Traffic lights in Drogheda are a joke!

kormak

There's too many of them!
and the ones at noticeable bottlenecks are simply not programmed right to allow the flow of traffic through...
i.e. turning right at Mary's st. or the string of ones going North outside Dominics. or indeed the ones coming from Slane on to Trinity st @ Mell.

Driving through the town at around 6am and you get stopped at the ones outside Scotch Hall??! does anybody use these at this hour and do they/should they not work on a sensor?
This morning, the ones going south on the dual carriageway outside Trinity arms were actually malfunctioning, which caused a big hold up before had to drive through a red light!!
I know there'll be many on here who will disagree with my views for all sort of reasons... however I just thought I'd throw it out there...
I regurlary see drivers breaking reds out of sheer frustration!! I would never condone this in any way... it's crazy!
But I know I'm not alone in thinking the traffic lights system is a bit of a joke in certain parts of the town.

atila

100% agree. The traffic management is terrible. There seems no plan or coherance to accessing parking and using the town hence the proliferation of "To let" signs on the main streets. The Town council need to urgently address the traffic situation or else all consumers will decide to avoid the hassle and spend in the fringe retail parks where parking and access are easier.

I appreciate their hands must be tied in respect of funding and that with the town layout, small number of bridges and other such reasons it must be tricky enough but simple measures would make a big difference.

kormak

atila wrote: »

1The Town council need to urgently address the traffic situation or else all consumers will decide to avoid the hassle and spend in the fringe retail parks where parking and access are easier.

Exactly! there's loads of shops/stores I would much prefer to go to, but I always find myself saying... feck it, i'll just nip into the M1 business park.
Woodies being a prime example!!

borderlinemeath

Those ones at scotch hall are a joke. They regularly turn red at 10pm at night when the carpark is closed and not a sinner crossing the road. Why a sensor can't be retrofitted I don't know.

As for the new set up at the duleek st/platin rd/beamore junction, were they necessary at all? A mini roundabout was all that was needed and a set of pedestrian light at the school. The congestion is ridiculous and causes havoc morning, afternoon and evening.

CMpunked

Personally i think a lot of the traffic lights in the town are fine.

The ones that go from outside st. marys church over past mcdonalds, across the bridge and up georges street flow the traffic along great. Your never stuck in traffic there for more than 5 minutes.

The ones at SH should be realistically turned off after a certain time, thats a given.

As for the beamore rd/duleek street's new ones, this should teach parents who put their kids in cars at millmount abbey and meadowview and Drive their kids to congress and the Marys!
I can understand when there were no lights and it was a lot safer to drive the kids to school because those lights were erected more-so for the safety of the hundreds of kids who walked to school, but now that the safe crossing areas are there, why drive and cause more traffic?! :mad:
Grinds my gears.

borderlinemeath

CMpunked wrote: »

Personally i think a lot of the traffic lights in the town are fine.

The ones that go from outside st. marys church over past mcdonalds, across the bridge and up georges street flow the traffic along great. Your never stuck in traffic there for more than 5 minutes.

The ones at SH should be realistically turned off after a certain time, thats a given.

As for the beamore rd/duleek street's new ones, this should teach parents who put their kids in cars at millmount abbey and meadowview and Drive their kids to congress and the Marys!
I can understand when there were no lights and it was a lot safer to drive the kids to school because those lights were erected more-so for the safety of the hundreds of kids who walked to school, but now that the safe crossing areas are there, why drive and cause more traffic?! :mad:
Grinds my gears.

I can understand some of the younger kids being driven to congress ave, but some of the "boys" being dropped off at Marys are twice the size of me!! Laziness indeed.

I do think the traffic would flow far better with just a mini roundabout and pedestrian lights at both schools.

kormak

CMpunked wrote: »

Personally i think a lot of the traffic lights in the town are fine.

