OXFORD’s only shop dedicated to selling recycled second-hand cycles is to close.

After nine years of trading, Oxford Cycle Workshop’s store in East Oxford will sell its last bike on Saturday, November 27.

Staff said the move was so the group could focus its efforts on recycled bike sales and repairs on estates like Blackbird Leys and Barton, in a bid to get more people on to two wheels.

Some 600 restored bikes a year are sold at the Magdalen Road shop after being collected from the county council’s Redbridge recycling centre. Although the city has 10 other bike shops, the workshop is the only one dedicated to selling recycled bikes.

Director Dan Harris said: “We’re sad it’s closing. It was a difficult decision.”

He added: “We want to take bike repair and maintenance out to places where cycling isn’t prevalent at the moment.

“We also want to take our mechanics out into communities which aren’t well served by bike shops, such as South Oxford, Headington and West Oxford.”

Drop-in workshops will be held at venues including the Skylight homeless centre, he said. The workshop is already paid to repair 3,500 bikes a year at the sessions, and these are returned to owners. It hopes the latest move will double the number of bikes dealt with in this way.

James Styring, chairman of city cycling pressure group Cyclox, said: “It’s a pity the shop is closing but I think it’s a good idea. I’m acutely aware the take-up of cycling in Barton and Blackbird Leys isn’t the same as in the centre of Oxford, so for the workshop to take the cycling message and the cycling bug to new areas is a good thing.”

Cyclist Paul Cullen, 67, from Jericho, said: “Riding recycled bikes is a very Oxford thing and fits in with the city’s green commitments.

“Anything that takes cycling out to the estates is a positive thing.”