Google, Vodafone, Intercom, DCU join call for network of segregated cycle routes in Dublin

Google, Vodafone, Intercom and Dublin City University are among the nearly 100 companies who have joined CyclingWorks Dublin to call for the Greater Dublin Area Cycle Network to be built “without delay”.

Others employers of different sizes who have signed up in recent months include the Expedia Group of travel websites, Thompson Insurers, ERM consultants, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, the Stella cinema in Rathmines, and trade unions Forsa and Siptu.

On Twitter this morning, CyclingWorks Dublin said: “The call for cycling infrastructure has more familiar names, now representing 160,000 employees and students, 90+ employers and places of education, and 280,000 government employees and workers from other sectors covered by their trade unions.”

The National Transport Authority (NTA) plan for the Dublin cycle network was launched in 2014 but cycling advocates have complained that that very few continuous, connection kilometres have been built since then. After years of planning, Dublin still does not have a single cycle route from suburbs into the city centre which is continuously segregated from heavy traffic.

When it was launched, then NTA chief executive Gerry Murphy said: “It is our vision to have as many people cycling into the city every morning in 2021 as currently take the bus. This is hugely ambitious but I believe it can be done.”

Cycling campaigners’ disquiet with the NTA has grown in the last year — an issue that has not been helped by low-quality cycling proposals in the infrastructure element of BusConnects and the authority continuing to delay the publication of a preferred route for the Liffey Cycle Route.

Sources had previously told this website that Minister for Transport Shane Ross told them privately that he does not get many requests for cycle routes to be funded, but since CyclingWorks Dublin was set up it is understood that some senior transport officials have been annoyed at the pressure from larger companies to build the cycle network.

A template letter for the companies, designed to send to the Minister for Transport, states: “The kerb protected cycle lanes through Dublin City will help us attract and retain the employees our business needs to continue to thrive. They will also make Dublin a more attractive city in which to build and run our business. The planned cycling network is, on balance,  great for our business and for Dublin. Please make sure these plans are delivered, without delay.”

MORE: cyclingworks.org


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