BusConnects - Cyclist Support Vital

magicbastarder

Chips Lovell wrote: »

To me, the biggest flaw in the plan was they attempted to pander to everyone and pleased virtually no one.

or, as is with a lot of things like this, the people who stand to benefit are legion but diffuse, and the people who stand to lose are much smaller in number but very specific.

an example being the pinch point at the bottom of the malahide road, through which many buses pass - there's about 5o houses on that stretch, and a bus lane inbound only. there are potentially a hundred thousand people served by buses (that figure is plucked straight out of the air) which use that road; much harder for them to make their voice heard when the benefit is (at the moment) theoretical, than it is for people in the 50 or so houses which may lose a metre or two of their front gardens.

Weepsie

average_runner wrote: »

In fairness I don't think any one should lose their garden and can understand their anger over. For example Crumlin Road is not full of rich people but they want to take some of their small gardens, best of luck and it will end up in court.

An aerial view of Crumlin road shows that most of the gardens have been concreted over or extended into. I honestly don't believe the majority of people care about their garden at either end of the scale, but they know a bit of a fight might lead to bette recompense.

The majorirty of people likely don't care about saving the trees on Mobhi Road either, because if they did, they'd stop driving their cars the few hundred metres to the various schools in the area every morning.

People are failing to look at the bigger picture, and the possible societal good that this would do.

Ballymun basically has a Dual Carriageway going through it to accomodate the heavy traffic volume. The people on Mobhi Road and elsewhere who are most vocal on that side of the city about objecting this, couldn't care a jot about that and were certainly not worrying about trees then. They could get to Ikea or the Airport quicker, so it suited them then.

magicbastarder

FWIW, i live on a busconnects route, but have a decent front garden (about 40 foot long) which is not going to be affected either way.

also FWIW - i chopped down most of the trees in the garden in the last year.

Macy0161

Hurrache wrote: »

Removing trees on the basis they may some day fall over, sure why bother planting any in the future. There's preventative maintenance on them as it is anyway. But because people don't want trees remove where possible, it doesn't make them idiots either.

I was being flippant, but it's purely selfish the majority don't want trees cut on "their" road. As has been said, the solution to not widening the roads, and therefore not necessitating taking trees and gardens, is more restriction on cars. The NTA/ Politicians don't have the balls for that though.

Hurrache wrote: »

Look at how O'Connell Street turned out.

fwiw I think O'Connell Street looks miles better than it used to. Only thing I miss is the floozie!

Breezer

magicbastarder wrote: »

what bugs me is the 'save the trees because of climate change!' argument (i've seen this many times).
some maths:
an average car will produce over 150g of CO2 per km driven (a petrol car managing 5.6l per 100km produces 130g of CO2 per km; you would not expect to get that efficiency in an urban area in a petrol car).
a tree - under ideal conditions - can absorb maybe 100g of CO2 per day. it's actually closer to half that, so let's say 75g as a compromise.

this means that simply driving 500m in a car produces as much CO2 as a single tree can absorb in one day.

on a road near me (mobhi road), there are trees roughly every 20m, so 50 on each side of the road per km; if you drive the 1km along that road, and make the return trip, in one day; in one car, you have taken up the CO2 sequestration of 4 of those 100 trees.

i.e. just 25 cars making a return trip on that road per day overwhelms the ability of the trees to deal with the CO2 emitted. that's less than one third the capacity of a single double decker bus (based on a passenger capacity of 1.3 people per car)

i'm a tree hugger, i know there's a hell of a lot more utility to street trees than just carbon sequestration, but that aspect of it is so miniscule as to be irrelevant. (and i know no-one here made the argument, i just felt like giving out).

That's on my commute and they are gorgeous mature trees. I'm very pro Bus Connects and if trees have to come down, they have to come down. I do find myself wondering would we be better off making Mobhi Road one way for private cars, and making Botanic Road and Ballymun Road one way the other way? It'd be private traffic chaos but Hart's Corner is mental anyway and to be frank, who cares. And we'd save the trees. Surely this is an alternative in most places where trees are due to be felled?

