It’s five years now since the great Covid influx of non-locals to our local canal walk, and you might still happen upon the occasional conversation about visitor resistance to a friendly nod. But conversations these days are more likely to be about the cyclists who regularly mistake the narrow towpath for a speedway.
Let’s just agree at the outset that cycling can be challenging and deadly. Recently a woman cycling across the narrow old canal bridge found herself competing with an oncoming driver who reckoned he could squeeze the van past her on the crest, which left her clinging to the stone wall with bike and bloodied knees. When he finally relented and reversed she accepted his apology with remarkable grace.
She cycles that same canal stretch every weekend at a leisurely pace, gathering the head space to face another week – and hers is probably the kind of gentle image that pops into mind when people think of bikes and picturesque towpaths. The problem is that she’s a rare one. More often it’s groups of three or more with all the competitive thrusting of lads chasing Sam Bennett. On a towpath. The problem, to be clear, is not the cycling but the aggressive speed and silence of the cyclists. Walkers don’t hear them coming until they’re bearing down on them. From there on, rather than communing with the swans and the herons, the walkers are on red alert for the next incursion. That fear is entirely rational on a towpath, an urban footpath or a country road.
Serious collisions between cyclists and pedestrians are not as rare as some like to think. A 10-year RSA study of seriously injured pedestrians showed that while 2,022 were hit by a car or light-goods vehicle, 125 had landed in hospital as a result of a collision with a cyclist. That’s one serious collision a month. Among those with the most severe – possibly life-changing – injuries, 46 had been hit by a pedal bike. That compared with 24 seriously injured by a motorbike or 56 by a HGV or bus.
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There are regulations around cycling. In 2023, 43 cyclists were issued with a fixed-penalty notice for breaking a red light. Eighteen were prosecuted for riding a bike without due care and attention. Other offences include cycling into a pedestrianised street or area, or on a footpath or cycling without reasonable consideration. The 1963 Road Traffic Regulations also stipulate that all bicycles used in a public place must be fitted with a bell (and regularly dinged presumably).
It is standard practice at this stage to say “But not all cyclists ...” But there is a culture problem, according to none other than the patron saint of cyclists, Eamon Ryan. Asked at a Dodder greenway meeting last year how he was going to make cyclists using such facilities obey the law, the then minister for transport talked about widening cycling and walking paths (which is not always possible) but also pointed the finger at “cycling culture”. A local who complained that walking was being made dangerous by cyclists who “really don’t care about pedestrians” was right, said the Minister. “I think it’s also very much incumbent on the cycling community to create a culture and an attitude.” He also wanted it properly enforced.
An interesting fact to emerge from all this is how stubbornly male and sadly small cycling remains. An Injuries Resolution Board’s report on 329 crash claims affecting cyclists in 2023 showed that 77 per cent of the cyclists were male, with an average age of 42. This suggests that middle-aged male cyclists are particularly vulnerable to injury or that fewer women are cycling and are less inclined to take risks.
But more than eight in 10 respondents said they never or rarely cycled, according to a recent Ireland Thinks poll for Red Click insurers, which is both surprising and sad. Here again the gender disparity kicks in: two-thirds of women blamed the danger of the roads but only half the men. Other deterrents were traffic volume, dangerous driving, lack of confidence, lack of segregated cycle lanes, weather, poor street lighting and near-misses. No one seemed to mention other cyclists.
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It may also be that Irish people generally have yet to settle into the common courtesies and manners around the use of public space. And that the authorities have yet to meet them in many cases with adequate seating, public toilets, bins and decent lighting. But some cyclists project the righteous sense that only they can fully appreciate – and suffer for – a society that encourages outdoor activity, active commuting, clean air and green transport.
The Cork Cycling Campaign’s nuanced tone on etiquette could be a starting point on the path to reconciliation. It believes that cyclists should behave as “guests” when “using the footpath for short stretches is inevitable”, but that children, for example, should be permitted to cycle on footpaths “after instruction on how to do so safely”. Cyclists should pass pedestrians slowly and with great care, they say, and should ring the bell “(politely) to warn pedestrians of your approach – no one likes to be startled”. If some of that sounds radical, brace for this one: “Be prepared to stop and yield the right of way to pedestrians if necessary.”
A final one might be a reminder that just as country roads are not built for high motoring speeds, towpaths and most greenways are not built for high cycling speeds. People might routinely break the rules or guidance on all of them but that’s hardly the safe, conciliatory or righteous answer for anyone.
