What a great response from Irish Cycling Campaign members countrywide in Ensuring Ireland’s Bike Riders are Lit Up This Winter!
Over the past winter months Irish Cycling campaign members from Malin to Mizen worked hard to distribute NTA supplied Bike Lights, and ensure that your bike, and other cyclists are lit up and legally compliant these winter nights. It’s been a great chance to meet fellow Campaign members and encourage voters before the upcoming election. And also an opportunity to encourage people to support and join the Irish Cycling Campaign.
The Bike Lights were distributed in Sligo, Cork, Limerick, Drogheda, Navan and in Dublin Local Authorities. Overall we distributed nearly 3000 sets of bike lights, ensuring many cyclists were legally compliant in being lit up this Winter.
Check out some of the images below from our bike lights handouts, and maybe next year you will join us in ensuring more cyclists are Lit Up? Its a great way to meet fellow campaigners/activists, have a bit of craic, and also to ensure that more cyclists are legally compliant on these winter nights.
A BIG thanks for the bike lights’ supply from the NTA and the RSA, and for the support of Cyclone Couriers in distributing the lights countrywide!
ICC Submissions Coordinator Colm gives us the low-down.
Above: Lifford/ Strabane planning image
You might not be aware that we in the Irish Cycling Campaign keep an eagle eye on public consultations exhibited on Active Travel issues, particularly from Local Authorities/Councils. This past year 2024 we have made over 100 submissions across the country in all 4 provinces on schemes ranging from major Pathfinder projects, to smaller active travel improvements, to school streets, greenways, and also Speed Limit proposals. We have also submitted on different policy matters to the Department of Transport, Department of Education and the NTA and TII! Our local groups around the country have also made their own submissions on a variety of schemes. You can check out all our nationally listed proposed schemes and our submissions to them on this LINK.
So, which counties appear to be active and which are not? It’s certainly easier to name those 8 counties which did not appear to have any active travel consultations that we were made aware of! These were counties, Waterford, Clare, Offaly, Laois, Wicklow, Leitrim, Monaghan & Cavan! This is not to say that no works were carried out in these counties to advance active travel in 2024, but on the surface it does appear that they were relatively inactive, despite being funded substantially through the NTA, as can be seen in this LINK. The level of funding granted from the NTA to these 8 counties in 2024 varied from a whopping €25 million for Waterford, down to the lowest €1.9 million for Leitrim! Though, it is also necessary to state that many projects can be advancing behind the scenes in terms of design development, and others are actually at construction stage. The NTA project development process is a rigorous and often elongated process – see image below.
Above: NTA Project Development Process
How did Your County do? It is worth checking out this LINK to see what your county was allocated? Did they do what they said they would do? How would you rate your county’s performance?
Range and Quality of Schemes The range of schemes going out through public consultation has varied, ranging from multi million Euro Pathfinder schemes, to minor school and village improvements. The quality of the proposed designs can also vary widely, and in some cases we in ICC were very critical of proposed designs, even going as far as to propose that some schemes be revisited entirely! Thankfully these poorly designed schemes were in the minority, and the vast majority of proposed schemes have improved in terms of design quality, which is mainly down to the development of the 2023 Cycle Design Manual, and the subsequent widespread training, and trips abroad to view quality designs, provided to local authority personnel.
Above: Cycle Design Manual Cover Image
I would encourage any reader interested in the subject, to dip into our 2024 list of consultation projects, and get a feel for the variety, quality, and size of projects and ICC’s responses to them. Overall we have tried to commend what we consider as good design, and be succinct in any criticisms, in line with the recommendations of the Cycle Design Manual.
Why Not Help Us Out? We are always looking for members who would like to help out in this area of tracking and reviewing public consultations on Active Travel. If you are interested to help out, even from time to time, or in a particular area, why not email us at [email protected]. We would be more than happy to hear from you!
2024 was another non-stop year for the Irish Cycling Campaign (ICC). Throughout the year we worked on behalf of our members, those currently cycling and those who would love to cycle if traffic conditions were more inviting.
