TWO weeks remain for councils to apply for a share of £60m in funding to support sustainable travel.

Local authorities across England are being asked to bid for a share of the Department for Transport's green Sustainable Travel Access Fund.

The fund has been launched to encourage councils to offer sustainable transport initiatives which can improve access to jobs, skills, training and education.

The cash, which will support projects over 3 years from 2017 to 2020, is part of a wider government fund of over £300 million to boost walking and cycling during the current parliament.

Councils are being encouraged to look at opportunities to work together on devising schemes. The successful authorities will be asked to contribute 10% of their scheme costs.

They are encouraged to work alongside Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) proposals being submitted in a further round of Growth Deals where up to £1.8 billion will be available.

The results of an earlier competition were announced in May.

It saw 23 local councils or combined authority projects sharing £20.6m to support initiatives worth a total of nearly £33.4m.

These included a successful bid by Hampshire County Council for its Connecting Hampshire to Grow Rural Prosperity project.

The closing date for councils to bid for a share of the new fund is Friday 9 September.

For full details, click here.