As a major conference on urban cycling opens in Dublin, bad planning and poor law enforcement remain the great dangers for cyclists, writes David Maher.
Dublin's hosting of Velo-City 2005, offers a welcome opportunity to promote cycling as an important transport mode. The bicycle is the most efficient form of transport ever invented - it is fast, convenient, non-polluting and an effective solution to both congestion and obesity.
Yet cycling numbers continue to decline, so where did it all go wrong? The key failures have been in planning, road design standards, enforcement and the failure to tackle the danger posed by Heavy Good Vehicles (HGVs).
Planning: Our recent economic boom has been seen by the authorities as an excellent opportunity to increase car dependency. All the key elements are there - ensuring that 80 per cent of transport spending goes on roads (mainly motorways), allowing ribbon development on relief roads, the creation of sprawling car-dependent suburbs and locating industry and shopping centres on green fields sites. This "Californication" of our towns and cities has all but eliminated cycling and walking from our new suburbs.
Road Design Standards: The National Roads Authority (NRA) seems to view the existence of any form of transport other than the car as some type of unsubstantiated rumour. Of course a "car only" approach to road planning makes things so much simpler. Thus huge multi-lane roundabouts and motorway-style slip roads become the perfect design solution for every occasion. The NRA's legal obligation to "consider the needs of all roads users" is little more than a sad joke.
Nowhere has the NRA's approach to road design been so perfected as when designing interchanges of radial roads crossing the M50. Travelling on the N4 from Lucan, one is faced with a series of slip roads and huge multi-lane roundabouts. In effect the N4 is treated as a motorway, with no need to consider the needs of cyclists and pedestrians. When cyclists recently raised these safety issues, the NRA retort was "no one is forcing you to cycle that route".
Cycle tracks are of little use unless the most hostile elements of the road network, such as high-speed roundabouts and slip lanes, are completely redesigned to make them cycle-friendly.
Enforcement: In terms of enforcement Ireland compares very badly to other countries. In Sweden a motorist can expect to pass a speed check on one in every six trips made, while in Ireland the figure is 4,000:1. A motorist can expect to be breathalysed every 140 years compared to once every two years in Victoria, Australia. For the gardaí, traffic law enforcement seems to be bottom of their priorities. The number of speeding tickets issued annually has dropped by 80 per cent since the introduction of penalty points.
Daily, gardaí turn a blind eye to endemic levels of illegal parking on footpaths, cycle lanes and pedestrian crossings. Since the introduction of penalty points five times as many people have won the National Lottery than have been disqualified for exceeding the 12 point limit. Meanwhile, pedestrians and cyclists are still excluded from the board of the National Safety Council.
Heavy Goods Vehicles: Of the 21 cyclists killed in Dublin over the past seven years, 16 (78 per cent) were killed by HGVs. Put simply HGVs and cities don't mix. While the opening of the port tunnel will alleviate the problem, nothing has been done in the interim to remove the danger posed by HGVs - no restriction on the time they can enter the city, no banning of super HGVs, no mandatory fitting of additional mirrors. What is needed is a national policy to ban HGVs from city centres and residential areas, and prevent HGVs "rat-running" through towns to avoid motorway tolls.
Despite all the problems, 25,000 people still cycle to work in Dublin each day. Bicycle parking is now provided at many train stations, bus stops and city centre locations. High quality on-road cycle tracks, such as those in Ranelagh or along the Grand Canal, show that good facilities can be successful in promoting cycling.
What is needed is a recognition that public roads are for all road users, and that cyclists are an integral part of urban traffic. We need appropriate road design, effective enforcement, integration of cycling and public transport, widespread use of 30kph limits, restrictions on heavy vehicles and congestion charging within the canal ring.
David Maher is PRO of the Dublin Cycling Campaign (www.connect.ie/dcc); Velo-City 2005 is a conference for cyclists, planners, engineers, transport experts and politicians being held in Dublin from today until Friday