Another Carless year in Dublin

In terms of getting from A to B, for me, 2015 was largely similar to the preceding few years - except this time I’ve made an effort to review my to-ing and fro-ing throughout the year. Although I travelled a bit in 2015, I spent the vast majority of my time in Dublin, Ireland. I used to have a bike of my own that I cycled everywhere on, but it was stolen in 2013 and never replaced— since then I’ve only used Dublin Bikes. I only use taxis when it’s raining heavily or I have too much stuff to carry. In these situations I use Hailo exclusively.

Share first, talk later

Dublin Bikes
number of trips: 810
average trip length: 2.6km (1.6 miles)
total distance: 2106km (1308 miles — Dublin to Galway over 10 times!!)

costs: €20 annual fee + €11.06 charges = €31.06 total ($33.60)

Taxis (Hailo)
number of trips: 46
average trip length: 7km (4.3 miles)

costs: including 10% tip for almost every fare €717 ($778) — total is from all actual Hailo receipts from 2015.

Other — Irish Rail, DART, LUAS
Irish Rail total: €126
DART Total: €78
LUAS: ~€30

Grand total* = €982.06
*this really is pretty much it, apart from being abroad for approximately 3 weeks which were mostly work expenses

In 2015, I lived on Mountjoy Square and worked at John’s Lane West beside NCAD. My most frequent route by far is between these two places and I shake up the actual route based on mood and traffic.

A few things of note about cycling daily across Dublin City in 2015:

• Dublin really does have the potential to be a great, cycling-friendly city yet there are pretty much no — ZERO — real cycle lanes in the city centre, especially on the North Side :(
• it’s taken a while to realise this… Dublin Buses are fundamentally incompatible with the shape, roads and scale of Dublin City — more on this soon
• I only got soaked twice in the entire year despite not having any rain gear
• no matter how bad the traffic gets, your cycle time is around the same
• it’s an absolute miracle that one or more cyclists or pedestrians haven’t mashed in or around College Green since the Luas works started. Dublin City Council and the RPA seem to only care about not upsetting retailers!
• the number of cyclists plummeted in the winter after the first storm, even though it was warm and only occasionally windy

I’ve also cycled out to nearest DIY / builders providers (Woodies in Glasnevin) quite a few times which just happens to be almost exactly the same distance away at 2.9km. Which reminds me — I wish Dublin Bikes offered a few cargo bikes!

This purpose of this short document isn’t to brag but to share, encourage (myself and others) and connect with people in similar situations. Something to add here is that you really have to work hard at not having a car, and some things are an absolute pain, like recycling and collecting / delivering things etc.

This year we’re going to join GoCar since there’s actually two GoCars outside our house! Hopefully this will fill in those awkward gaps.