Exploring Public Opposition to Active Travel Planning in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown: Synthesis Report

Abstract

Ireland needs to halve its transport sector emissions by 2030 to meet international decarbonisation targets (Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications, 2022). In light of nearly three- quarters of journeys in Ireland being undertaken via private car (Central Statistics Office, 2020), modal shift from private car use to active travel and public transport is one of the major planned strategies for reaching this goal (Department of Transport, 2022). In order to facilitate mass modal shift, goals to incorporate changes to the built environment that favour active travel users have been incorporated into Irish policies. These goals include the development of dedicated cycling and walking infrastructural networks (Department of Transport, 2022). In a recent report by the OECD (2022) that critically evaluated the Irish transport system and national policies to decarbonise the transport sector, the authors advocated for policies with transformative potential. In particular, they argued for the importance of not only active travel spatial provision but more ambitious road space reallocation that favours active travel modes and public transport. This transformative orientation is reflected in the revised Climate Action Plan (Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications, 2022), in which the ‘Shift’ strategy is argued to involve interventions that reduce the accessibility provided by driving relative to active travel and public transport. Road space reallocation along with broader car ‘demand management’ measures are discussed as measures that can help to realise this shift. On the basis of this wider policy context and existing objectives in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown to increase modal shift from the private car to active travel modes (Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council, 2010; Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council, 2022), research was undertaken to explore how a dominant car system is politically sustained in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown. In particular, a Critical Discourse Analysis of 150 public consultation submissions opposing redistributive active travel measures proposed in the major ‘Active School Travel’ scheme was implemented (Dún Laoghaire- Rathdown County Council, 2020c). Importantly, with this scheme, the council proposed redistributive – as opposed to additive – active travel measures, such as segregated cycle infrastructures to replace mixed-traffic road spaces, lowered speed limits, and car access restrictions (Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council, 2020). Some of these proposed measures garnered considerable opposition through the medium of public consultation (Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council and Ramboll, 2020), but also within the county council chamber and through collective protest (O’Sullivan, 2021). This resembles wider opposition to redistributive cycleways in both Dublin (Halpin, 2021) and Galway (Burke, 2022). On this basis, our study was carried out with two objectives in mind: i) to explore how redistributive active travel measures are publicly perceived and socially constructed, and ii) to inform how new narratives may be formed through understanding the discourses that might continually ‘lock- in’ (Urry, 2004) mobility practices and transport planning practices that favour private car use. This interest in generating new narratives of transport planning and mobility is in keeping with both the recommendations of the OECD (2022) report and the revised Climate Action Plan (Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications, 2022)