullswater. He is the Chair of Trustees of the transport charity Sustainable and Integrated Transport for Ullswater (SITU)(reg. no. 1214271), and Chair of Transport for Communities in Cumbria (TraCC). He is a retired commercial litigation lawyer who has also been a mediator, trustee of a London charity supporting disadvantaged young people, non-executive company director and parish councillor. He is a keen cyclist and can often be seen on a tandem with his wife, Jane.

Michael Firth

Georgina Lowe

Throughout her twenties, Georgina has had the pleasure of living in two rural destinations abroad – Banff in Canada and Morzine in France – where frequent, free public transport made life without a car easy, despite both places being rural. This experience showed her what’s possible when rural transport is done well, and it shapes how she thinks about the Lake District today.

Returning home, idolising international transport systems, she volunteered for Sustainable & Integrated Transport for Ullswater in 2025 – a charity she resonated with – before starting as their freelance Project Co-ordinator in March 2026.

Alongside her transport work, Georgina co-owns a social media agency with her partner. She understands how to make public transport appealing to visitors and how good communication and digital storytelling can shift how people think about getting around. She enjoys bringing these visual and digital skills to projects like this one.

The initial 2026 delivery is funded by a grant from the Foundation for Integrated Transport.

Our plan for the first year involves:

  • Working out a set of principles that help to drives the design of a transport system.
    Click here to find out for more on this and how to have a say
  • Working out what transport systems might look like a local (valley) scale, for the whole Lake District and for how the Lake District links to other places.
    There are some initial ideas here, but we’ll be focussing on working this out from Autumn 2026. This is so that it is properly driven by the Principles
  • Engaging meaningfully with the general public, relevant organsiations and local decision makers on the principles and transport systems.
    We’ll be doing this actively via networks, social media and events.
  • Engaging with mayoral candidates for the new Cumbria Combined Authority.

The elections are in May 2027, so we will be working from Autumn to make sure that all candidates understand the case for supporting the development of a world class transport system for the Lake District and how this will benefit the whole county.