has cork city been ruined by bike lanes?

hoodwinked

seriously can people stop blaming cyclists/motorists for these things....this happen's with road junctions all the time, look at that roundabout in togher that became a traffic light junction and then reverted back to a roundabout.... :rolleyes:


if it's not working out, it's not working out, at least they tried it and will now try a different approach, unfortunately all kinds of commuter traffic in Cork tends not to go the way the planners and engineer's envision when they design these layouts and it may take a few attempts to get it right.

Frostybrew

All that needs to be changed here is the traffic light sequence needs to be altered to favour Popes quay, and even then it need only be a minor alteration. I live near that area and pass along Popes Quay several times a day. There is very little traffic on that road. When a build up of traffic occurs it is due to the sequence of the lights, nothing to do with the cycle lane. Sometimes it can be several minutes before the lights turn green, and when it does only for a short period of time, which disrupts the traffic flow from this direction.

The cycle lane on the other hand had made a huge improvement to the street. There's a much more relaxed atmosphere, which seems to have benefitted the businesses located on the street.

enas

Frostybrew wrote: »

The cycle lane on the other hand had made a huge improvement to the street. There's a much more relaxed atmosphere, which seems to have benefitted the businesses located on the street.

This. Pope's quay was a bit grim to be honest before the change.

That's an aspect that often gets overlooked and that should be much more emphasised I believe.

j8wk2feszrnpao

KCAccidental wrote: »

which is due to the usual over reaction of motorists and local politicians.

Not really. It's a 'possible' change to one cycle lane. No need for such an over reaction.

mire

Is it time to suggest a modification to the thread title ?

"Has Cork City been ruined by car lanes"?

whisky_galore

enas wrote: »

This. Pope's quay was a bit grim to be honest before the change.

That's an aspect that often gets overlooked and that should be much more emphasised I believe.

And nothing at all to do with certain businesses that opened up on that stretch??

Stepping Stone

It is simply bad planning/ not reviewing the traffic that is the issue. You cannot change one part of the system without looking at the bigger picture.

They removed one lane without considering that they were halving the potential number of cars to get through the lights.

You see it all the time around the city, the roundabout in Togher, the priority given to traffic to and from the Well Rd, not the main Skehard Rd. Those pavements that prevented buses turning corners on Parnell Place...

It isn't cyclists/ motorists, it is the horrific lack of joined up thinking in City Hall.

mire

Stepping Stone wrote: »

It is simply bad planning/ not reviewing the traffic that is the issue. You cannot change one part of the system without looking at the bigger picture.

They removed one lane without considering that they were halving the potential number of cars to get through the lights.

You see it all the time around the city, the roundabout in Togher, the priority given to traffic to and from the Well Rd, not the main Skehard Rd. Those pavements that prevented buses turning corners on Parnell Place...

It isn't cyclists/ motorists, it is the horrific lack of joined up thinking in City Hall.

You are correct in that making changes to road layouts will inevitably have consequences for traffic movements. And that these need to be considered. The removal of one lane along the quays (which is a good idea for many reasons - one of which is that we shouldn't allow our quaysides to be functioning as fast moving traffic arteries in the first place - at the expense of safety, pedestrians, businesses, public space, amenity etc) will not half the number of cars going through the junction; traffic capacity is not dictated solely by the number of lanes, so that is a major exaggeration.

In addition, if those changes reduce the capacity of the quays in vehicular terms, improve its attractiveness as a pedestrian and cycle route, calms the overall traffic environment, well then - minor inconveniences such as delayes to motorists are, on balance, justifiable. Absolutely they are.

But, more importantly, we should be asking ourselves what kind of a city centre do we want. Should the priority be for

1. Ensuring cars get through and around as fast as possible?
2. Re-balance the priority in favour of non-car users?

Stepping Stone

mire wrote: »

You are correct in that making changes to road layouts will inevitably have consequences for traffic movements. And that these need to be considered. The removal of one lane along the quays (which is a good idea for many reasons - one of which is that we shouldn't allow our quaysides to be functioning as fast moving traffic arteries in the first place - at the expense of safety, pedestrians, businesses, public space, amenity etc) will not half the number of cars going through the junction; traffic capacity is not dictated solely by the number of lanes, so that is a major exaggeration.

I think that you misunderstood me. What I meant was that reducing the lanes from two to one reduces the potential numbers of cars getting through the lights.

