BEXLEY residents could be stepping out in clogs and bright orange football shirts if the Mayor has his way.

Boris Johnson wants to make the area into a "mini-Holland" by dangling a slice of £100m earmarked to promote cycling in outer London boroughs.

Bexley will have to bid for funds against the capital’s 19 other local authorities outside the city centre, with only four boroughs to be awarded the "substantial investment" aimed at getting people on their bikes.

Rather than bringing the famous Boris bikes to Bexley, the Mayor hopes successful boroughs will become every bit as cycle-friendly Amsterdam with residents benefiting from improvements in their quality of life and travel - whether they cycle or not.

Ideas designed to get residents dusting off their old boneshakers include redesigning town centres to make them "genuinely excellent" for cyclists and building a network of cycle paths "radiating out from the town centre" alongside other travel routes.

Cycle superhubs offering secure cycle parking at railway stations and redesigns of problem junctions are other proposals put forward by Boris - well known for biking his way to work at City Hall.

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The Mayor said: "This will go beyond anything seen in the UK before.

"It could amount to a complete transport makeover of the successful boroughs and we expect councils all over London will see the huge potential to make significant improvements using this funding."

Boroughs are also encouraged to put forward any other ideas they may have to improve cycling so thousands of short local journeys by car can be easily biked instead.

Most of London’s cycling growth in recent years has taken place in inner London but more than half of all potentially cyclable trips are in outer London, according to TfL research.

The majority of trips in the suburbs are less than two miles, which takes around 10 minutes by bike, but are currently made mostly by car.

Mr Johnson added: "Boroughs shouldn’t worry if they haven’t done much cycling before: it is the future we are interested in, not the past."

Boroughs have a deadline of June 21 to submit outline proposals.