O’Dowd launches consultation on Active Travel Delivery Plan | Newry News | Latest Newry News, Newry Sport and Newry Business for Newry City

O’Dowd launches consultation on Active Travel Delivery Plan | Newry News

Infrastructure Minister John O’Dowd has launched a public consultation on the Active Travel Delivery Plan.

 

O’Dowd launches consultation on Active Travel Delivery Plan | Newry News - todays news newry

 

The Active Travel Delivery Plan sets out how the Department will prioritise and deliver over 200km of high-quality active travel infrastructure within our urban and rural settlements over the next 10 years.

It focuses on three key connection types for each area which they believe will offer the greatest potential to maximise benefits for people, the environment and society.

These are connections to local schools; connections to public transport; and connections to town centres.

Speaking at the launch event at Craigavon Civic and Conference Centre, Minister O’Dowd says, “This Plan showcases the Department’s ambitions for increasing active travel options in 42 settlements across the North; delivering a bold transformation for all of our communities.

“It will complement the existing Belfast Cycling Network Delivery Plan and the Strategic Plan for Greenways, providing our teams and local councils with a firm basis for the prioritisation and delivery of active travel over the next 10 years.

“Research has shown that over one-third of our journeys are less than two miles long and two-thirds are less than five miles.

“These shorter journeys offer an opportunity to choose a different mode of travel to the car and make small changes to our lifestyle, regardless of age or ability, by choosing to walk, wheel, or cycle.

“We want to create high quality and safe active travel infrastructure that will make a positive difference to your lives, so we need to understand how it could help you to choose active travel to make those shorter journeys; whether it be travelling to work or school, maybe to the local shops, to visit family and friends, or just for leisure and exercise.

 



 

“Active travel is also a key element of the Climate Change Act.

“It reduces our carbon footprint, improves air quality, we have less noise pollution,  it reduces traffic congestion by decreasing the numbers of vehicles on our roads and it is also beneficial to our mental and physical wellbeing. 

“I am fully committed to improving active travel opportunities and separate to these proposed schemes today I am pleased to announce that I have just commissioned the design of six signature Active Travel projects across the North and will be sharing the details on these in the coming weeks and months as they are developed.

“By launching this consultation I am calling on the public to have their say on the future development of infrastructure projects in their local area.

“It is important that our neighbourhoods, towns and villages are designed to meet the needs of those who live there.

“People are at the heart of this plan because active travel is for everyone. Your journey matters, and by making little changes, and thinking about how we could travel differently, we can all make a big difference.”

The consultation, which contains a number of interactive maps for each area, is available on the Department’s website and will be open until 28 February 2025.

 

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Posted by on Nov 28 2024. Filed under Community, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

1 Comment for “O’Dowd launches consultation on Active Travel Delivery Plan | Newry News”

  1. Does O’Dowd not deserve his title of Minister as much as your reference to Minister Lyons yesterday?

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