Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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788. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the current programmes which are directly funded by his Department and which provide in whole or in part cycle infrastructure or cycle promotion; if he will quantify funding provision for same in 2017; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [11603/17]

Shane Ross (Dublin Rathdown, Independent)
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€9.3m has been allocated for 2017 for Smarter Travel initiatives.  Over recent yearsmy Department has funded a number of behavioural change programmes under Smarter Travel including the Green Schools programme, Bike Week and the Smarter Travel Workplaces and Smarter Travel Campuses programmes.  Funding of these behavioural change programmes will continue in 2017 and this year the Department will also fund the roll-out of the new national cycle training standard - Cycle Right.

My Department has also funded a number of infrastructural programmes under Smarter Travel including the National Cycle Network, Smarter Travel Towns and Active Travel areas programmes. These infrastructural programmes were multi-annual funding programmes that ran until the end 2016.  Some grants awarded under these programmes were not fully drawn down by end 2016 so there is some carry-over of funding for those projects in 2017.

My Department will now undertake an evaluation of the Smarter Travel infrastructural programmes to establish what worked and what did not work in the Smarter Travel Area, Active Travel Towns and National Cycle Network programmes.  The knowledge gained from this review will determine the best way of using the remaining funding available for Smarter Travel under the remaining period of the Capital Plan.  My Department is also developing a new Greenways Strategy to inform future investment in greenways.