Early in 2025, we’ll do a more formal reflection on our advocacy experiences of 2024, but at this point we want to say a sincere thanks to everyone in ICC who contributed to our work. Not a day passed without our volunteers engaging in a myriad of ways so as to advance our cause. Much of this happened ‘behind the scenes’ with volunteers examining public consultations documents and drafting considered responses, preparing for and attending meetings, looking after our various membership and communications systems, and nurturing relationships with many other organisations at home and internationally; and with further work happening in the public domain and within the traditional and social media spheres.
Following our recent AGM, we are delighted to have a refreshed Executive Committee in place, with three new members on board – Caoimhe Clarke, Anne Nospickel and Síle Ginnane – and our previous Chair Colm Ryder returning to the EC. We also thanked Dave Anderson for his enormous contributions after he stepped down following 3-4 years on the EC.
2025 will be another crucial year for cycling advocacy, as a new Programme for Government is negotiated and published, and a new cabinet appointed. We look forward to seeing a new Minister for Transport further developing the momentum behind the design and construction of high quality cycling networks in each of the 31 Local Authorities countrywide. ICC is also endorsing the calls of An Taisce for the new government parties to comply with the Irish Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act that was passed in 2021 – they need to commit to fixing the Sectoral Emissions Ceilings so they align with the carbon budgets within the first 100 days of taking office. The rationale for this important ask is laid out in this excellent An Taisce and DCU explainer.
To close, we’d like to plant the idea in our members’ minds to consider getting more involved in 2025 – that can happen through ICC’s Local Groups (organised at a County or sometimes a town level), our Action Groups or our Thematically organised groups. Or, it might simply mean turning up for an ICC organised event with a friend. Whatever way you become involved, we will look to ensure that it’s a sociable and satisfying experience, and all the more so as we see new high quality cycling schemes opening up in 2025.
We wish you all a restful festive break.
Neasa Bheilbigh Chair of Irish Cycling Campaign’s Executive Committee Wednesday 18 December 2024
Irish Cycling Campaign unveils the Strong, Mediocre and Weak Parties in Active Travel as per the Manifestos for General Election 2024
PRESS RELEASE – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – MON 25 NOV 2024
In the lead up to Friday’s election, Irish Cycling Campaign has evaluated the manifestos of the main political parties against their priorities for cycling. The Campaign is calling for increased investment in cycling, walking and public transport to accelerate the shift to sustainable transport and to help fulfill our climate responsibilities.
As shown in our analysis below, parties can be divided into three groups:
Those receiving good grades – Green Party, Labour, Social Democrats – were clear in their prioritisation of active & sustainable transport and had detailed targets for funding and resources to support this.
In the middle were Sinn Féin and PBP who had many positive policies but lacked policy specifics.
Those with a weaker commitment – Fianna Fáil & Fine Gael – showed a poorer commitment to prioritise active and sustainable transport and had few specific targets.
The Campaign notes that there has been significant progress over the last five years, but the main political parties are now showing a worrying lack of commitment to continued investment. The Campaign says that much more remains to be done to connect the completed individual projects so as to create connected and safer networks countrywide.
Examples of new cycle routes in Dublin include Sandycove to Booterstown, North Strand to Clontarf, Royal Canal greenway and Dodder Greenway. Transformative projects in other regional cities, such as Waterford’s new pedestrian and cycle bridge and Limerick’s East-West links via Childers Road, show how arterial routes are delivering modal shift and transport decarbonisation.
The Campaign notes that many more people want to make the switch to active travel modes, but are dissuaded by the lack of safe, segregated cycle routes. For example, the Dublin Metropolitan Region Walking and Cycling Index [1] shows that up to 50% of adults want to switch to cycling, if the cycling network was made safer, while currently only 11% of adults cycle daily. For school kids, between 1991 and 2016 walking and cycling to school in Dublin fell from 64% to 46%, while the percentage being driven to school more than doubled, increasing from 17% to 41%. The #1 reason for not cycling is fear of mixing with general traffic, hence the need for high quality segregated routes.
