Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I have a few other points. On the issue of the island bus stops, I believe that issue has been treated very thoroughly and sensitively in the new national cycle manual. There is provision there for a type of belt and braces approach where there would be a signalised situation. The engineer, whether it is in the NTA or in the local authority who is designing it, will make his or her own judgement as to whether that is necessary. My concern is they will default to that situation which may not be actually necessary but which ultimately may be much more expensive. I would like to know how much more expensive that solution is versus the solution that is, perhaps, more modest and does not have the cabling and the signalised junction?

I would like to know where we are on continuous footpaths, which I believe is a very significant issue for people with disabilities and for people who are in wheelchairs or other mobility devices. In other countries, the standard is coming that continuous footpaths are to be rolled out everywhere whereas we still have the dished footpaths, which are a very significant problem. Is it the NTA that dictates that standard and what is the position there?

I believe Mr. Doocey mentioned in his statement that the boards of the transport operators, the taxi advisory committee and the railway safety advisory committee all have at least one representative from the disability community. There is a challenge there in that we have learned in this committee that there is such a wide range of disabilities, and where there is just one representative of the disability community, how does that person really represent all of the variety of disabilities? It is a big challenge. Mr. Doocey may have some thoughts on that point.

I will pick up on the point made by Deputy Murnane O'Connor about the new bus service in Carlow. I will not be getting any votes in Carlow, that is for sure, but she mentioned the service does not go near the train station. I believe there are concerns throughout the country that there is not connectivity between the various modes. Perhaps our guests would like to speak about the Carlow situation but also perhaps about the general approach with Connecting Ireland. What level of communication and collaboration is going on between Connecting Ireland, its team, and Irish Rail such that when the train arrives, there is a bus waiting or that the bus would bring people to the station in time for the train?