A climate policy researcher has said she “hasn’t looked back” since selling her car about six months ago.

Sadhbh O’Neill said she believes she has saved around €5,000 on fuel, insurance and petrol costs in that time.

She told Newstalk Breakfast that she now uses an e-bike in her daily life and hires a car from a local dealer when needed.

“I live in the city centre of Waterford, so I’m not even in suburbia, I’m right in the heart of the city,” Ms O'Neill said.

“Where I live, car parking was a huge challenge and also there’s one-way streets – it was like a nightmare to have a car, to be honest.”

Ms O’Neill said the change required a “mindset change” in order to adjust.

“If you own a car and it’s sitting outside in your driveway and you want to go somewhere, you just go when you want,” she said.

"You arrive and you can usually park the car at your destination quite easily.

“But if you’re using public transport, you have to go and wait at the bus stop, you have to figure out the timetable, you have to figure out where the stop is that you need to get off and then you may need to walk a bit – and you’re at the mercy of the timetable.

“That is a mindset shift, and if you see that as a deprivation, if you see that as something that’s an inconvenience compared to a car, it’s always going to lose out.”

Forcing the right of way on the road for the driver of a car with the participation of a cyclist. Image; Monika Wisniewska / Alamy. 11 June 2018

According to Ms O’Neill, “the burden of that lifestyle change is, for most people, too high”.

“Most people are really quite addicted to their cars, even the ones that don’t need to be,” she said.

“So, I think that it’s going to require cultural change that we have to collectively as a society start to look at cars as the problem, not cyclists, not anything else.

“Cars are the problem – they're choking our streets, they’re making us lazy, they’re making us unfit and they’re making it impossible for children to enjoy freedom, independence and an opportunity to play on the streets.”

Ms O’Neill acknowledged that this was not a practical solution for everyone, but said people should assess whether they really need their car or not.

Main image: Woman cheering and driving car. Image: Tetra Images, LLC / Alamy. 15 May 2014