Chips Lovell

Macy0161 wrote: »

As has been said, the solution to not widening the roads, and therefore not necessitating taking trees and gardens, is more restriction on cars. The NTA/ Politicians don't have the balls for that though.

Politicians in power at least. I recall Eamon Ryan came out and said you could deal with these concerns by throttling back on the provision for cars.

magicbastarder

one option they were looking at was a system like that - outbound buses might go past the botanic gardens and up old ballymun road, and inbound would come down mobhi road.

average_runner

Weepsie wrote: »

An aerial view of Crumlin road shows that most of the gardens have been concreted over or extended into. I honestly don't believe the majority of people care about their garden at either end of the scale, but they know a bit of a fight might lead to bette recompense.

The majorirty of people likely don't care about saving the trees on Mobhi Road either, because if they did, they'd stop driving their cars the few hundred metres to the various schools in the area every morning.

People are failing to look at the bigger picture, and the possible societal good that this would do.

Ballymun basically has a Dual Carriageway going through it to accomodate the heavy traffic volume. The people on Mobhi Road and elsewhere who are most vocal on that side of the city about objecting this, couldn't care a jot about that and were certainly not worrying about trees then. They could get to Ikea or the Airport quicker, so it suited them then.

Just because a garden is cemented over, doesn't mean they do not care about their garden, its their space for their own use.

Weepsie

average_runner wrote: »

Just because a garden is cemented over, doesn't mean they do not care about their garden, its their space for their own use.

An awful lot of the same people going on about the environmental impact of cutting down trees are the very owns concreting over their gardens so they can fit their second and third cars in. That was more my point.

Hurrache

Weepsie wrote: »

An awful lot of the same people going on about the environmental impact of cutting down trees are the very owns concreting over their gardens so they can fit their second and third cars in. That was more my point.

A lot of older people like to pave it in order to reduce maintenance as they get older, of which there's a large amount in the areas immediately affected

average_runner

Weepsie wrote: »

An awful lot of the same people going on about the environmental impact of cutting down trees are the very owns concreting over their gardens so they can fit their second and third cars in. That was more my point.

And nothing wrong with that. Maybe there is two cars there because kids are living at home due to the housing crisis.


Anyhow when we go EV, it be all ok

Just make the road a one way system, simple

Hurrache

average_runner wrote: »

Anyhow when we go EV, it be all ok

We'll need lots of additional on street car parking added in order to provide on street charging.

average_runner

Hurrache wrote: »

We'll need lots of additional on street car parking added in order to provide on street charging.

That's ok, we can get rid of the cycle lanes then.

Weepsie

average_runner wrote: »

And nothing wrong with that. Maybe there is two cars there because kids are living at home due to the housing crisis.


Anyhow when we go EV, it be all ok

Just make the road a one way system, simple

Better bus connections and public transport connections would mean that those extra cars shouldn't be required. In reality, a lot of the cars on the road now are not required. People are (a) just lazy and (b) feel like it is their absolute right, rather than a privilege that should be earned.

average_runner

Weepsie wrote: »

Better bus connections and public transport connections would mean that those extra cars shouldn't be required. In reality, a lot of the cars on the road now are not required. People are (a) just lazy and (b) feel like it is their absolute right, rather than a privilege that should be earned.

If you can afford it, it is a privilege you earned.



Having more buses passing by your house at a closer distance isn't healthy.

magicbastarder

i think very few people are arguing that those people affected should be happy about it.
it's a public infrastructure project, the balance to be struck is whether it's in the public interest to proceed anyway.

Weepsie

average_runner wrote: »

If you can afford it, it is a privilege you earned.

Having more buses passing by your house at a closer distance isn't healthy.

Having more busses passing by is perfectly fine if it drasstically cut the amount of cars on our roads.

that said widening roads might just leave people to see the extra space and jump in their car and to hell with everyone else


I'll say that to the next person who complains when I'm on the road. "This is a privilige I've earned" Nonsense guffaw.

average_runner

magicbastarder wrote: »

i think very few people are arguing that those people affected should be happy about it.
it's a public infrastructure project, the balance to be struck is whether it's in the public interest to proceed anyway.

