Greenways and nature-based solutions

Waterford Dungarvan Greenway

In March 2022 I was invited by Roy O'Connor of the Roads and Transport section of Engineers Ireland to open their seminar on Greenways. I made the point that Greenways are not simply a recreational phenomenon, but can be at the heart of our efforts to decarbonise by encouraging walking and cycling. My opening address can be found below.

Thanks to Roy O'Connor, and Engineers Ireland for inviting me to open this seminar.

Good morning and greetings from Strasbourg in France where I am attending the plenary session of the European Parliament. It is a dark moment in Europe, and we hope that de-escalation will occur. It is a week in which the energy rulebook for Europe is being re-written, in order to reduce reliance on Russian energy. That means less coal, oil and gas, and hopefully an acceleration of the green energy transition. This has significant implications from transport, and may assist in decarbonisation.

From a transport and mobility perspective, that means more support for active travel, public transport, and electrification. Active travel covers walking and cycling and now is the right time to boost these sustainable modes. The 2018 Strategy for the Future Development of National and Regional Greenways states, “Greenways are not simply a means of getting from A to B, they are an experience in and of themselves. They are also a means to experience the communities through which they transport us.” I’d like to flip that around and stress that they ARE a means of getting from A to B, and with the rise of pedal-assisted bikes, they can be transformative in achieving a favourable modal spilt for short and medium length journeys. 

However, let me backtrack for a moment. There was a lightbulb moment around twenty years ago when Fáilte Ireland realised that Ireland Inc was generating more revenue from cycle holidays than golf holidays, and this thankfully has led to a rise of investment in greenways. Nevertheless, we know that the reasons for greenway investment go far deeper than that. Increased concern about local air quality, particularly post-Covid have reinforced the importance of clean air, and travel on foot, or by bike and Greenways help achieve this. Active travel also helps tackle our obesity crisis. 63% of Irish men and 48% of Irish women have a Body Mass Index higher than 25, and being active daily tackle this. Ireland is above average, in a bad way and greenways can address this. 

The climate and biodiversity crises are further reasons for investment in greenways as they can, if designed correctly improve this at a local level. Greenways can also assist in climate adaptation. Embedding sustainable drainage systems from the outset can help nature heal, and provide resilience. Last week I visited Valkenburg in the Netherlands as part of a European Parliament delegation examining the aftermath of the deadly floods last summer that took hundreds of lives in Germany and Belgium. Tellingly, no lives were lost in the Netherlands and the mayor Valkenburg Mr. Daan Prevoo painstakingly explained the Dutch approach of giving ‘Room for the River’, a phrase I had previously heard from Henk Ovink, the Dutch water ambassador. You know all about these challenges, and I would like to think that we are moving away from concrete to more reliance on nature-based solutions, though I certainly see this argument raging within the Office of Public Works and other agencies. You know, I think we all need to go back to school every once in a while, and learn about new approaches to how we carry out our work. I know this leads to practical challenges: how for instance can we incorporate permeable surfaces that are strong enough to withstand extreme rainfall events that are becoming more common. We must work with nature, not fight against it. 

 The Irish Government has pledged a million Euro a day to walking and cycling. However, we cannot just throw money at projects, we need do it right. Continued Professional Development is crucial. While temporary Covid-related mobility measures have been positive, they have often come with a lot of plastic baggage attached! I hope that we can rely more on wood, green concrete, and trees and planting in the future. I live close to the Phoenix Park, and while I welcome the smooth resurfacing and plastic wands that now firmly delineate the cycle path, perhaps we could consider a row of cherry trees next time out. Nature can help with sustainable solutions. Transport and mobility has come full circle since I first campaigned about urban motorways in Dublin over thirty years ago. Back then, the mantra was that the car is king. We now know it was a pretender to the throne. The transport pyramid now puts teleworking on the top of the ladder, and the pedestrian, wheelchair user and cyclist on the rungs below, and that is the way it should be. Delivery vehicles, public transport and shared mobility come next, with dirty diesels barely making it onto the ladder, and being phased out as electrification takes hold.

 I am glad that land acquisition will figure in your discussions. That nettle must be grasped. So many Dutch towns have the cycle path safely planned at a short distance away from the main road, and that requires the purchase of land, a small price to pay for sustainable infrastructure. Greenways can transform our tourism offer, and our transport infrastructure at a fraction of the cost and a fraction of the carbon footprint of our motorway network. Let us ensure that local transport needs are central to the planning of greenways, not just for recreational use, but also for serving local everyday journeys. I hope the investment in active travel will also lead to a re-thinking of rural roads, where too often road markings consists of a dashed white central divider. In Denmark, on such roads the central divider is not present, but instead solid white lines on both sides delineate a metre of shared space that is available to cyclists and pedestrians. The psychological impact of this also helps reduce vehicle speeds. 

