A Dublin City Councillor has said he stands by remarks in which he compared illegal parking on footpaths to “blowing smoke in a baby’s face”.
Paddy Monahan of the Social Democrats made the remark at a meeting of the North Central Area Committee meeting and described it as “off the cuff”.
On Newstalk Breakfast, he said he stands by every word.
“Blowing smoke in a child's face, it's unconscionable, it's unthinkable, it's repellent and nobody would do that,” he explained.
“What I'm saying is, there are other countries where parking on a footpath, it's unconscionable, it's repellent.”
Cllr Monahan continued that many people who park illegally underestimate the huge inconvenience their actions cause to other people, whose lives they have little insight into.
“The issues around it are things like the dangers and inconvenience that they cause to people with disabilities, with mobility issues, old people, parents, parents of buggies, just lowly pedestrians trying to get around,” he said.
“It's extremely selfish behavior, extremely selfish [and] we're blind to it in Ireland.”
Illegal foothpath parking. Picture by: Alamy.com. As the son of a wheelchair, the issue is personal for Cllr Monahan.
“This made my blood absolutely boil, having to deal with this,” he recalled.
“I used to call into people's houses, tell them to move their cars.
“I used to put stickers on people's cars.”
The reaction, he added, varied; while some responded with “just pure bullishness” or even anger, some people expressed “mortification.”
Cllr Monahan is far from the only person to raise the impact of illegal footpath parking, with many disabled people having contacted Newstalk about it over the years.
Main image: Illegal foothpath parking. Picture by: Simon Dack / Alamy
