Plans to improve travel across Inverness for cyclists and pedestrians have been unveiled.
Highland Council is planning to create a dedicated route from Culloden to South Kessock, joining up existing infrastructure and improving the streetscape.
The council is bidding for up to £3million in funding from the Scottish Government to help deliver the scheme.
Transport bosses at the local authority want to create what they describe as an “active travel route” across the city for those energetic enough to venture out from behind the steering wheel.
The east to west corridor will join up Inverness High School, the city centre, Millburn Academy, Inverness Campus and Culloden Academy.
Richard Gerring, transport planning manager at the council, said the aim was to drive down the number of single occupant car journeys made across the city.
He said: “We’ve given it some thought. We believe if people learn to walk and cycle to school and then move on to further education or a career then they will sustain that for the rest of their lives.
“That’s why this west to east route is very important for us and that’s probably our main focus, which does include Millburn Road and Academy Street.”
Much of the infrastructure is already in place – but the funding would be used to join up elements such as the Millburn Road cycle route and the city centre.
Elements such as tree planting would also be used to improve the appearance of routes.
Stuart Black, the council’s director of planning and infrastructure, said: “To encourage a step change in people cycling in Inverness we’ve got to link up existing bits of infrastructure and that’s what this is trying to do.
“There’s also new bits of infrastructure. We’ve had investment for example in Millburn cycle route and that’s proved very popular.
“The figures for the first three months of the year are 14% up on last year which is very encouraging.
“So what we have to do now is make sure that the Millburn cycle route joins better into the city centre.
“That’s one of the early things we want to do.
“You get to Morrison’s at the moment and it becomes a bit unclear so we’re trying to encourage a joining up of some of the existing bits of infrastructure.
“It also focuses on routes which bring people into the city centre, we want to try and help people think about getting into the centre in different ways.”