Galway traffic

Mrs OBumble

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120298650#Comment_120298650

I've come down there around 7pm pretty frequently, and there has been no noticeable traffic.

Mervyn Skidmore

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120298738#Comment_120298738

Yes, I should have said between around 5 and 6ish.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120298579#Comment_120298579

I do wish the original, and still widely used officially, and in the UK, meaning of dual carriageway was more understood; a road divided by a central median, to give two separate carriageways. It has obvious implications for clarity of communications re safety.

Pedants are an endangered species in Ireland I think.

GBXI

It should be 80kph, 50 is ridiculous.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120298551#Comment_120298551

All of the other things on the list are much more likely to happen if the road is built

Prove it

Show me how the bypasses of Oranmore, Athlone, Limerick, Waterford etc etc etc etc, led to a reallocation of road space, enhanced PT etc upon the opening of their bypasses. I'll let you choose the location you want, but show how the opening of a bypass led to reduced priority for cars, reduced parking, better PT, better infrastructure for AT

That line keeps getting trotted out with a "just trust me bro" attitude. If it was legit it should be provable with evidence

many of them will not work without the road being built.

Thats not even remotely true. Pick anything I listed and explain how it won't work until a ring road is built.

Unrealistic

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120298551#Comment_120298551

@GBXI "All of the other things on the list are much more likely to happen if the road is built"

I haven't seen anything credible that suggests this is true. Experience suggests the opposite; that there will be empty talk about facilitating other modes of transport to get the ring road over the line and then it will be all forgotten about as soon as the road gets the green light.

@GBXI "and many of them will not work without the road being built."

I don't think this is true either. Which of those measures do you think could not work without the ring road being built? Dublin has shown that it is possible to simultaneously reduce private motor vehicle traffic (by almost 50%) and significantly increase the number of people commuting into and living in the city centre. We have the example just a couple of hours away that reallocating road space so that cars still have access, but public transport, walking and cycling become more attractive, means that more people can be moved along those roads. Why wouldn't that work in Galway?

@GBXI "And at first you think, jees why isn't this built first and then the houses after? Makes sense initially but the council have shag all resources to make that happen and are reliant on the house being built and people being there to actually use the bath before building it."

That's not true either. The Council has more money in its Active Travel allocation than it is able to spend. It only drew down a fraction of its allocated budget last year. The reason footpaths are not getting built is because the Council is not prioritising them even when given 'free money' to build them.

@GBXI "When Galway gets the chance to progress itself, it needs to just do it."

That's a subjective interpretation of progress. There are plenty who would view an expanded Galway still completely dependent on private car transport as totally regressive rather than progress.

@GBXI "I think the vast majority of locals are very much in favor of this but there's a vocal minority (or in the case of Friends of the Environment, a skilled legal minority) that are not."

a) yet another commentator who chooses to shine a spotlight on one of the three parties who appealed the ABP decision but omits mentioning the prominent Galway business that also took the case in it's own name and that the Galway Race Committee, funded by a cross section of Galway businesses, also appealed the ABP decision.

b) there is indeed still significant support for the ring road but much of it is based on the mistaken impression that it will 'solve' Galway's traffic problem when it will actually just create more traffic. Many people seem to be unaware that even the planning application for the road projects that overall traffic will increase, traffic on many roads in the city centre will increase rather than decrease, and travel by public transport, bike and walking, will remain at their current low percentages.

c) thankfully there is a growing cohort who are starting to recognise this reality. Dara Bradley came on board last week in the City Tribune when he called for people to stop pretending that the road was not actually about making land on the outskirts of the city more valuable for development. How long before Keith Finnegan joins in, I wonder?

thebackbar

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120298551#Comment_120298551

You're pretty much contradicting yourself when you state 'All of the other things on the list list are much more likely to happen if the road is built' but at the same time you state the council have shag all resources which implies that they wont happen.

At the moment traffic from the west side of the city heading into the city is backed up to Barna in the mornings, if you build the bypass say 10% of this traffic in the mornings might go away (that's a very generous assumption), however with more and more houses being built any gains from the bypass will be quickly eroded, I haven't seen any plans that would help alleviate the suffering of people living in the west of the city trying to get into town, have you ?

dumb_parade

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120298579#Comment_120298579

There’s been cycle lanes on that road for 25 years, no sign of induced demand or significant use of it…. Might be time to remove the cycle lanes, add a central median and increase the speed limit. Time to use the road space for what needs it most

xckjoo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120299631#Comment_120299631

The cycle lanes are used constantly. It's just a more efficient mode of transport so queues take longer to build up and clear faster. You could also have it 5 lanes wide and it'll still have the same bottlenecks at both end.

I'm pretty sure someone was killed there in the first few years of it being open. I was young so memory might be playing tricks, but distinctly remember the flowers, etc from a driver leaving the road and hitting someone walking on the footpath. I always assumed that contributed to the relatively low speed limit.

xckjoo

Good letter to the editor in last week's City Tribune about ABP rejecting the planning permission for the housing on the Headford Road. Basically highlighting that they knew about the rejection for 4 months and instead of addressing the issues and resubmitting, they've gone on national news to lie about it and cry that it's unfair they have to follow the rules. They're engineers. Following the rules is a massive part of the job.