Irish Cycling Campaign is calling on the next government to:
Increase Investment in Sustainable / Public Transport to the tune of – 20% of transport capital budget allocated for walking+cycling – 5:1 ratio of spend of new public transport to new roads
Rapidly deliver High Quality Cycling Infrastructure
Prioritise Safe Routes to School
Enhance Cyclists Safety
Broaden access to bikes
Expand Bike Parking and bike sharing schemes
Legislate to enable best practice cycle infrastructure designs
Address motor vehicle overuse and oversize.
Results, Analysis and Commentary The results are presented here in tabular and graphic forms.
Neasa Bheilbigh, Chairperson of Irish Cycling Campaign, said “While cycling advocacy in Ireland is 40 years old, it is in the past few years where we have made real progress in re-building a cycling culture in Ireland. The government funding over the past 4.5 years has been instrumental to that progress. That funding needs to continue and grow, to develop segregated cycle ways, greenways and safe routes to school to allow this generation and the next to feel safe enough to choose to use the bike for their daily activities. We need to adapt our private car use to achieve the critical goals of an improved and safer public realm, lower emissions and more efficient movement of people around our towns, cities and rural areas“.
Research from the National Transport Authority shows that 11% of adults cycle daily in Dublin but 46% would like to cycle or cycle more if they felt safer [2]. Irish Cycling Campaign’s Damien Ó Tuama says that we know from research and from the cycle traffic on the Grand Canal, Dun Laoghaire & Seapoint and the newly opened North Strand cycle tracks that segregated routes increases the number of cyclists and enables people of all ages and abilities to cycle.”
Only 1 in 4 adults and 1 in 10 teenagers who cycle in Dublin are female. Mairead Forsythe from the Campaign says that “the figures show a major gender gap in cycling and while the barriers to more women and girls cycling are varied, the #1 barrier is fear of mixing with motor traffic, hence the need for investment in segregated routes and traffic calming.”
From a healthcare perspective, a transport system that builds in exercise, whether that is a short walk at either end of a bus journey or a cycle to work or school, to a healthcare appointment or to a sporting event, may be the easiest way of achieving the increased physical activity that our health professionals advise. Behavioural and “nudge” initiatives will only have a limited effect without the infrastructure alongside it.
Therefore, Irish Cycling Campaign calls on all parties to accelerate the move to sustainable and active travel, and show international leadership in this domain.
We look forward to continuing to work with representatives from all parties during the next government term.
Notes and References:
Irish Cycling Campaign is the national cycling advocacy body for Ireland. Its local groups include those in cities, towns, villages and rural areas. ICC’s Local Groups have been campaigning since the 1990s to bring everyday cycling into the centre of transport policy and practice. ICC is the member for Ireland of the European Cyclists’ Federation. See www.irishcyclingcampaign.ie
Irish Cycling Campaign Condemns RSA’s “Lose Your Licence, Lose Your Independence” Campaign for Insensitive Messaging and Misguided Focus
The Irish Cycling Campaign today voiced its deep concerns over the Road Safety Authority of Ireland’s (RSA) recent “Lose Your Licence, Lose Your Independence” campaign. The campaign, which aims to highlight the consequences of dangerous driving, has been criticised for its inadequate educational content, ableist language, and its trivialization of the very serious risks posed by young, reckless drivers.
The “Lose Your Licence, Lose Your Independence” campaign is part of a troubling pattern of ineffective and misguided road safety initiatives by the RSA in recent years. This latest campaign, like several before it, fails to adequately educate the public, instead focusing on the personal inconvenience of losing a licence rather than addressing the root causes of dangerous driving and its impact on all road users.
“This campaign is emblematic of the RSA’s persistent failure to create effective road safety education,” said Neasa Bheilbigh, Chairperson of the Irish Cycling Campaign. “For too long, many of the campaigns the RSA has produced either miss the mark or are outright insensitive, and this latest effort is no different. It trivialises the serious behaviours that lead to licence disqualification and reinforces harmful stereotypes about independence.”