The ones that go from outside st. marys church over past mcdonalds, across the bridge and up georges street flow the traffic along great. Your never stuck in traffic there for more than 5 minutes.

Obviously you've never come down the Dublin Rd. in the evenings?!
Right enough, it is fairly free-slowing along the dual carriageway on a quiet day, but my point is the right hand turn for the BullRing @ St. Marys can cause caos the best of days as backed up traffic reduce the carriageway down to one lane.
And then sometimes, some trucker throws a spanner in the works and blocks both lanes!!

Mell is a disaster area on a Saturday pre-lunch!
The residents of Ashfield must be well pissed off at the traffic dodgers nipping through their estate...

Shoe Lover

I agree, traffic management in the early mornings in Drogheda is a shambles! :mad: The amount of time I've wasted sitting at the traffic lights at the Georges Street/Patrick Street Junction! And only the light for traffic coming up the hill is green :eek: It's so fustrating!

And the Scotch Hall lights - that sequence has been changed only in the last week, it used to be green in the mornings all the time, now it's red every bloody morning :mad::mad::mad::mad:

It's not so bad in the evenings though, except for the right hand turn at the Bull Ring which blocks everything. Oh and the fact that the lights take ages to change for the traffic coming down the Dublin Road.

Kaylee

kormak wrote: »

Driving through the town at around 6am and you get stopped at the ones outside Scotch Hall??! does anybody use these at this hour and do they/should they not work on a sensor?

I rang the Council about this last year, asking why there was no sensor on these lights. I got so fed up driving up for the 7am train and being delayed by that ridiculous red light when the Scotch Hall Car Park is shut. I got this guy in the traffic management section who sounded like he was half asleep, said he would look into it. I should have followed it up but I didn't, I felt like a bit of a nut tbh. Glad this came up here - I'm not alone!

The traffic lights on the right hand turn over Mary's Bridge are one of the reasons why I've given up getting the train home and instead get Matthews Bus which drops me over the other side of the town - much less stressful!

gebbel

100% agree with you OP. Especially the lights on the N1/ Dublin Road at the Bull Ring........they only give about 15 seconds green light time to cars heading towards McDonalds...... but way more to (lesser volume!) traffic coming over the bridge from the North Quay/ Shop Street. This contributes significantly to the ridiculous tail-backs that sometimes reach the Black Bull during rush hour.

lucernarian

The stupidity of the timing of traffic lights along the R132 is quite a coincidence when that's also the route which people would use to avoid the Drogheda toll on the M1.

Of course, this coincidence means trying to get to e.g. the train station if you come from Monasterboice or Dunleer is an absolute disaster. Why should I have to wait in traffic on Georges st and the north road for 5 minutes or more in heavy traffic just to see the light traffic from Patrick st having too much time on the green light! The timing is simply crazy.

For fair green, there's only a few seconds for any waiting cars to turn left while Fair St. allows about 30 seconds for the same amount of cars going in the same direction (north)! That makes no sense whatsoever. Traffic coming from either Fair St or Fair Green to George's st should each get 10 seconds as they're both lightly used turns and through traffic to and from the bridge of peace need more priority.

The men responsible for setting these traffic lights in Drogheda are idiots and worse, are being paid to be foolish!

Biggins

To_be_confirmed wrote: »

...The men responsible for setting these traffic lights in Drogheda are idiots and worse, are being paid to be foolish!

From what I have been told, they don't even live in the town to see the complicated mess they have made.
I have been in regular contact with a lot of taxi drivers in Drogheda over this very matter and I can tell you, they alone are cursing them daily.

They as do I, think they (the light timing adjusters) sometimes like to slow the timings down as to 'persuade' the very regular heavy goods vehicles (and maybe others) going through the town not to do so, to use the motorway outside the town and thus the tollbooths.

Depending on what time of the day (in all honesty, most of the time), driving through the town is utter chaos and nothing but painful.

