Malahide Community Forum

Enabling residents to safely walk or cycle to local amenities

We’re fortunate to live or work in Malahide – it’s a wonderful place. We want to make it even better, by enabling residents to safely walk or cycle to local amenities, including schools, clubs and shops.

To progress this, we set up an Active Travel Sub Committee in 2020 to examine how Government Policy on Active Travel* can best be applied for the benefit of everyone who lives and works in Malahide. Active Travel is defined in the Government Active Travel Policy as travelling with purpose using your own energy to get to work, shop or school. Generally, this means travelling by foot or bike.

Photo Anna Groniecka Photography. 

We identified 4 priority routes that we want the council to provide/improve in order to enable kids to safely bike or walk to school:

1. Seapark Hill to Seamount Road (footpath) –
   Critical part of safe route to Malahide Community School (MCS)
2. Caves Marsh Boardwalk – Safe route from Seabury to Pope John Paul II (walk / bike route)
3. New bridge over the railway into the back of Malahide Community School – safe route connecting to Malahide Demesne via Ashwood Hall. (walk / bike route)
4. Swords Road (R106) – Waterside to Malahide Castle (to allow for children from Waterside to get to PJP2 safely & for people from Malahide to get to the Educate Together High School safely) (walk / bike route) 

While progress to date has been slow (detailed in our monthly notes), we expect this to accelerate rapidly over the next few years, based on Active Travel initiatives announced last year (2020) and especially those announced on 11th Feb this this year (2021):

Active Travel announcements – 2021

• Feb 11th 2021 – FCC allocated €14,870,000 as part of NTA allocation of €240,057,943 in Sustainable Transport Measures Grants: 2021 Allocations Funding directly relevant Active Travel in the Malahide area include:
  • Malahide (Main St) to Swords (Brackenstown Rd) €100,000 (via R106 – Swords Road)(Appointment of consultants to look at scheme from malahide village / greenway to Swords by McAllisters)
  • Sutton to Malahide cycle route: €310,000

Active Travel announcements – 2020

• May 2020 – FCC commence preparations for the construction of the €12m Broadmeadow Greenway which will link Malahide and Donabate.
  
• June 2020: Draft Programme for Government allocates EUR365 million per year funding for improved walking and cycling infrastructure
  
• July 2020: Government Active Travel Policy published 
  
• Sep 2020: FCC obtain funding for Swords to Seabury cycle route along estuary  
  
• Oct 2020: €360m for walking, cycling projects under Budget 2021
  
• Oct 2020 – FCC established new “Climate Change, Environment and Active Travel Department”
  
• Nov 2020: Government announces support for roll-out of a new Safe Routes to School Initiative.

What do we expect in 2021:

• FCC to hold a public consultation on Sutton To Malahide cycle route (March 2021)
• FCC to progress the Swords to Seabury cycle route along the inner Broadmeadow estuary (EUR1,000,000 was allocated in Sep 2020)
• NTA will provide FCC with updated cycle network plan for Fingal
• We hope to have a deputation meeting with FCC to discuss our proposals (deferred since May 2020 due pandemic)
• We will inform residents of and seek their input to proposed Active Travel routes

What are we asking for?
We believe that cycle routes should concentrate on providing safe routes to schools, clubs, shops parks and other community facilities, physically separated from motor vehicles whenever possible. We believe that priority should be given to pedestrians with adequate pavement space and crossing facilities. We believe pedestrians need proper pavement space and sufficient crossing facilities, separate to other road users including bicycles with prioritisation where there is conflict with other road users.

What does safe walking and cycling infrastructure look like:

• Segregated / protected from motor traffic where possible
• Segregated pedestrian and cycle infrastructure where possible
• Minimum width / Desired width of footpaths and cycle paths
• Pedestrian priority on “Share with care paths” – e.g. as currently in Malahide Castle