The Irish Cycling Campaign also criticised the RSA’s use of ableist language, which suggests that individuals who do not have a driving licence are less independent or capable, a perspective that is out of touch with the realities of many people who do not drive, whether by choice, necessity or disability. This messaging is not only insensitive but also distracts from the more pressing issue of ensuring the safety of all road users. The Irish Cycling Campaign fully supports the criticism of this ad campaign from Irish disability groups and advocates.
“Following the recent review we are on the cusp of significant reform within the RSA, and this is a moment for real change,” ICC Chairperson Neasa Bheilbigh continued. “The RSA must undergo a complete refresh of its leadership and communications strategy to ensure that future campaigns are not only effective but also inclusive and respectful of all members of society. We need road safety campaigns that focus on education, accountability, road danger reduction, and the protection of vulnerable road users, not ones that centre on the inconvenience to dangerous drivers.”
The Irish Cycling Campaign calls for the imminent reform of the RSA to include a comprehensive review and overhaul of its approach to public communications. As the RSA prepares for a renewed mandate, there is an urgent need for fresh leadership that prioritises the health, safety and well-being of all road users, particularly those most at risk, such as cyclists and pedestrians.
“This is a pivotal moment for the RSA and road safety in Ireland,” concluded ICC Chair Neasa Bheilbigh. “With the right leadership and a renewed commitment to effective, inclusive communication, informed by the professional expertise currently lacking, the RSA has the potential to transform into a body that truly champions road safety for everyone.”
The Irish Cycling Campaign advocates for better cycling conditions and infrastructure across the island of Ireland, representing thousands of members and over 30 local advocacy groups. We are a registered charity (RCN 20102029). The Irish Cycling Campaign is the Irish member of the European Cyclists’ Federation (ECF).
Kilkenny, Ireland – a city renowned for its medieval charm and its burgeoning cycling community. Cycle Kilkenny, a group dedicated to promoting everyday cycling in the city, are now part of the Irish Cycling Campaign. Volunteer Dave Anderson from the Irish Cycling Campaign recently visited Kilkenny to meet the group, to share experiences organising local groups.
We had a super turnout of supporters of cycling from the Dáil, Seanad and beyond at the annual Oireachtas spin.
It’s almost become a tradition now for Oireachtas members to ride around Dublin to celebrate Bike Week and the joys of cycling.
It’s a great way for us to catch up with Oireachtas members who appreciate how good cycling is for mental and physical health, how it offers real economic opportunities, and how it can help restore local and global environments.
(L to R) Senators Maria Sherlock and Gerard Horken, cycle organiser Ivana Bacik TD (Mike McKillen)
Ivana Bacik TD (Lab), Lynn Boylan TD (SF), Richard Bruton TD (FG), Patrick Costello (GP), Senator Roisin Garvey (GP), Senator Gerard Horken (FF), Senator Alice-Mary Higgins (Ind), Pauline O’Reilly TD (GP), Darren O’Rourke (SF) Senator Marie Sherlock (Lab), were members who made time to bike and chat.
We were very grateful to Ivana and staff for gathering the All-Party group and organising the event, in cooperation with our hard-working Irish Cycling Campaign Vice-chair, Dave Tobin. Also a shout-out to Dublin Cycling Campaign members who came along.
‘Great to see Bike Week uniting the likes of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, the Greens, Labour, Sinn Féin and others, and for once no-one competing for first place!’
Cyclists are at their most vulnerable at junctions — the location of one in four of all cycling fatalities. Can changes to traffic movements help make cycling safer?
In 2011 the Dublin Cycling Campaign highlighted what it considered to be the most dangerous junctions in Dublin. These were places where cyclists were left unprotected from vehicles and particularly vulnerable to collision with cars, buses or lorries …
In this article, we look back on 2023 through the frame of our 2021-26 Strategy (with our six strategic aims shown below) and consider how much progress we have made. In particular, we highlight where Irish Cycling Campaign / our Local Groups are making a real impact on the mobility culture of Ireland. Note, however, that this article only scrapes the surface of all of the incredible work conducted by our network of volunteers for which we are very grateful.
