Sir, – I fully agree with Liam O'Grady (Letters, August 27th). I have seen cycling on footpaths become more common and I too would like to see a solution.
It may be radical, but I propose building and maintaining more dedicated cycling infrastructure.
As a fellow cyclist, I’m sure Mr O’Grady has noticed the appalling condition of many existing cycle lanes. In far too many cases, cycle lanes are strewn with litter and broken glass. Often, they are used as car parking spaces with little to no Garda enforcement, leaving cyclists no choice but to dangerously manoeuvre into traffic or onto a footpath. They are often so poorly surfaced as to be almost dangerous to use, or simply defeat their own purpose by randomly terminating at a road or footpath.
Cyclists in most cases are left in a Catch-22 to choose between dangerous roads, illegally using the footpath, or gambling on a cycle lane that they might get a few hundred yards out of (if even that) before meeting a parked car or being dumped back into traffic anyway. This is a situation that pleases neither cyclists, pedestrians, nor drivers and yet every suggestion of cycling infrastructure is met with talk of the ruination of entire towns – typically from a vocal minority whose objections are indulged time after time. Until the fear-mongering about building and maintaining extensive, high-quality, dedicated cycling infrastructure is stopped there will be no solution to cyclists being where they ought not to be “for good”, as myself, Mr O’Grady, and many other cyclists, pedestrians and drivers would like to see. – Yours, etc,
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AARON CASSIDY,
Chapelizod,
Dublin 20.