Before I conclude, may I make a final plea on the subject of way finding, or signage. It is clear that many who choose to drive are not aware that walking and cycling infrastructure exists. We need to improve the quality and quantum of signage that indicates active travel infrastructure. The Slí na Sláinte signs do this, but we need a similar system for all active travel routes. Such signs could list destinations, but also travel times. Over the years, we have reduced road signage to a listing of letters and numbers that are unintelligible to the layperson. The N17, as far as I know the only one of these that has acquired any cultural recognition. Let us get back to using authentic and grounded place-names that have been neglected, but that have a rich cultural grounding. I of course have to remind you, that in doing this we do not wish to create excessive signage and that we also need to declutter our streets and roads.

Thank you, enjoy the day!

A Green response to Russian Aggression in Ukraine

 

 

Green Party Ukraine Crisis Webinar March 2022

On 3 March 2022 the Green Party organised a discussion around the Ukraine Crisis at short notice. It was a webinar like no other: listening to Ukrainian MP Maria Ionova speaking to us from Kiev with sirens in the background. Minister Eamon Ryan TD, gave us an introduction, and Professor Donnacha Ó Beacháin from DCU outlined the need for support from Ukraine and Grace O’Sullivan MEP and myself gave a perspective from the European Parliament. Garret Kelly our Foreign Affairs Working Group chair joined us from Sarajevo and Senator Vincent Martin chaired the evening’s proceedings. Below are my speaking notes. 

Maria, I cannot imagine what you are your family are living through in Kiev. 

I ask myself, what can we do? How can we de-escalate? This is the key question this evening. As we watch the violence on our screens, we feel powerless at this remove. Lenin stated, “There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen." Meanwhile European Commission President von der Leyen said this week: "This is a clash between the rule of law and the rule of the gun; between democracies and autocracies; between a rules-based order and a world of naked aggression.”

Putin’s murderous actions must be condemned. However, we must avoid a direct confrontation between NATO and Russian forces. It was important for the European Parliament to be united yesterday in condemning the invasion, showing solidarity with the Ukrainian people, and calling for the EU to act on issues like greater humanitarian assistance and refugee protection. It is right that Ireland will play its part in welcoming refugees, despite our housing and homelessness challenges. I am pleased that in the European Parliament this week we voted for €1.2 Billion of aid for Ukraine.

Last week I was in Albania, as a member of the Delegation to the EU-Albania Stabilisation and Association Parliamentary Committee. They have waited for many years to be on the list for EU accession.  Today, Georgia and Moldova have applied for EU membership. It is clear that there is now renewed pressure on the European Union to speed up the process for countries that wish to look towards Brussels. Also today, Ministers in the Justice and Home Affairs Council have agreed, for the first time, to trigger the ‘Temporary Protection Directive’ to support people fleeing the Russian invasion of Ukraine. 

The Greens/EFA Group are calling on EU Member States and the Commission to ensure that all people fleeing the war can find sanctuary in the EU. I am glad that Ireland has agreed to play its part in this. The European Union was founded as an economic entity; the Steel and Coal Community, and it has become an environmental and social body. I am worried if it were to morph into a military body, and I am not convinced of this need. I ask myself where would it end? Of course, innocent citizens must be able to defend themselves, and Ireland must provide humanitarian aid. However, the EU must not become a military organisation. This would take away from its key role.

A year ago, I contributed to the public consultation to the Commission on the Defence Forces. I said then that our strengths as a neutral nation have served us well in our peacekeeping role abroad, and in humanitarian tasks in the Mediterranean and elsewhere.   Ireland sits on the United Nations Security Council; it can again assist in tackling global challenges. Our neutrality can be an asset.  In line with the Irish’s State’s constitutional commitment to neutrality, the triple-lock must be respected in terms of any external deployment of the Irish Defence Forces. 

This week’s economic sanctions are strong and significant. Ukrainian resistance is high. A year ago, I raised concerns over attempts that may have occurred involving the hacking of such infrastructure such as undersea cables by foreign forces, and the unannounced incursion of defence aircraft and submarines into Irish waters and airspace. These concerns must inform our defence capabilities.

