Ever since the New York Times covered the idea in April 2006, I was wondering how long it would take Michael O'Leary to use it for creating a media storm: Standing room for airline passengers. After all, you can stand on a bus, can't you? And deceleration in a crash is not much higher ... or is it?

Now O'Leary, CEO of Ryanair, has hogged the headlines with his sudden brainwave to introduce "standing room only" tickets, squeezing another six or so seats out of his beloved Boeing 737. It makes me wonder, however, that the Chinese beat our man Michael to it - no-frills carrier Spring Air already contemplated the same idea in public earlier this year.

Madness?

I don't think so. Retention systems for standing passengers may actually be safer for the passenger than the old "belt and backrest" approach to crash damage limitation. After all, would you rather experience a few g strapped onto a plank or held by a belt around your waist? And stretching your legs wouldn't be such a problem either. As long as they supply some sort of misericord to rest during flight, I wouldn't mind a standing room ticket.

But then again I have to say ... I don't really see it happening any time soon. Because the aviation regulatory bodies will have to agree. And that can be a time-consuming process.

In a rather cunning plan, tourism think-tanks have now recommended to reinvent Ireland as a travel destination for cyclists. With an eye on Ireland's late railways - late as in "gone and lamented", not as in reference to timekeeping.

When the optimistic second half of the 20th century came to be, many countries scrapped railway lines left, right and center. The future was the car. And words like "emissions" and "greenhouse effect" were the stuff of dystopian novels. Now that roads are clogged and you can hardly breathe within shouting distance of them we know how clever this was. Thanks very much!

Anyway ... the old embankments and cuttings scan still be found in the landscape, often overgrown, but always forming an old, straight track that connected towns in remote areas. Now Irish planners want to follow Continental examples where such tracks were reused as cycle tracks, instant attractions without the danger of speeding juggernauts. A viable plan?

When an old railway track near my (German) home town was reactivated in such a way during the late 1970s, it was said to be a folly. Today it is an attraction, especially for local families wanting a good and safe day out cycling. So go ahead, I say ...

The venerable prison of Armagh, owned by the city council, 230 years old and at the moment disused, is to open again. As a hotel. The redevelopment will be similar to that of Oxford Prison - reinvented as the Malmaison Hotel.

Reusing old prisons is a tough theme in Northern Ireland. Many want to keep the prisons as reminders of (real or perceived) injustices, others would rather erase them from the landscape altogether, freeing up prime real estate in many instances. And as the former prisons in Kilmainham and Wicklow Town prove, they can be a tourism attraction too.

In a comment on the Armagh redevelopment, former inmate was quoted as follows: "I just hope the food is better now!"

"Spending your holidays in the republic won't save you money — there's better value to be found overseas." This is the rather gloomy verdict of Sunday Times writer Gabrielle Monaghan on spending a vacation in Ireland. You can read the whole article online here.