Mr. Fabian Küster:

My impressions are a little more positive but I spend a lot of time riding around Manchester where we can definitely give Dublin a run for its money on some aspects. I have seen some positive developments. I like the light segregation using the Orcas, which have improved the route. That route, which we have used the most to travel to and from the conference, is a little off and on. I have ridden around Dublin quite a bit in the past and there are some very good facilities. Near Temple Bar, springy bollards effectively filter the entire street to allow people walk and cycle around the area. The ride through there is very nice and as good as one will find anywhere.

What I try to do is look at the positives because I am defending the engineering community. There are many good facilities here and the stage we are at is that we want people to say, "That is good. Can we have more of it?" rather than "It is all terrible", of which we have heard a good deal. The members have not looked at every street and all the interventions or ridden all the routes. There is great stuff around now. They could say, "That bit is good. It works. Let's do more of that". It is similar to the way central London and the rest of the UK used to be in that one will find brilliant pockets everywhere. It is a question of identifying the bits that work, getting the evidence and rolling out the facilities. There are good improvements here. There has been some nice treatments at junctions. The pedestrian crossings work much better than they do in the UK. Certain regulations here are better than ours in the UK. There is a good deal to build on. It is a question of finding something that works for Dublin in the right street context and then rolling it out as part of a plan. That is my impression.