Jimmy Harte (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy McGinley, to the House. The concept of smarter travel has been pushed very actively by the Minister of State, Deputy Kelly, recently. He announced funding under smarter travel for Letterkenny cycle lanes when he was in the town a few months' ago. A cycle route through Donegal will also be developed and people will be actively encouraged to get out of their cars and on their feet or bicycles.

I listened to an interesting debate on Radio Ulster while I was coming from home. Bus corridors are being introduced in Belfast and people are being encouraged to go around the city rather than through it. The public reaction was that everyone wanted to drive their cars into the city. A transport specialist from Galway said he passed 40 cars in the morning, every one of which contained one person. We have gone past that and have embraced the cycle and bus lanes in this country. We understand the benefits of them. People can develop the mindset that they must start walking and cycling. The cycle scheme in Dublin has been fantastically successful. A former Lord Mayor, Councillor Andrew Montague, pushed for that at the time.

At the time he did not realise how successful it would be and I understand that an extra couple of thousand bicycles will be ordered for Dublin. We should encourage large urban areas, such as Letterkenny, Sligo and other towns, to provide a similar scheme on a smaller basis. When tourists see that bicycles are available they do not want to see the town on foot or by car; they want to cycle out to see the outlying area. Smarter travel is important from a health and a tourist point of view. Everyone can walk and jog. Jogging is like sex - one does not have to be good at it to enjoy it. Everyone can jog at some pace.