They are certainly not helping attract further cars to the town filled with shoppers.

blingrhino

from kierans on the north road to the grange rath roundabout there are 14
different traffic lights sets -is this a world record??

mornington man

I agree that the sequencing of the lights is a joke. You only have to look at the list of "Traffic Backlog" roads to see this. Donore Rd. / Rathmullan Rd. / Trinity St. /North Rd./Marsh Rd. spring to mind. A number of lights are timed on a 24 Hr. Clock and change whether there is traffic or not. In fact, traffic has been known to flow better when they have been "Out of Order". The only traffic which flows well is inward along the North Quays towards Mary St. Bridge. Some years ago the Port Company got agreement from the Council to "prioritize" traffic leaving the port, as part of a plan to promote the port.
Having spent many frustrated minutes outside the Garda Station heading towards the West St./North Rd. Junction, I decided to see how many "get through" at each light change. Every 7 minutes some 5/6 get through with some amber gamblers included. Not very good if you are stuck outside the Dominican Church or Bru. This situation was compounded with the recent fire at the Weavers and subsequent road closures. Was anything done?, well you know the answer!! So much for "Is Feider Linn":

kormak

Think I might forward this thread on to Ged Nash and maybe LMFM...
Bit of publicity might help the cause!

kormak

blingrhino wrote: »

from kierans on the north road to the grange rath roundabout there are 14
different traffic lights sets -is this a world record??

1. Junction of North Rd. & Cement Rd.
2. Another pair right beside those (just for good measure like...)
3. Junction of Georges St & Patrick's St.
4. Junction of Georges St. & Fair St.
5. Georges St./Trinity St./Narrow West St. juntion
6. Pedestrian crossing on the dual carriageway.
7. Bus Depot junction
8. Bullring
9. Bottom of Mary's St.
10. Scotch Hall
11. Train Station
12. Cross @ Bryanstown
13. Pedestrian crossing @ FloGas/BlackBull
14. Junction for Southgate

Christ! when you think about it... it's a bit over the top alright.

Shoe Lover

I just rang the council there, got really p'd off this morning while waiting at Georges St/Patrick's Street. Rang the traffic number, got through to some guy in that office, asked him if he dealt with trafficlights, he says "yeah", I launch into my story only for him to stop me midway and say "I don't deal with Trafficlights", so then he says he'll transfer me, the phone rang for 2 mins, then I got put through to Accounts of all places :mad:
Anyway, very nice man on the phone there, who listened to me, then said he'd try the extension of the correct man, couldn't get him so he took my details and sent them to two ppl - Barry and Ken who apparently look after the lights. Waiting on a call back from them. Not holding my breath though!

Bykobap

*cough*

gipi

And we're lucky that an election "promise" made in 2007 wasn't followed through, otherwise there'd be yet another set of lights at Wheaton Hall!

kormak

Bykobap wrote: »

*cough*

Ha! very good... I knew I probably missed one.

Shoe Lover

Shoe Lover wrote: »

I just rang the council there, Waiting on a call back from them. Not holding my breath though!

Surprise, surprise, the council didn't ring me back :mad: So I rang them back instead and managed to get straight throught to this Barry person! Apparently another person from the roads section (how many departments do I have to go thru) has been in contact with the ppl that they contract out the lights to, a company called Traffic Solutions. They will do some sort of test and give them back a report but it will most likely be next week before they even get back to the Roads guy :mad: And then he said that even if they do find a problem, there are regulations surrounding when the lights should change and they have to obey those regulations. So I asked him why the scotch hall lights were changed given that the car park is closed at 6am - he couldn't answer that. We'll see what they come up with. I'm not letting this go though!

kormak

Shoe Lover wrote: »

Surprise, surprise, the council didn't ring me back :mad: So I rang them back instead and managed to get straight throught to this Barry person! Apparently another person from the roads section (how many departments do I have to go thru) has been in contact with the ppl that they contract out the lights to, a company called Traffic Solutions. They will do some sort of test and give them back a report but it will most likely be next week before they even get back to the Roads guy :mad: And then he said that even if they do find a problem, there are regulations surrounding when the lights should change and they have to obey those regulations. So I asked him why the scotch hall lights were changed given that the car park is closed at 6am - he couldn't answer that. We'll see what they come up with. I'm not letting this go though!

