Paul McAuliffe (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for being here. Many of the topics they have discussed are the backbone of the conversations that many Tidy Towns groups have when they are out and about each week carrying out their work. I will be going to my local Tidy Towns group in Santry this evening. These conversations happen right across my constituency in Finglas, Ballymun and Santry.

I was interested to hear Dr. Rock talk about what I would call an urban town or an urban village. My constituency is in the difficult position of not being the priority of a local authority, in that it is not the city centre, and equally it does not have the local democracy that the outer towns in the county have. It is sandwiched between local authorities in Fingal, such as Blanchardstown and Swords that are rapidly developing, and the city centre, where we are trying to concentrate footfall. In places like Ballymun, Finglas and Santry, there are often two options: either continued dereliction because of a lack of investment by both public and private operators, or the only opportunity of development being that which comes with significant intensification and when that is developer led, it does not deliver for the community. Intensification is appropriate but it is right to say that communities have fears around that because often they are the places where housing has been put before facilities in the past.

I have two areas of questions. One is around the question of how we drive development that is not necessarily solely around the delivery of housing. I am not saying that we should not have it for the delivery of housing, but how do we develop it? From what I can see, Dublin City Council or local authorities do not seem to have the remit to develop in the way they should or in the way local authorities in other countries have done. If any witness, other than Dr. Rock, has looked at Housing for All particularly around the issues of Croí Cónaithe towns and cities, and when compared with the funding allocated to many rural towns to tackle dereliction, funding which is not available to Dublin urban villages, I would be interested in having a conversation on that.

My second question is for Mr. Donovan. In Dublin North-West, we are unlucky in our history in this area but lucky that we have significant transport projects coming down the line. In the west we have a new Luas line proposed and a new metro line through Ballymun.

In the east we have a new BusConnects route through Santry, Finglas and Ballymun and we have two great orbital routes across the constituency, with one along Collins Avenue linking Clontarf to Glasnevin, while above that there is a route from Finglas to Kilbarrack that goes along Glasnevin Avenue and so on.

We are retrofitting a very old area with very good and active public transport models but that creates much conversation and controversy. Motorists have not had to share the road for the best part of 100 years and at that time they shared it with horses. Many people take for granted that everyone supports this. I have dealt with the great Dublin Cycling Campaign organisation, for example, but I ask Mr. Donovan in particular how we can bridge the gap in what is sometimes a very toxic conversation between people who share the roads. It can sometimes be bus users versus car users. How can we try to make people realise these cyclists are not some sort of alien Lycra-clad beings but they are actually our work colleagues and children? How would we promote that?

These are two very broad areas but, to be fair, the topic for overall discussion is also very broad. I am happy to hear the views of Dr. Rock, Mr. Donovan and anybody else who wishes to contribute.