Hello Reader,
What is IrishCycle.com? At its core, IrishCycle.com is independent journalism covering the resurgence of cycling in Ireland. It’s basically an online newspaper covering news and analyses of cycling and related issues. There are others other there already focused on cycling as a sporting activity, so, IrishCycle.com covers mainly cycling as a means of transport and greenways.
When most media outlets can only scratch the surface on cycling and related issues, IrishCycle.com’s goal is to use a journalistic backing to give the issues the space and detail needed.
This website is often the first with the news on cycling-related law changes, cycle route projects, bicycle sharing, road safety issues, bicycle parking and security, and where different levels of government have failed to implement their own policy. Our analysis looks at the detail of what has gone wrong or what can be done to stop repeating failures. But as well as highlighting what’s wrong, IrishCycle.com also strives to highlight good design and examples of progress.
IrishCycle.com is edited by me, Cian Ginty. I’ve had freelance work published in nearly every national newspaper in the Republic of Ireland as well as a few magazines and a number of national and international online publications. My training is also in journalism, with a BA (Hons) in Journalism from Dublin City University, and HDip in Print Journalism from Ballyfermot College of Further Education (BCFE).
A quick history: The website started in 2009 under the name Cycling in Dublin, before it was renamed to reflect a national focus. Under the ‘Cycling in Dublin’ name, two free newspapers were published for National Bike Week in 2012 and 2013. In November 2021, IrishCycle.com took the full plunge into trying the reader-funded model and the adventure is ongoing.
What does reader-funded mean? With the fluxation in advertising and the disruption of the internet, the funding of journalism is changing. There are examples, big and small, which show that the reader-funded or listener-funding model can work to support journalism — from the Dublin Inquirer and The Guardian to many podcasts. IrishCycle.com follows the open model, which means there’s no paywall at all.
Subscribers are needed to give our journalism a dependable base of support, but these subscribers are readers who want the website to remain open.
In 2022, its first full year of reader-funded journalism, IrishCycle.com had well over half a million views, and just under 380,000 readers in the year or an average of over 31,000 readers per month. We know our readers include people who cycle and those who don’t, including politicians, officials and campaigners.
But we know only a small percentage of readers will see the value of keeping this website open enough to subscribe, that’s the reality of the open reader-funded model.
Thank you for reading,
Cian Ginty
Editor, IrishCycle.com