Jees' fair play Shoelover!
If I get a moment in work, I'll do the same. Power in Numbers and all of that.

Shoe Lover

kormak wrote: »

Jees' fair play Shoelover!
If I get a moment in work, I'll do the same. Power in Numbers and all of that.

Well, this morning just took the bisuit! At 6.15am, at the scotch hall lights, there were 8 cars, a van and a lorry all sitting waiting on the lights to change. It just got on my wick!

See if you get through and get the same response as me - interesting to see if they try to fob you off as well!

Wolfe Tone

Scotch hall lights are a bloody joke, turn them off when the place is shut for gods sake.

Shoe Lover

Still no word back from the council :mad::mad::mad: Went down Mell this morning to avoid George's Street lights. Yesterday morning, myself and about six other cars ended up going through the red lights at the Trinity Arms because the lights from Mell went green FOUR times while the lights going down and straight across the bridge stayed red :(:( Not the first time that has happened!

kormak

Shoe Lover wrote: »

Still no word back from the council :mad::mad::mad: Went down Mell this morning to avoid George's Street lights. Yesterday morning, myself and about six other cars ended up going through the red lights at the Trinity Arms because the lights from Mell went green FOUR times while the lights going down and straight across the bridge stayed red :(:( Not the first time that has happened!

well this was one of the main reasons I started this thread after one morning @ 6.10am, sitting outside Dominics chipper in bisbelief looking at the lights staying red and vehicles having to break them eventually....

Shoe Lover

kormak wrote: »

well this was one of the main reasons I started this thread after one morning @ 6.10am, sitting outside Dominics chipper in bisbelief looking at the lights staying red and vehicles having to break them eventually....

I was probably one of those cars :mad:

Siobh73

My bug bear is the junction of the Donore Road, heading into town, at the Lidl turn. To activate the right turn filter light, you have to stay behind the lights. Most people move forward thinking the reasonable place for the sensor would be half way across the junction and then have to dash across after the lights have changed!

kormak

I mailed the appropriate engineer almost 3 weeks ago now, outlining how ridiculous it is having redlights @ Scotch Hall, at 6.15am when the car park is clearly closed.
I have not yet heard a single thing back, however I have noticed that this light appears to be constantly green now in the mornings??
Anyone else notice this?!
Maybe they did some out complaints on-board....

Shoe Lover

kormak wrote: »

I mailed the appropriate engineer almost 3 weeks ago now, outlining how ridiculous it is having redlights @ Scotch Hall, at 6.15am when the car park is clearly closed.
I have not yet heard a single thing back, however I have noticed that this light appears to be constantly green now in the mornings??
Anyone else notice this?!
Maybe they did some out complaints on-board....

Yep, Scotch Hall lights are working correctly now I'm not sure what happened - whether they took the complaints on board or not. I emailed Ged Nash and he said he'd pass it on and bring it up at some meeting. Then the very next day they were fixed - a bit soon after me emailing him, so I'd say it wasn't him that got it sorted. Maybe they just got themselves a bit of cop on!

kormak

Response fom the Drogheda Boro engineer this morning:

Dear

---

,
Indeed there was a fault with the Traffic Lights at Scotch Hall following their resurfacing of the entrance to the Shopping Centre’s car Park and as a result the Traffic lights were not responding to the Traffic flow pattern.

This was rectified within the last few days and Scotch Hall Traffic lights should only work when it detects traffic coming out from car park and as a result Dublin Road traffic congestion should be reduced at Shopping centre closing times.

Many thanks for your observations/feedback and apologies for delay in replying.

