Ruairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank all the witnesses. I think there will be general consensus and agreement regarding the fact that we want our roads to be as safe as possible. Mr. Waide said that it is not so much about being fair to motorists when we are talking about towns. Rather it is about ensuring people are able to involve themselves in active travel. I always find that in this State, to some degree, we start from a bad place. Our road network is somewhat imperfect. I was in Strasbourg recently. You have to watch out for people on e-scooters and bicycles and there will always be the element of criss-crossing at certain points but the network in general is better and there is more space to allow that room for active travel.

I will use an example in Dundalk involving a reduction in lanes. People were obviously worried about this and said it would clog up the town to a further degree. I am talking about the far end of Bridge Street and Clanbrassil Street. The general notion was that it would probably slow down traffic and cycle lanes would not be put in because there is no room so it would be shared space. I am not sure whether it has resulted in a huge uplift in the number of people cycling on it but traffic is probably moving slowly and it has not been the disaster people might have thought it would be.

I suppose it is about how one builds in that level of planning. On a personal basis, sometimes I see a 30 km/h limit and think it is incredibly slow. You would not even realise you had gone over the limit. I suppose it would take a huge shift change to get people to that point. It would be a hard sell at this time, while accepting the argument is that we are going to save lives and facilitate the rest. What are the real moves that need to happen here? I do not believe we are in a place where tomorrow one could bring this into Leinster House, propose it and get it accepted.