Ukraine is a breadbasket. It is also rich in coal, oil, and gas, and nuclear. I had not considered concerns about nuclear installations in times of war, I had been more focused on terrorist attack. Clearly, I’d be more worried about a nuclear facility being a battlefield than a windfarm.  The EU’s dependence on Russian oil and gas is now in plain sight. Filling our cars with petrol fuels Putin’s ambitions. 

Now is the time to hit two birds with one stone: end reliance on Russian fossil fuels by promoting a 100% renewable energy economy which helps us tackle the climate crisis. The more we invest now in energy efficiency, energy storage, demand management, peak-shifting and renewable energy, the quicker we’ll be able to stop funding Putin’s war by buying less of his gas and oil. 

Update, 12 March 2022

Back in 1994 Putin made his intentions clear. Michael Stuermer, author of ‘Putin and the Rise of Russia’ was listening carefully. Referring to the 20 million Russians who lived beyond his country’s border Stuermer quotes Putin as saying “For us, their fate is a question of war or peace.” It seems clear that any solution to Russia's war in Ukraine will require assurances for ethnic Russians living there. He sees NATO expansion, and to a lesser extent the EU as a threat.

Earlier this week I had a meeting with Commissioner Frans Timmermans in Strasbourg. He speaks Russian and also knew Putin going back to the 1990s. He had his fair share’s of run-ins with him, over the behaviour of Russian embassy staff in the Netherlands, and Russia’s treatment of Dutch diplomatic staff in Moscow. He even negotiated with him for the release of a Greenpeace ship that was detained in Russia. He is acutely aware of Russia’s power after 192 Dutch citizens died after a Russian missile downed Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over Eastern Ukraine in 2014. Timmermans believes that sharp and severe economic sanctions will have an impact.

However, I repeat, the focus right now must be on de-escalation. Hopefully peace talks will achieve this.

Thank you.

Good COP, bad COP

Globe hanging from the ceiling at COP26 in Glasgow

 It is three weeks since I boarded the ‘Rail to the CoP’ train in Brussels, and a week since I came back from Glasgow via London and a Eurostar to Brussels. For me, the optimism that I felt stepping off a train in Glasgow and seeing Greta Thunberg and her supporters has been replaced with that familiar feeling that progress is slow, and rarely moves at the pace required. On that first weekend I watched Patti Smith sing “The people have the power” from a Glasgow stage, but the reality is that Governments and Institutions have the real power, and rarely change direction in a hurry, even when it is badly needed. Former President Mary Robinson's emotional plea summed up how so many of us felt. 

My last memories of COP26 were on Saturday afternoon as I sat at the back of the huge Plenary Hall. A ‘stocktaking’ was about to start. To my left I could see Frans Timmermans the European Commission Vice-President working the room with some of his senior advisors close to hand. He was listening to voices from all around the world from the smaller island states to powerful players like Russia. To his right was John Kerry, US president Biden’s climate envoy. He too was touring the room, ignoring cameras, and listening carefully to the disparate voices and concerns that filtered through to him. This was geo-politics in action played out on a global stage. To even get access to the Plenary room was an achievement. Thousands of activists and campaigners were not allowed beyond the security fences, and even those who were restricted to certain rooms and spaces. Meanwhile the corporate branding was everywhere. From the Team Britain Formula E electric racing car to the ticker tape displays reminded you that firms like NatWest, Microsoft, Unilever, and Scottish Power were Principal Partners for the event. I noticed that #TogetherForOurPlanet was the official hashtag, but the campaigners outside the fences might disagree.

I have been to four COPS at this stage. COP15 in Copenhagen back in 2009 had us holding our breath for a ‘Hopenhagen’ moment, but it was not to be as Obama and China’s Wen Jinbao failed to bring the ambition we needed to the table. A year later at COP16 in Cancún I was head of a small delegation from Ireland and the talks process was on life support, but it survived and COP17 in Durban gave a new lease of life to the process that culminated in the Paris agreement at COP21 in Paris in 2015. Would the postponed COP26 in Glasgow be different? Philip Boucher-Hayes put his finger on it when he said that France had put years into preparing for the Paris COP. There was not much sign of that with the UK Government. The acid test was in India’s last-minute watering down of the core text on pushing for replacement of the phase-out of coal with a reference to ‘phase-down’. As my MEP colleagues for whom English is not their mother tongue said to me, “Is that even a word in English?” I am not sure if it is.

I some respects Nicola Sturgeon was a more compelling figure that the UK’s COP26 President Alok Sharma MP who ended up apologising for the watered-down text. Even though her stance on oil and gas is poor, she managed to convey the sense of urgency that is needed on the climate crisis. Speaking in Glasgow, a city which prospered on coal and steel, she knows that Scotland’s future prosperity will be built on wind and solar. She also understands that this change must be accelerated, not postponed. 