Would agree if this wasn't Ireland. We don't do things the right way here

Weepsie

average_runner wrote: »

Would agree if this wasn't Ireland. We don't do things the right way here

And when we try everybody objects because they don't want to lose out on their space, give their time.

"It's all right for the greater good, so long as it doesn't impact me"

average_runner

Weepsie wrote: »

And when we try everybody objects because they don't want to lose out on their space, give their time.

"It's all right for the greater good, so long as it doesn't impact me"

There is alternatives that we could do, ie a one way system. Invading people space is not the answer.

Oh and your losing the cycle lane on Crumlin Road with Bus Connect, so this is another reason to be against it

Breezer

Weepsie wrote: »

Better bus connections and public transport connections would mean that those extra cars shouldn't be required. In reality, a lot of the cars on the road now are not required. People are (a) just lazy and (b) feel like it is their absolute right, rather than a privilege that should be earned.

Unfortunately that's not where the government is heading. They're planning to incentivise mass purchasing of new cars (albeit electric/hybrid), have rowed back on the public transport plans they had (Metrolink, Bus Connects) and not planned any major new public transport initiatives.

Don't get me wrong, I'll be happy about the EVs If they happen, but modal shift needs to occur too and Fine Gael has run out of ideas. They'll do the bare minimum not to upset anyone and stay marginally ahead of Fianna Fáil next time out.

Chips Lovell

Yes, while electric vehicles have some merits, they're not a silver bullet for all problems. They do nothing to solve congestion for example.

Weepsie

Chips Lovell wrote: »

Yes, while electric vehicles have some merits, they're not a silver bullet for all problems. They do nothing to solve congestion for example.

Plus Lithium mining is already have a devastating impact in areas where it is occuring. It's just shifting from one environmental crisis to another.

average_runner

Weepsie wrote: »

Plus Lithium mining is already have a devastating impact in areas where it is occuring. It's just shifting from one environmental crisis to another.

Which is what our government does all the time!


Remember they said Diesel was more friendly than Petrol 10 years ago

Breezer

average_runner wrote: »

Which is what our government does all the time!


Remember they said Diesel was more friendly than Petrol 10 years ago

To be fair, that was based on the best scientific evidence available at the time. It is better in terms of climate change. We just weren't aware of how much other stuff it spews out that's hazardous to human health.

magicbastarder

Breezer wrote: »

Unfortunately that's not where the government is heading. They're planning to incentivise mass purchasing of new cars (albeit electric/hybrid), have rowed back on the public transport plans they had (Metrolink, Bus Connects) and not planned any major new public transport initiatives.

they're sending mixed messages:
'We want to force private motorists out of their cars'
https://www.independent.ie/news/environment/we-want-to-force-private-motorists-out-of-their-cars-38229046.html

Mercian Pro

Given that the second round of public consultation has started following publication of revised Core Bus Corridors, it might be worth checking out the detail at https://busconnects.ie/initiatives/core-bus-corridor-project/
There are Public Information Days planned for each corridor and you can leave comments there or on the website.
In my own area they have increased the amount of disruption to general traffic in order to minimise encroachment on trees and gardens while facilitating the bus corridors and segregated bike routes. This is likely to lead to plenty of objections from those who drive through the area and this will need to be countered by those who cycle or take the bus.

eeeee

From the Blackrock end:
"The width of the road between Estate Avenue and Merrion Gates junction
has been reduced to a three-lane arrangement with outbound bus lane only to reduce land take and impact on trees."

FFS :mad:

And to make it worse, the cycle lane becomes a footpath at almost every. single. bus stop.

That's a pure fcuking disaster. You'd find it hard to do worse.

Fcuk sake.

eeeee

Also almost every single route features the old 'fire the cyclist into oncoming left turning traffic'.
Great, more cycle lanes I can't use, more punishment passes and angry motorists because we can't use the shye designed cycle lanes.
FFS!
:rolleyes:

blackbox

Breezer wrote: »

To be fair, that was based on the best scientific evidence available at the time. It is better in terms of climate change. We just weren't aware of how much other stuff it spews out that's hazardous to human health.

Of course we were.

It was the green agenda to reduce CO2 at the expense of everything else.