ICC’s overarching aims as per our current strategy, are:
Develop a vibrant and resilient all-island cycling advocacy community
Influence the national conversation on mobility and quality of life
Seek to ensure public policy embraces cycling
Advocate for more effective institutions and new legislation
Seek to ensure there is ample funding spent on cycling
Seek to secure high quality routes and infrastructure
We frame our 2023 highlighted achievements around these:
Community Underpinning effective advocacy work is having a resilient organisation, and we put significant work into this in 2023.
National Conversation Throughout 2023, Irish Cycling Campaign was the ‘go-to’ NGO for the media for insights on cycling policy. We also helped to shape the conversation on wider (public) transport topics, and on links between public health outcomes and transport investment types. A summary of our 2023 media contributions can be read here while our contributions in the media in 2024 to date can be read here. Without these contributions, media discourses would be dominated by less informed and more car-centric perspectives. Our contributions soften the ground for a greater public acceptance for active travel investments.
Public Policy Throughout 2023, we advocated to the Departments of: Transport; Environment, Climate & Communications; Health; and Finance for cycling as a climate-friendly, healthy, congestion-free transport mode.
Institutions and Legislation One of the most difficult domains ICC operates in is where we seek to change the culture of driving, and this brings us into close contact with the National Transport Authority (NTA), the Gardaí and the Road Safety Authority in particular.
Amongst the topics raised with An Garda Síochána were collision reporting, the portal for video evidence, and wider enforcement issues through our meetings with the A/Commissioner for Community & Roads Policing, Paula Hilman, and her team. We are now building on these conversations so as to put a greater emphasis on reducing road danger from driver behaviour, vehicle speeds, and ever increasing vehicle sizes.
The Irish Cycling Campaign’s initiative to prohibit or reduce fossil fuel advertising has moved forward a significant step with today’s Earth Day promotion by Paul Murphy TD of his Bill.
Deputy Murphy’s Bill was initially published last month. It seeks to prohibit the advertising of any fossil fuels, and any land vehicle or aircraft using fossil fuel. The way our transport system is skewed towards the use of cars, the dominance of our roads by car use, and the huge health detriments of our sedentary lifestyle and chronic car dependence are all worsened by advertising.
To quote Deputy Murphy, ‘Once you start to notice it, it is striking just how much car advertising there is: how many advertisements you see on TV are for cars; how many billboards are for car advertisements; and how much sponsorship of popular TV programmes, such as “The Late Late Show”, is from car manufacturers. There is evidence this has a direct link to the lack of media coverage of climate change, a topic, for example, that “The Late Late Show” has barely covered in all its years of showcasing shiny new cars. Last year in Ireland the number of new fossil-fuelled cars increased by 10% to more than 99,000’.
So some restriction on the ability of the motor industry to spend tens of millions in the Irish market would bring huge benefits to society. Action is long overdue.
The Bill’s already passed the first stage in the Oireachtas and received significant news coverage, such as the following:
Attending the press release at Buswells Hotel today was (centre of photograph) the Campaign’s Board Member Mary Sinnott, who worked to bring the issue to the attention of Deputy Murphy and team, filmmaker and activist Peadar King and Dr. Seán Owens, whose campaigning work focusses on the devastating effects of climate change on public health. Deputy Bríd Smith is on the far left, beside Deputy Murphy.
We understand that Sinn Féin also have a Bill, promoted by Senator Lynn Boylan aimed at restricting fossil fuel lobbying and (as an apolitical advocacy group) the Campaign will be glad to work with any body seeking to improve our transport choices, improve road safety, reduce air and noise pollution, and of course to limit climate change.
Reflecting on the Bill, Mary told the press conference,
‘Irish road transportation contributes 94% of transport-related greenhouse gases.Restricting fossil fuel product advertising will rebalance consumer choice towards sustainable modes of transport. It will reflect our national commitment to reduce our CO2 emissions by 2030, and to phase them out by 2050. Those committments we are already behind on.’
Mary quoted the poem “Begin” by Brendan Kenneally:
Though we live in a world that dreams of ending that always seems about to give in something that will not acknowledge conclusion insists that we forever begin