Dingatron

Great stuff kormak good to see they listen in any case.

andrew1977

kormak wrote: »

Response fom the Drogheda Boro engineer this morning:

Dear

---

,
Indeed there was a fault with the Traffic Lights at Scotch Hall following their resurfacing of the entrance to the Shopping Centre’s car Park and as a result the Traffic lights were not responding to the Traffic flow pattern.

This was rectified within the last few days and Scotch Hall Traffic lights should only work when it detects traffic coming out from car park and as a result Dublin Road traffic congestion should be reduced at Shopping centre closing times.

Many thanks for your observations/feedback and apologies for delay in replying.

Well done with the result on this, those set of lights drove me insane with anger every morning on my commute out of Drogheda. !:D

kormak

driving through town this morning @ 07:45am and guess what traffic lights were red?? you guessed it... Scotch Hall!!!
I wonder are we "faulting" again or is there a more sinister reason for this... :eek:

mornington man

Yes, I was held up last night for 3-4 mins, no traffic from shopping centre and no pedestrians. Whats new!!!!:o:o

markc1184

Those lights at Scotch Hall have never been fixed. Many a time I've been stopped late at night long after the shops have closed or indeed early morning. I'm not sure if they are the kind of light that works on a sensor. Usually there are tell tale signs on the road but i can't say I've seen them at scotch hall. That's not to say they don't have sensors though.

Dingatron

kormak wrote: »

driving through town this morning @ 07:45am and guess what traffic lights were red?? you guessed it... Scotch Hall!!!
I wonder are we "faulting" again or is there a more sinister reason for this... :eek:

They were probably scarlet in sympathy with the Make Drogheda Toll Free thread. :pac:

kormak

Dingatron wrote: »

They were probably scarlet in sympathy with the Make Drogheda Toll Free thread. :pac:

well I'm glad you mentioned toll...
because the rumours I heard was that the powers that be, are happy for extra traffic lights and unnecessary red lights in the town to more or less force people to use the tolls!!
It's probably old news and possibly absolute bull****e... but I love a good conspiracy theory!! :cool:

Dingatron

Me too as I think it was the main reason why most trucks stopped going through Drogheda after the initial boycott of the tolls by them

OT It's interesting to note that on the odd day that the lights have failed/switched off traffic has flowed smoothly through the town. For example I've seen the lights turned off specifically for some of the GAA matches where there it was known there was going to be a lot of traffic through the town. Not great if your trying to make a right hand turn though.

ploki66

just thinking with regard to the messed up junction at dominics you could take the lights out on the fairgreen ,trinity street and west street and put a rectangular style roundabout in this area where traffic would flow alot easier you would have no traffic problems from any of these streets especially coming up from the garda station and fair street . and also the lights turning into the town across marys bridge need alot more time to relief the dublin rd and marys street

ploki66

and i almost forgot them blasted lights at the pheasant i live in millmount abbey and you may forget about trying to get out of here when schools are opening and closing and if you think its bad now just wait until they open the new school on the bryanstown crossroute ?

Dingatron

and also the lights turning into the town across marys bridge need alot more time to relief the dublin rd and marys street

Frustratingly the filter light for traffic turning right onto St Mary's bridge from the Dublin Rd is green longer than main traffic light's which is also attributing to the clog up of traffic along the Dublin Road and Mary's Street.

ploki66

sitting here thinking about that and your spot on about the lights going straight on

Speaking of traffic lights, what's up with the loveheart at the bottom of the grove hill, as you're coming off the Bridge of Peace?





Not a great photo of it, but personally, I think it's brilliant. Not sure who done it, but it's genius.

borderlinemeath

kormak wrote: »

Response fom the Drogheda Boro engineer this morning:

Dear

---

,
Indeed there was a fault with the Traffic Lights at Scotch Hall following their resurfacing of the entrance to the Shopping Centre’s car Park and as a result the Traffic lights were not responding to the Traffic flow pattern.