For example, if we assume that three cars get through the lights on a green currently, and there has been no adjustment to the timing sequence since before the work, that means that previously with two lanes, there was a potential for six cars to get through.

I would imagine that if anything the number of cars has dropped along there if anything since the introduction of the cycle lanes?

TheChizler

Stepping Stone wrote: »

For example, if we assume that three cars get through the lights on a green currently, and there has been no adjustment to the timing sequence since before the work, that means that previously with two lanes, there was a potential for six cars to get through.

That only makes a difference if the junction is constantly at capacity, if it were then tailbacks would lead as far as the next junction at these times. It doesn't seem like this is happening so the junction must be operating under capacity.

Stepping Stone

TheChizler wrote: »

That only makes a difference if the junction is constantly at capacity, if it were then tailbacks would lead as far as the next junction at these times. It doesn't seem like this is happening so the junction must be operating under capacity.

I agree, but my point is that they should have looked at it as a whole. They implemented the scheme, therefore they should have forseen issues. Drivers feel that they are being delayed, therefore there is resentment about the cycle lanes. A small tweak of the light sequence should have been made to give the sense that traffic was moving as fast as before. Obviously it needs to be a comprehensive change, but it should have been considered.

SpaceTime

Cork urgently needs much better public transport (and I mean just busses essentially although a tram line or two might be an idea).

In the short to medium term they could do with building a few more multi stories on the edge of the city centre too. I know there's a good few but the prices are insane for what's involved. The council needs to incentivise provision of parking at an attractive price.

Driving cars up and down narrow city streets doesn't make sense really. Another service the city could offer is some kind of shop and park mini busses in the city centre to link up the car parks on the edges. That would be a huge assistance to shoppers who aren't so mobile or have lots of bags.

The city centre needs to think of itself as a shopping centre really and provide those kinds of facilities.

You don't drive your car up and down the mall at Mahon Point or Dundrum so, why do you need to do that in Patrick's St?

TheChizler

SpaceTime wrote: »

In the short to medium term they could do with building a few more multi stories on the edge of the city centre too. I know there's a good few but the prices are insane for what's involved. The council needs to incentivise provision of parking at an attractive price.

I agree about the prices but aren't the various multi-stories around rarely full?

SpaceTime

Something is seriously up then as the prices are FAR too high for a city this size.

Dannyboy83

Stepping Stone wrote: »

It is simply bad planning/ not reviewing the traffic that is the issue. You cannot change one part of the system without looking at the bigger picture.

They removed one lane without considering that they were halving the potential number of cars to get through the lights.

You see it all the time around the city, the roundabout in Togher, the priority given to traffic to and from the Well Rd, not the main Skehard Rd. Those pavements that prevented buses turning corners on Parnell Place...

It isn't cyclists/ motorists, it is the horrific lack of joined up thinking in City Hall.

This is spot on imo.
Most of the problems at Pope's quay were caused by the poorly timed lights.

I'm surprised at how many people commented they never noticed heavy traffic here, compared to what I experienced on a daily basis for about a year.
However, it does make sense. There are a higher number of HGVs trying to get onto the N20 at 6.30am, and this was usually when the problems would arise.
Usually one, maybe two HGVs would make it across the intersection before the lights would change (it seems to be a difficult turn for a HGV to make anyway). Then a queue forms.

I noticed a lot of people commenting that people were either turning right for the N20 or going for Sunday's Well, but - in my experience at least - about 1 in every 3 cars was actually going up Mulgrave Rd. That was why it became so dangerous - people became frustrated at queueing behind all the right turning vehicles and just started using the empty left lane, then cut through the intersection (and frequently red lights).
The problem for me was that I was the dummy who was prepared to queue to head up Mulgrave Rd, so I would subjected to lunatics trying to cut through me all the time, lol!
Laughs aside, someone could easily be killed here if they weren't prepared for the phantom merging.

A better timed light would have nipped this in the bud. It's crazy to think this has persisted for a year without being addressed.

thomil wrote: »

The basic fact remains that Cork is a city that is not built for cars. People should finally realise that. If you want to make Cork a car-friendly city, pretty much the only way to achieve that is to carpet bomb the entire city area, and rebuild it from the ground up with an appropriate road network.