There's zero chance this crowd will do any planning and improvements if the ring road is built. They're a one trick pony. Everything they're doing is being forced on them and they're doing their best to do it badly

what_traffic

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120299631#Comment_120299631

Incorrect. These tarmac sections along the N6 are SERVICE Ducts. THey were only marked as cycle paths about 10years ago when Council /TII started removing the multilane roundabouts.Primary function though are service ducts. Would be very very expensive to do what you are proposing as they would have to moved.

what_traffic

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120300229#Comment_120300229

Your 100% right on the efficiency. The cycle paths that were created here about 10years ago on top of the service ducting here have the same carrying capacity as the 2 vehicular lanes beside them. The N6 ones are not well connected with the surrounding neighbouring area's, when this road was designed back in the day - it was designed as a Ring Road and was not designed for people on foot or bike. Even at places like the the University /Dyke Road which have very high footfall / bike usage; don't have ramp onto the Dyke Road or stairwell / ramp into NUIG near the Kingfisher on the Southern side of the N6.

dumb_parade

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120300349#Comment_120300349

They are marked a cycle lanes as far as I can see, so you shout SERVICE ducts all you want, but that’s not what the markings say.

Unrealistic

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120301754#Comment_120301754

Maybe read the post more carefully before responding. No one is disputing that there are cycle lane markings. You claimed that there have "been cycle lanes on that road for 25 years", which is not true. I don't know that the road itself has even been open for 25 years yet, but the cycle lane markings are much more recent in any case and (as @what_traffic pointed out above) were painted on to what where originally the service channels. I think the random pieces of tactile paving were added around the same time.

I used to cycle that route twice a day when I worked on that side of town. It is busy enough that I both passed out other people on bikes, and was passed out by those faster than me, on most days. But it could definitely be much more widely used. That cycle lane is OK when you're on it but unless you happen to be living in Sandyvale, and working in Rocca Tiles, it's not going to be much good to you in isolation.

If someone is travelling a 30 minute bike ride from Knocknacarra to Parkmore, then those 2km of cycle lane will only make up a fraction of the total journey. They'll also have to contend with:

• at least four (could be up to seven) lethal roundabouts where the cycle paths just disappear and spit you out among the car traffic. The Browne Roundabout behind the hospital is particularly bad. I see experienced cyclists travelling to the hospital and university every day who cross the road at Westside Shopping Centre and cycle the wrong way up the cycle path rather than risk their lives on that roundabout. I don't do this but I've paid for my stubbornness by being hit by a driver there a couple of months ago, despite the fact that I had multiple lights, reflectors and hi-viz clothing. No injuries, thankfully, but I know people who have been put off cycling for life by that kind of experience.
• multiple left turn lanes to the right of cycle paths where you could be intending to go straight ahead but drivers will still overtake you and cut left across you. This happens so regularly that if I didn't have disk brakes on my bike I'd be under someone's wheel long ago.
• when you get to the new junction that was the Kirwan Roundabout you are in theory looking to continue on the N6 straight through the junction but your options are either to join the cars in one of the two centre lanes or to get off your bike completely and wait to cross at five separate light controlled crossings. If you do the former you're either waiting at a red light hoping the drivers don't take you out in their eagerness to get going when it turns green, or your moving out into the centre lanes when traffic is still moving, hoping that drivers see you and they're not just focussed on the traffic lights trying to get through on amber. If you opt to get off and press the buttons instead you are easily looking at an 8 to 10 minute wait to just go 'straight ahead' through a junction.
• When you're gone through the Ballybrit junction the only way to get to Parkmore is cycling on the hard shoulder of a 100km/h dual carriageway with a slip road cutting across you from your left half way along. I did that once and swore I'd never do it again.

People who need to travel along a route that will include Bothar na dTreabh won't just take that small section of cycle path into account when deciding whether they feel safe doing the journey on a bike or not. I did it daily but I certainly wouldn't take my kids on it. If the government was building a road through a mountain pass and had completed the central part but on one end had left a narrow road on the edge of a cliff with no barrier, and on the other end you had to ford a fast running river, would you think it reasonable to judge the success of the completed section based on the number of users willing to brave the uncompleted sections to get to it? It's the same with cycle routes.

In any case, if you really believe that it's "time to use the road space for what needs it most" then surely you should be advocating for one lane in each direction to be turned into a bus lane?

?Cee?view

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120298390#Comment_120298390

What a joke.

Mrs OBumble

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120304632#Comment_120304632

At least his involvement in the Cycle Bus initiative means he will have been Garda vetted by the school.

rustyfrog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120304632#Comment_120304632

Why? He seems like an upstanding active member of the community.

?Cee?view

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120304724#Comment_120304724

Well in that respect at least he seems to be a step up for the SocDems

Potential for an increase in train services from Ballinasloe and other towns on the rail line

https://galwaybayfm.ie/galway-bay-fm-news-desk/eamon-ryan-voices-support-for-increased-train-services-for-ballinasloe/

https://twitter.com/GalwayCycling/status/1631258403292037120?s=20

London can do it, Paris can do it, Brussels can do it......

The same pattern emerges time after time, in place after place, once safe infrastructure is put in place

what_traffic

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120301754#Comment_120301754

There is nothing more I can add here other than I hope you read Unrealistics detailed explanation, not once but twice to understand it.

dumb_parade

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120305943#Comment_120305943

You might want to get off your high horse or bike or whatever you travel on before you fall off. There's no need for the condescending tone. It says more about you than it does about me.

what_traffic

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120306244#Comment_120306244

You are in danger here of falling off your own wagon here.

Gaspode

OK, back to the snotty remarks I see. Thread closed for a while to allow people to cool off..