This was rectified within the last few days and Scotch Hall Traffic lights should only work when it detects traffic coming out from car park and as a result Dublin Road traffic congestion should be reduced at Shopping centre closing times.

Many thanks for your observations/feedback and apologies for delay in replying.

Bumping this as it's "on the blink" again.

Scotch hall traffic lights were red for the Dublin Road and green for the traffic coming out of the shopping centre... at 12.45 am on the 26th of December.

Myself a taxi and another car broke the lights, it was ludicrous sitting waiting for traffic to come out of a closed car park..

Dingatron

You reminded me to chase up the sequencing of the lights at the Dublin Road/Bull Ring area. Just sent a mail to the Drogheda Borough engineer. Let you know if I hear anything back.

MugMugs

Sitting at the bus station waiting on the Xtra vision lights to change with no cars waiting. Sat waiting to turn onto the donore road for 4 minutes which would be cool if there was any traffic.

borderlinemeath

Dingatron wrote: »

You reminded me to chase up the sequencing of the lights at the Dublin Road/Bull Ring area. Just sent a mail to the Drogheda Borough engineer. Let you know if I hear anything back.

Was sitting on Mary St in backed up traffic last week thinking about just that. Cars that can't get into the lane turning onto the bridge completely block up Mary St traffic too, they just sit there and refuse to turn onto the Dublin Rd, restricting traffic who want to go straight through the Bullring. :mad:

kormak

I've sent the engineer I was dealing with a mail again to highlight this.
It is ridiculous... had to break a red light yesterday morning @ 06:50am

EI8GHB

One of the major problems with Drogheda's traffic is due to the nature of the layout of the town, straddling the river on two hills. Inevitably a large proportion of journeys around the town will bring you to the dreaded "Dual Carriageway" and all its associated bottlenecks, such as the junctions at the Bull Ring, the Haymarket, and Trinity Street/West Street to name but three.

The proliferation of traffic lights has not helped the situation. I think someone on this board identified 16? sets of traffic lights on the old Dublin-Belfast Road between the Rosehall roundabout to the north and the Grange Rath shopping centre to the south. Ridiculous. I think we need more of those "painted on" white circular roundabouts. Engineers in this town like traffic lights. They seem to want to put traffic lights everywhere. Ironically, the only place that doesn't have them is the junction at the Tholsel.

Drogheda needs two more bridges over the Boyne - one to the west of the Bridge of Peace, and one to the east of Scotch Hall, to help ease the congestion at all the dual carriegeway junctions. Think, for instance, of how much the situation at the Bull Ring would be relieved by a right turn off Dublin Road before Scotch Hall, say for instance opposite the entrance to St. Mary's Hospital. A bridge to the north quay would take a heap of traffic off that filter lane outside St. Mary's Church trying to turn right onto St. Mary's Bridge, thus alleviating also Mary Street traffic.

On the west side of town, we already have a bridge - the M1 Boyne Cable Bridge - but it is tolled. Removing that toll would help massively. (See separate threads on removing the toll campaign). Yes, I am suggesting locals could use the motorway to get from one side of the town to the other. Why not? There are people in Dublin getting onto the M50 at junction 1 and getting off at junction 2, for example, and not being penalised for it.

Anyway, just some thoughts.

lucernarian

I really don't think it's appropriate to treat the route between Dublin and Belfast as a western relief road of Drogheda. Better to build a bridge for traffic from Mell to the Rathmullen Road (and keep the M1 as a PPP rather than spending tens of millions in compensation for taking the tolls off the Donore road junction) - but that's a separate issue.

I think the lights at the bottom of Patrick St. were never necessary, there's not a huge amount of traffic that must use it purely to access nearby residences and I've never seen a massive buildup of traffic there. Also, the yellow box almost acted as a relief for traffic to get out whenever the lights outside Fusion nightclub/Dominic's were red.