Bradford could be part of an ambitious £20 million super cycleway if a bid to link the district with Leeds city centre via bike routes gets the go ahead.

West Yorkshire Integrated Transport Authority’s executive board will consider tomorrow the bid for the Cycle City Ambition Grant, open to all those areas with City Region deals, including the Leeds City Region, of which Bradford is a part.

Only three grants will be awarded, and if the Leeds City Region bid gets the go ahead, an east-west super cycleway will be built across Leeds, with an extension into the Bradford Moor and Thornbury areas.

Exact details of the bid will remain under wraps until it is submitted to the Department for Transport on Tuesday. But first members of the ITA must agree to it being submitted.

If the bid is successful, work could start immediately because the routes need to be created by 2015.

The detail that has been revealed in the report to the ITA states that it plans to provide a cycle-friendly infrastructure in the centre of Leeds, and improve the surface of the Leeds-Liverpool canal towpath.

A Council spokesman said that the conceptual ideas would be trading on the fact the Tour de France comes to Yorkshire next year.

The spokesman said: “It is a joint bid headed by Metro and Leeds and Bradford. We already have a network of cycle routes with the city centre as the hub and Manchester Road bridge is part of that.

“And we are just in the process of developing a similar route that goes from the city centre to Shipley along from Canal Road and that will create a high quality route from North to South.

“What this bid is doing is giving us an opportunity to look at something similar through from the city centre to Leeds.

“This could mean segregating cyclists from other road users, providing safety at junctions and it would be a much more pleasant arrangement.

“One of our core things going into the bid is that it links into the legacy of the Tour de France.”

Councillor Val Slater, Bradford Council’s executive member for transport, said Bradford was trying to connect up some of the existing cycle ways with Leeds city centre.

“Obviously for us the route that would be followed does give access to major employers,” she said.

“There is quite stiff competition for these grants, but we hope Bradford and Leeds are putting in a transformational bid and hope it will be successful.”