Niall Kiely, senior consultant, Carr Communications
What was your first machine? Around 1970 my Dad spent 40-odd quid to buy me a Yamaha 70 which I named Bucephalus. Wonderfully liberating for a UCC student carousing long after the buses stopped running. None of your sissy helmets in those days. My survival remains a joyful mystery.
What attracted you to two rather than four wheels? They're such damned fun! You go where and when you please and park at will. I'm with the Robin Williams school of thought: God gave man a brain and a penis, but only enough blood to run one at a time.
Do you have a car? Yes, a Honda CRV.
So why do you need a bike as well? A car is an affliction and a cross in Dublin right now. A bike makes more sense when getting through the traffic.
How did your family react to your decision to take to two wheels? Present wife still takes unreasonable exception to my parking plan of chain sawing a front-garden cordyline australis - and I planted it, dammit. Both pre-teen offspring delivered my bikes the echt-accolade of their era: cool. And the AN650: megacool. The defence calls Maggie and Patrick Kiely, m'lud.
Such a large scooter is really just a bike, isn't it? Why not go for a motorbike? I'm neither a petrol head nor a true biker. I relish the scooter's convenience, comfort and safety. On a big bike shoulders, arms, elbows, hips and knees variously get scorched, a scooter offers "lady's bicycle" egress. Mine also offers pretty good wind and rain deflection. Big bikes are for people who take the entire business of personal transport much more seriously than I do - and probably find TV motorbike racing bearable. I couldn't countenance whining around on one of those 50 cc sewing-machine scooters, but the AN650 has oodles of poke for my purposes.
How much do you spend on gear? Not much - several hundred on helmet, good gloves, otherwise any wind or waterproof gear I have to hand. I've a 00 Drizabone waxed-cotton horse-riding coat, perfect for scootering, and I'm thinking of an 0 waterproof boilersuit.
You're obviously not a leather-clad biker then, do you see yourself as an urban professional on two-wheels? Mostly I look like an extra from Central Casting rejected for Mad Max. I don't have a leather fetish. If I were doing a long-distance commute, however, protective gear would loom much larger in my priorities because coming off the machine would become a serious actuarial possibility to factor into my safety equation. There are extraordinary numbers of idiots driving cars now, and increased exposure to their vagaries and ineptitudes would rather ratchet up risk levels. I try hard to "drive smart" and not depend on St Christopher.
Any encounters with the law? I've been pulled over twice for no apparent reason and treated like dirt by motorcycle cops. I pursued one through the full Garda complaints procedure.
If you were minister for transport would you make any improvements for motorcyclists? Yes, all two-wheeled vehicles should have access to bus and taxi lanes - apart from bicycling parasites. Also, I would make clampers the new traffic corps - they're pernickety, efficient and are taken seriously. The gardaí have more important things to do.