Dr. Gerald Craddock:

We are working closely with the National Transport Authority, NTA. For example, we were in Fairview just last week to look at active travel from Clontarf to the city centre. In short, there is confusion about what is shared space. It is a significant issue not only for people who are autistic but those who are blind or visually impaired. What has happened over the past couple of years, particularly in the UK, has given shared space a very bad name. For example, shared space was put on the top of an off-ramp on a motorway at Coventry. People were coming off the off-ramp at 60 km/h to 70 km/h, whereas our recommendation is for somewhere between 20 km/h and 25 km/h in order to create a shared space that includes motorised transport. The biggest issue we are seeing at present is the segregation of, or shared space between, cyclists and pedestrians. That is quite a contested area currently.

As I said, we are working with the NTA on coming up with solutions. We are running a workshop with some international experts on 26 June to specifically look at this. The area around bus stops, in particular, is causing a huge issue at the moment. Again, shared space is very much part of that.