Maeve O'Connell (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)

My constituency of Dublin-Rathdown has seen significant change during the past five years through the development of active travel greenways and other similar schemes. Over €80 million has been spent, with €29 million allocated in 2025 alone, to support the various commitments in the national sustainable mobility policy to get people out of cars to walk and cycle instead, as well as the climate action plan which aims to reduce transport emissions overall. Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council, of which I was a member, led the way on these schemes. Kilometres of lanes have been built, concrete and plastic dividers have been installed, junctions have been narrowed, filter lanes have been removed, roads have been closed and new traffic lights and traffic sequences have been installed. After five years of investment, and counting, we still do not really have any clarity as to whether this investment is actually delivering because we do not really know whether our emissions have been reduced. We have estimates and surveys but have we actually done the assessment before all of these things were implemented, and afterwards, to see whether the emissions were actually reduced?

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