On the substance of the COP26 texts, Fossil Fuels, Loss and Damage, and Article 6 were the crunch issues. 

On fossil fuels, unabated coal, and inefficient subsidies for fossil fuels were at the heart of the debate. Although the end of the oil gas and coal age was signaled, the can continues to be kicked down the road, but the final text while clunky did indicate that fossil fuels days are numbered. It stated: “Accelerating efforts towards the phasedown of unabated coal power and phase-out of inefficient fossil fuel subsidies, while providing targeted support to the poorest and most vulnerable.”

'Loss and Damage' featured in discussions, but it was clear that the US did not want to come to a decision on this and open a Pandora’s Box of historical blame. The word reparations came up in the corridors, and in news commentary, but it will be hugely challenging to make the Western World face up to their obligations to compensate the Developing World for damage caused by a problem that was not of their making.

The Article 6 mechanisms, set out the functioning of international carbon markets to support further global cooperation on emission reductions. A lot of work was completed in Glasgow to clear up the accounting rules for carbon credits before and after the Paris Agreement and some loopholes that allowed double accounting were closed. The elephant in the room: the give-away of free carbon credits to the largest polluters was not up for discussion.

I was pleased that references to ‘Mother Earth’ and ‘Climate Justice’ made it into the Glasgow Agreement, and here’s the text on this: “Noting the importance of ensuring the integrity of all ecosystems, including in forests, the ocean and the cryosphere, and the protection of biodiversity, recognized by some cultures as Mother Earth, and also noting the importance for some of the concept of ‘climate justice’, when taking action to address climate change”

From a personal perspective it was great to meet civil society representatives from countries such as Bangladesh. It was also good to to catch up with Green colleagues such as Elizabeth May who became a Canadian MP shortly after I met her in Copenhagen in 2009. I also met Ross Greer MSP, another green who has been a strongly-opinioned member of the Scottish Parliament since 2016. I was also proud of the work of Green Ministers such as our own Eamon Ryan who chaired some of the negotiations over the last week. He had a great team assisting him in Glasgow, and strong support from our Civil Service.It was good too to catch up with my colleagues from the Dáil; Brian Leddin TD and Minister Malcolm Noonan.

However, these fruitful meetings were over-shadowed by conservative politicians who made so many weak and strung-out promises: for instance President Bolsonaro of Brazil said he will halt deforestation by 2030. This is too little, too late. The 2020s need to be the decade of transformative change, and the heavy lifting must be achieved in the next few years. Sometimes you didn't know whether to laugh or cry at the slow progress. Tuvalu is a low-lying island state and their stand at COP feature a group of polar bears wearing life-jackets and a penguin with a noose around it's neck, not a bad depiction of the climate crisis.

The Glasgow COP signaled that the world’s economies will shift towards a cleaner future, but it did not provide the urgency or the money that is needed. It also exposed the deep divisions between those in the room, and those excluded from process. When the COP caravan moves on to Egypt next year, these cracks may become larger and the divisions more pronounced between wealthy and poorer countries.

What next for Dublin's Charlemont Street?

 

Looking down Dublin's Charlemont Street, pretty much everything you see was built within the last thirty years. We haven't quite cracked decent modern street design, have we?  I mean, where are the trees!

On the plus side we're at least building (or re-building) streets again. Back in the 1980s many felt that car parking was best placed in front of a new building, and the building itself should be set back from the road. In many parts of Ireland this is still the case and road traffic dominates. However, what struck me is that there isn't a shred of greenery in the image. Best practice these days means at least planting street trees along a road that is twenty metres wide. We could also do with some public seating, protected cycle lanes, attractive streetlamps, less advertising placards, and use decent materials rather than grey concrete for the footpaths and tarmacadam for the roads. and that's only for starters. 

The challenge is that no-one sat down and designed this street. Well, actually Sir Patrick Abercrombie did, back in the early years of the twentieth century, but that's another story. Looking at what you see here, architects designed the buildings on either side, and engineers provided (and designed) the carriageway in between. I doubt that Dublin City Council's urban planners or landscaping staff were even shown the drawings. That is why we need a Head of Urban Design or Public Realm at Assistant Chief Executive level within Dublin City Council. The Chief Executive Owen Keegan should create this post and ensure someone with the ability to knock heads together gets the job. 

