There's a huge campaign on to introduce a 1.5 metre safe passing law, and indeed culture, in Ireland. But not everyone is in favour.
Irish 1.5 metre safe-pass cyclist law "unenforceable"
The mooted 1.5 metre safe-passing distance for cyclists will be unenforceable and is a waste of money, the Irish Road Haulage Association has said.
And it believes the promised legislation should be abandoned and new laws to make helmets compulsory should be introduced.
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“There is a huge influx in the cycling regime and I understand that. It’s going to be the future because we have such carbon issues,” hauliers’ association president Verona Murphy has said.
“But, equally, we have cyclists who are very, very irresponsible. They should not be tarred; everybody with the same brush. But we have such irresponsibility across the spectrum of road users.”
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She added while the promised close-pass legislation was commendable, it simply would not work.
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“The proposed new cycling Bill doesn’t work, it won’t work, and I commend Minister (Ciaran) Cannon for even trying to bring it in as a Bill,” she said.
“But I don’t think in legislation it will work because who at the very incident is going to measure 1.5 metres on a country road when an incident has occurred.
“So I think we need to stop wasting time and money on something that’s not enforceable. We have lots of legislation that’s there; it’s not implemented and it’s not enforced.
“The trouble is that if you hit anything at that speed you are going to do damage, from a truck’s perspective.
“A cyclist that hits, at 10 miles per hour; if he hits his head in the wrong place the consequences can be fatal.
“I’m not sure that we can guard against it. But what we have to do is limit the risk where possible. And I think that means the mandatory use of helmets.”
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