To reduce traffic Galway needs Light Rail. Light Rail will also enable Galway to grow.
The National Transport Authority has confirmed that bus and train fare hikes will lead to fewer people using public transport. An Oireachtas committee was told that for every 10% fare increase, passenger numbers fall 3%. jrnl.ie/7164363
NTA confirms that bus and train fare hikes will lead to fewer people using public transport
The NTA said for every 10% fare increase, passenger numbers fall 3%.
jrnl.ie
RIP Frank McDonald "Over a reporting career lasting some 50 years, he campaigned for better urban planning and design, and against the sort of corruption that can attend the nexus where swashbuckling construction comes into contact with politics and public administration."
Frank McDonald obituary: campaigning journalist changed how we think about urban planning
His reporting was relentless and led to the publication in January 1985 of his ground-breaking book The Destruction of Dublin
irishtimes.com
The Irish Times@irishtimes.com · last mo.Frank McDonald, former environment editor of The Irish Times, has died
Frank McDonald (1950-2026) was a tireless champion for good urban planning, a stalwart advocate for sustainable public policy and a relentless critic of corruption and incompetence in Ireland's body politic.
Frank McDonald@frankmcdonald60.bsky.social · 6mo agoNo doubt there will be whoops and hollers in Galway about this. But it’s very sad news because it means that the notoriously congested city will be locked into car dependency when what it really needs is an east-west light rail line and bus lanes on every arterial route. A billion Euro wasted! …
irishcycle.com/2026/07/29/c...
Car adman turned road safety and sustainability advocate Tom Flood to speak in Dublin
Tom Flood — whose work used to include car advertising but who turned his skills to promoting road safety and mobility beyond cars — is to speak at an event in Dublin on September 22nd.…
irishcycle.com
What We Lost When We Lost the Veranda | Psychology Today www.psychologytoday.com/ie/blog/non-...
What We Lost When We Lost the Veranda
Modern architecture may be unintentionally making us feel more isolated.
psychologytoday.com
A Washington Post article suggests that, beyond a certain threshold, larger homes don't make people happier. Instead, well-being is correlated with affordable housing in walkable neighborhoods where they feel socially connected. www.washingtonpost.com/climate-envi...
![Excerpt reads: "Prioritize your neighborhood
Neighborhoods drive our happiness (or unhappiness) more than we think.
When Lina Martinez, director of POLIS, the Center for Wellbeing Studies at Universidad Icesi in Colombia, studied the happiness of households in the city of Cali, she couldn’t find much difference between poorer and richer areas. “Their happiness is pretty much the same,” she said. But that changed when she isolated neighborhood conditions, such as access to transit, health care and parks. “The conditions of the neighborhood affect happiness,” she said. “I can’t link that to the space where [people] live.”
That aligns with findings from a 2023 study of the Vancouver metro area: Researchers found no significant differences in well-being between people living in single detached homes, duplexes, townhouses, laneway houses and apartment buildings (basement units smaller than 300 square feet were the only negative exception). What did people say they missed most in their neighborhood? Affordability, proximity to family and friends, and a sense of community. Home design was eighth on the list."](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:ks3gpa6ftoyaq7hmf6c4qx4c/bafkreicapfknasylzk2lqzaxxeb5mchgnru75obggn45dusda6j5zogvuu)
The award-winning Climate Inspirations Festival 2026, a landmark celebration of creativity, innovation, and community action in response to the climate crisis, will take place from 24-28 June 2026 in various venues throughout Galway City www.advertiser.ie/galway/artic...
Galway Climate Inspirations Festival official launch
The award-winning Climate Inspirations Festival 2026, a landmark celebration of creativity, innovation, and community action in response to the climate crisis, will take place from 24-28 June 2026 in…
advertiser.ie
Bigger cars are costing Irish motorists parking spaces and threatening lives, study finds www.irishtimes.com/ireland/2026...
Bigger cars are costing Irish motorists parking spaces and threatening lives, study finds
Research shows 14% of on-street car parking spaces will be erased by ever bigger cars
irishtimes.com
Too many people are dying on Irish roads. Road deaths are not inevitable. Stop referring to them as ‘accidents’ www.irishtimes.com/opinion/2026...
Opinion: Road deaths are not inevitable. Stop referring to them as ‘accidents’
We should be furious that road safety campaigns focus on high-vis clothing while our streets become increasingly dangerous
irishtimes.com
Galway, Ireland had a streetcar over 100 years ago. An early version of the proposed Gluas Light Rail?
READ THIS: “The Highway Lobby has been shaping transportation policy conversations for decades in its interests.” And they spend MILLIONS buying car dependency, to make sure all of us have to spend BILLIONS. #UrbanTruth Via the Union of Concerned Scientists @ucs.org. blog.ucs.org/kshen/the-hi...
