Dr. Lorraine D'Arcy:

I echo the point with regard to zebra crossings. In Oslo, where there are zero pedestrian fatalities at every junction, whether on the periphery of the city or in the city centre, there is a zebra crossing at every corner. Some of the crossings that are on the more heavily trafficked roads or the distributor roads have lights on them as well but there are not that many distributor roads. The default pedestrian was mentioned. One of the key challenges in terms of training traffic engineers and in learnings about junction and traffic light design is that the pedestrian is always at the lowest ebb of it. The full cycle of movement of all of the cars has to happen before the pedestrian face comes in. The pedestrian face might only happen if the button is pressed, but one still might have to wait for the three minutes regardless of whether there are any vehicles at any junctions. There is an issue in regard to compliance with red lights. We see that happening everywhere. People think that because there is nothing coming they can keep going.

Reference was made to "having to look". Zebra crossings force people to slow down and look out for a pedestrian. The person driving the car does not have the priority in that case. This refers back to Deputy Hourigan's point earlier about the hi-vis jackets. It is about the expectation that one might see something. It can be seen as victim blaming but it puts the onus on the pedestrian to be seen rather than on the driver to keep a look out and to be mindful of what is happening.

On the Chairman's point with regard to London, they are at very early days in that study. It is hard to tell yet if there is going to be what we call "traffic evaporation" in that case. There is long-standing literature and evidence around traffic evaporation in other cases when pedestrians are prioritised. Where we facilitate and make safer pedestrian and cycling trips, we see less cars on the road. This is not necessarily because people feel like they are stuck in traffic for longer. It is more that they see that bicycles can move about much more efficiently. People give out that nobody is using the cycle lanes. That is because they are so efficient people are moving through them quickly. When people are stuck in traffic they do not really take note and accept that they are the traffic that is causing the problem.

Equally, when we design for better pedestrian infrastructure and cycling infrastructure, when we are more equitable in our provision, we find that females by default are a lot more affected. When we design around the car and default to the car, we assume that everybody in the household has access to a car but it is the women of the household who are generally left without mobility. Added to that, is the issue around having a child and a buggy or a mobility issue. Anyone who has ever had to hold on to two toddlers at the same time while trying to cross a road when there is no pedestrian crossing knows how difficult that is. I refer to the KCR junction in Dublin as being one of those junctions where my heart went through my mouth so many times. If there is no pedestrian crossing, the person is forced to get into a car to drive 500 m to the shop because it is too difficult and too dangerous to do otherwise. The older person who wants to collect a pension has to rely on somebody else coming to collect and bring him or her to the post office instead of him or her being able to travel their independently. We have to consider all of these causes and balance the provision.

Walkability is my area. Walking is top of the hierarchy. For me, it is about pedestrian infrastructure and recognising walking, cycling, active travel, sustainable transport, including public transport, because every public transport trip includes a walking trip and so in providing better public transport we are providing for walkability. By default, that makes people slow down. It makes people much more aware of their surroundings. There are more people that they have to consider and therefore behave more responsibly.