What brought me into politics thirty years ago was that the then Dublin Corporation felt that 'sorting out the traffic' was the only game in town. By traffic they meant cars, and they were happy to demolish chunks of the city to make it easier to drive from the suburbs to the city and back every day. When I was first elected as a councillor in 1991 one of my first acts was to seek support from dropping many of these ill-conceived road proposals from our plans and promote light rail instead. As it happens at the end of the view in this photo there used to be another street: 'Charlotte Street', and it was built over by a developer. Dublin Corporation even held a Street Closing Inquiry in the early 1990s, where I presented evidence that the Street should be kept, rather than built on, but my plea fell on deaf ears. 

Problems remain, though in recent years senior Council staff understand that streets aren't just for traffic, they also have a social and commercial function. Over the years we've moved the debate on from providing from cars to facilitating public transport with the introduction of Quality Bus Corridors in the late 1990s. Since then, initially reluctantly, but now with enthusiasm Dublin City Council is rolling out walking and cycling infrastructure. Even now there’s too much emphasis on plastic bollards, rather than on using greenery or planters to separate cyclists from cars. New concerns and ideas about greening our cities, and sustainable urban drainage demand a co-ordinated and design-led approach. In the past, and in some quarters today trees are seen as at best and afterthought, and at worst a problem, this must change. I'm glad to see that the City Council has appointed an arboricultural, or Street Tree Officer. Different players must work together in an inter-disciplinary approach to 'co-create' quality spaces and places. Communities also need to be at the centre of the process, and not just involved through a public submission period after the plans have been drawn up.

We need to adopt a 'whole streets' approach to ensure everyone is focused on improving the public realm: from public lighting engineers to the Parks Department. Far too different staff sit in separate silos and communicate by long-distance semaphore! Within Dublin City Council I struggled to ensure the posts of Dublin City Planning Officer, and City Engineer were filled after long vacancies. We also have a City Architect. We now need to complement these roles with a head of Urban Design. That person could ensure that all these civic officials work together to up the quality of our public realm. Simple tasks, like ensuring that road surfaces are reinstated road works might come under their responsibility. As it happens, we do have a Public Realm Strategy, but it can be hard to know who ensures that all staff are focused on delivering it. Just look at the streetlights in this photo. No-one in the Council woke up some morning and said I am going to give Charlemnt Street the best new street lighting that we can design! The BusConnects project has the potential to dramatically improved the public realm. Some of the draft proposals are good, but others fall far short of what is required. Let's hope that the plans that go to Bord Pleanála are of a high standard. If we try and 'bolt-on' bus lanes by widening streets and maintaining the same level of car-use we will be on a hiding to nothing.

Streets aren't just for traffic, they must provide for social interaction and commercial activity, and this requires a joined-up approach by developers, engineers, and all other disciplines to ensure the public realm is improved. Back in 2010 when I was a Minister of State with responsibility for planning and sustainable transport, I kicked off a process that led to the publication of an Irish Design Manual for Urban Streets and Roads (DMURS). It helps the different players to design a decent street, but it doesn't automatically ensure that good design is achieved. We need to tackle this, from providing decent street signs to getting rid of crappy randomly placed utility boxes that were put in place with the Cross-City Luas.

At this stage in Ireland, we need clearer guidance. Transport for London have a 'Streets Toolkit' which is helpful, and they've also produced good information on taking a 'Healthy Streets' Approach. DMURS helps, but more detailed street guidance is now required.  Often councillors get blamed for poor planning decisions and poor streets. To a certain extent that is a fair criticism, but I would say that the level of responsibility, funding and devolved powers in Irish local government is amongst the worst in Europe. It is therefore hard for councillors to make a difference. (Believe me, I've tried!) Looking ahead we need to devolve more powers to our Councils, put in place an elected Mayor for greater Dublin, and ensure a senior official is responsible for quality streets and providing and managing the decent public realm.

What next for Charlemont Street? That's up to Dublin City Council. My work is focused on European issues, and while I do spend time on policy documents such as a Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy where I'm prioritising active travel (walking and cycling) and public transport, the EU doesn't micro-manage things at a national or local level. Really it boils down to local councillors and officials sitting down to get things right. Personally, I'd reduce the street back to two rather than three lanes of motorised traffic, and add segregated cycle lanes, as well as wider footpaths. I'd narrow the width of these lanes to around three metres, as wide lanes encourage speeding. I'd put in semi-mature street trees with wide tree pits that allow for planting and storm water drainage. I'd also put in attractive street lighting, and some quality street benches or seating where neighbours or visitors could sit down and have a chat. All of this can be done, it simply requires the political will.