![\"In](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/H3EK4VQECBBKRDRL6YSX46LBT4.jpg\")
In Amsterdam about a third of roads are designed for cyclists. Photograph: iStock <\/p>\n\u201cI learned to bike before I learned to walk. Biking wasn\u2019t really a choice,\u201d master\u2019s degree student Rosalie de Groot (22) says of her childhood in the Netherlands. <\/p>\n
In Dublin, where she has lived and cycled for the past year, \u201cit\u2019s very different\u201d.<\/p>\n
Menno Axt (30) agrees that cycling is \u201calmost as natural as walking somewhere\u201d in the Netherlands. <\/p>\n
\u201cIts seen as a mode of transportation, it\u2019s not seen as an activity,\u201d he says. <\/p>\n
But, comparatively, cycling in Dublin, is \u201cabsolutely horrible. I\u2019m surprised that not more cyclists get killed on the roads with how it\u2019s set up here\u201d.<\/p>\n
So far this year, nine cyclists have been killed on the State\u2019s roads, Garda statistics show. <\/p>\n
Eoin Hernon (24), an engineer from Galway, has also noticed the difference in roads culture since he arrived in Amsterdam five months ago. <\/p>\n
He says the Dutch capital is \u201ca cycling paradise\u201d. <\/p>\n
In Amsterdam about a third of roads are designed for cyclists. Photograph: iStock <\/p>\n
\u201cI just saw a couple well into their 70 or 80s trundling along on their bikes \u2026 everyone is in the bike lanes,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
He cycled throughout his teens and kept it up while studying in Galway even as his friends \u201coutgrew\u201d their bicycles as they learned how to drive. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you\u2019re cycling above the age of 16 people are like, \u2018Why don\u2019t you have a driver\u2019s licence?\u2019,\u201d Mr Hernon says. <\/p>\n
This dominance of the car in Ireland, he says, has created \u201ca divide between cyclists and drivers\u201d.<\/p>\n
Infrastructural improvements are gradually making Dublin and Galway safer for cyclists and active road users. <\/p>\n
The European Cycling Federation\u2019s infrastructure tracker says 11.8 per cent of all public roads in Dublin now accommodate cyclists. <\/p>\n
This is still far lower than Amsterdam and the Danish capital Copenhagen where a third of all roads are designed for cyclists. <\/p>\n
![\"Cyclists](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/GKC5OKODGBHAZOIYRETTPCG64E.jpg\")
Cyclists ride in a segregated cycle lane installed along the Liffey Quays in Dublin. Photograph Finbarr O’Reilly\/Getty <\/p>\n
Infrastructural development goes beyond painting cycle lanes. <\/p>\n
Mr Axt says Dutch local governments have put lanes above the roads next to pedestrians and have installed separate traffic lights that allow cyclists to move before cars or with pedestrians without breaking the lights.<\/p>\n
However, in Dublin and Galway, slower and more vulnerable cyclists are often funnelled into lanes with double-decker buses, which he says means \u201cthe bus is annoyed and the bikes are scared\u201d. <\/p>\n
Ms de Groot has noticed in Dublin that the \u201ctraffic here is less efficient and you bike through red lights all the time, otherwise you would be waiting forever\u201d.<\/p>\n
For example, the newly developed North Wall cycle path has cycle-specific lights at pedestrian crossings. <\/p>\n
However, some lights change at the same time as those for cars, meaning many cyclists continue to cross them when they are red. <\/p>\n
![\"Student](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/LPCQXBAKBREDHJXQN57JLLCLA4.jpg\")
Student Rosalie de Groot with her bicycle in Dublin <\/p>\n