I agree, I think trying to make Cork more car friendly is daft tbh.
We should really be looking for ways to take cars out of the city, or better yet, ban private cars.
I said from the outset that I welcomed the cycle lanes, but that it wasn't going to work without an orbital road.

Dublin didn't have to destroy the city, they just built the M50.
Cork needs a similar solution.

monument

Dannyboy83 wrote: »

Dublin didn't have to destroy the city, they just built the M50.
Cork needs a similar solution.

The N40?

Stepping Stone

monument wrote: »

The N40?

The southern ring road isn't much good for bypassing the city centre really. You still have to go through the city centre to get to or from the Northside.

Ludo

Stepping Stone wrote: »

The southern ring road isn't much good for bypassing the city centre really. You still have to go through the city centre to get to or from the Northside.

Or take the tunnel and onto North Ring to avoid city centre. Not ideal but the option is there.

Stepping Stone

Ludo wrote: »

Or take the tunnel and onto North Ring to avoid city centre. Not ideal but the option is there.

You are practically back in town by the time you get to Silversprings though and nobody coming from the west or south will take that option. The north ring road is pretty congested, so not much faster a lot of the time.

SpaceTime

Ludo wrote: »

Or take the tunnel and onto North Ring to avoid city centre. Not ideal but the option is there.

There's a northern ring?!?
It looks more like a local road through some housing estates and suburbs to me...

The tunnel really serves the Eastern side of the City from Montenotte, Mayfield, Silversprings, Glanmire. Other areas of the Northside are actually totally reliant on cutting through town really and are quite badly served with roads compared to the south, west and east.

whisky_galore

SpaceTime wrote: »

Something is seriously up then as the prices are FAR too high for a city this size.

Extortionate, never again will I use one.

Ludo

SpaceTime wrote: »

There's a northern ring?!?
It looks more like a local road through some housing estates and suburbs to me...

The tunnel really serves the Eastern side of the City from Montenotte, Mayfield, Silversprings, Glanmire. Other areas of the Northside are actually totally reliant on cutting through town really and are quite badly served with roads compared to the south, west and east.

I didn't say it was necessarily faster...just pointing out that you don't HAVE to go through town. It is an option. Douglas to Blackpool can be faster to go through tunnel and North ring than thru town. All depends. Check traffic before you leave and decide.

lisasimpson

I do like the bike scheme and the idea of cycle lanes, however some of them weren't planned great and some of the bike stations could have in better places instead of taking up parking spaces. The council and others need a reality check in relation to traffic management in cork...no point in suggesting a ban on cars when there is no plan b - proper public transport in place. The area over by the albert quay site for example has the potential to become a bottle neck with the building is finished and occupied... now Im not against the building I welcome it, will do wonders for the city. Phase three over in Mahon has started...over there is already madness at times. its great having all these developments. On top of that add in the housing/rental situation in cork where people are living further away from the city they have no option to drive to work. So traffic management/planning really needs to get sorted. Probably peoples attitudes to driving to work need to change a bit too, I know of a number of examples where people live within a 10/15 min walk of work and insist on driving everyday

SpaceTime

Ireland's weather doesn't help much either. Most of the year, walking to / from work isn't a viable option as it's highly unpredictable and you get soaked.

The other massive problem here is that the schools aren't actually a planned, public system and they're complete chaos. Historical hang ups about religion and single sex schools means parents drive unusually long distances and make multiple drops for different children. In a lot of other places I've lived they've just got excellent local schools and that's where the vast majority of kids go. Here it's all about minor barrier fees, snobbery, religion, gender etc

I know families that drive their kids 20km each way to go to a particular school of choice.

The moment school holidays kick in, there's no traffic!! So, the school "system" and lack of an ability to organise or use school transport has an absolutely massive impact on morning traffic.

I like some aspects of Ireland but on certain issues we're completely weird.

enas

SpaceTime wrote: »

I like some aspects of Ireland but on certain issues we're completely weird.

As a matter of fact, I have lived in many countries too, and, as a non-Irish national with children of school-going age, I really value the Irish school system that lets you freely choose a school for your children.

However, even with that system, in the vast majority of cases, distance to school are short, with a ridiculous percentage (around 50% if I remember correctly in Dublin and Cork) of school runs under 1km!

I share your opinion that school runs are responsible for a vast amount of traffic, but that problem is not due to either the school system nor the lack of school transport, but bad urban planning and poor road designs that renders walking and cycling an unattractive choice for kids to travel to school.