IMPORTANT: The Dutch invested €595 million annually on urban biking, resulting in €19 BILLION saved in public health care costs alone. That’s how smart governments do the math on investing in better mobility. Let’s be clear— it WASTES public money to NOT do it. #CityMakingMath HT @modacitylife.com
Galway's very latest contribution to the public realm. All of a sudden! What shall we name it?
ICYMI: The One-Hour City Conspiracy! “Here's the REAL conspiracy: Too many people forced into car-dependent lives, with more health harms, crashes, noise, air pollution, social isolation —and less space for everything our streets should be giving us.” Thanks @usa.streetsblog.org #1HourCityConspiracy
Urban Truth Collective: The One-Hour City Conspiracy — Streetsblog USA
Here's the real conspiracy: Too many people are forced into car-dependent lives, with more health harms, more crashes, more noise, more air pollution, more social isolation — and less space for everyt...
usa.streetsblog.org
Every day I surprise my patients. By telling them their disease is not from poor personal choices, but rather from poor land-use decisions by their city. No access to safe walking & biking, more diabetes and kidney disease. They get it. @urbantruth.bsky.social #UrbanTruth
Safe, protected bike-lanes are: Better for business Better for emissions Better for air quality Better for space Better for public health Better for noise Better for equity Better for affordability Better for public costs Better for safety for EVERYONE Better for oil independence Better.
Urban Truth Collective@urbantruth.bsky.social · 4mo agoHow many more studies does your city need proving that people on bikes and on foot spend more on shopping streets than people in cars? Bike-lanes mean business. #UrbanTruth
STUDY: “We found that the way neighborhoods are planned and maintained mattered for happiness, health, and trust. Our findings suggest that mixed-use neighborhood designs that enable residents to shop and socialize within walking distance to their homes have direct & indirect effects on happiness.”
Walkable Neighborhoods
We examined whether living in a walkable neighborhood influenced the happiness of younger and older city residents. The data for this study came from a comprehensive household population survey of ...
tandfonline.com
“…persons living in walkable, mixed-use neighborhoods have higher levels of social capital compared with those living in car-oriented suburbs. Respondents living in walkable neighborhoods were more likely to know their neighbors, participate politically, trust others, and be socially engaged.”
Social Capital and the Built Environment: The Importance of Walkable Neighborhoods
Objectives. I sought to examine whether pedestrian-oriented, mixed-use neighborhoods encourage enhanced levels of social and community engagement (i.e., social capital). Methods. The study investigated the relationship between neighborhood design ...
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
"be safe, be seen" as a national strategy for road safety is an absolute joke
The Journal@thejournal.ie · 5mo agoA woman who drove over a cyclist twice having taken an illegal right-hand turn has been given a 12-month suspended sentence jrnl.ie/7032459
Finding out I was considered "radical" for wanting kids to be able to get school safely and independently was shocking and what motivated me to try and help change that perspective. Culture Shift developed with @thebikinglawyer.bsky.social
“A newly released manifesto from the @ecf.com European Cyclists Federation & its partners lays out a 10-point plan to dramatically scale up cycling across the continent—positioning it not as a niche lifestyle choice but as critical infrastructure in a time of crisis.” momentummag.com/the-energy-c...
Pollution levels in Paris after 10 years of advancing sustainable transport.
Amazing job by www.urbantruthcollective.com 🙌 👍🏼 The real “urban conspiracy” isn’t proximity, it’s distance. The “One-Hour City” traps millions in long commutes, car dependence and lost time. We need cities of proximity, time, and quality of life 🙏🏻 @brenttoderian.bsky.social @urbantruth.bsky.social
Every year, billions of vehicles worldwide shed an estimated 6 million tonnes of tire fragments. These tiny flakes of plastic, generated by normal driving, account for 28% of microplastics entering the environment globally. Heavy vehicles eg SUVs/EVs especially. Via @us.theconversation.com
Car tyres shed a quarter of all microplastics in the environment – urgent action is needed
Tiny flakes of plastic, generated by the wear and tear of normal driving, eventually accumulate in the soil, in rivers and lakes, and even in our food.
theconversation.com
"Waymo has told advocates that expecting it to respect bike lanes is 'too high a bar' because customers expect to be dropped off in them." To be crystal clear, it's illegal for a car to be in a bike lane. It doesn't matter what Waymo's customers expect; the company shouldn't be doing it.
Waymo Is Not In The 'Vision Zero' Toolbox: Data - Streetsblog New York City
At least two of the cities where Waymo operates have not experienced declines in traffic-related injuries and deaths.
nyc.streetsblog.org
"What robot cars are promising is the next generation of car dependency." Excellent read here! www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Why Cities Shouldn’t Fall For the Robotaxi Hype
Transportation historian Peter Norton sees a pattern in the promises that autonomous vehicle companies make as they push self-driving cars into cities.
bloomberg.com
