Armageddon for Dublin City Businesses if people can't drive their cars into city

Carawaystick

lxflyer wrote: »

Well actually officially that is a QBC but like most of the other ones it does have gaps in the on street priority.

None of our QBCs have 100% priority for the entire route.

There is a substantial amount of bus priority on that route.

There is, and with the cat and cage works finished, the main bottleneck is gone. But the brt plan had full buslane the whole way. including the non-bus lane sections I mentioned, apart from Santry...

LXFlyer

Carawaystick wrote: »

There is, and with the cat and cage works finished, the main bottleneck is gone. But the brt plan had full buslane the whole way. including the non-bus lane sections I mentioned, apart from Santry...

But BRT does not equal a QBC - the latter implies substantial bus priority - it does not equal full priority as you seem to think.

BRT takes it a step further to more or less full priority.

LXFlyer

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

There's no need to "defend" anything.. the points have been made.

Those who value their time and have access to alternatives (ie: cars) will take their business elsewhere -this thread was about shopping, not commuting to work after all.

But on that latter point, I wouldn't accept a job in the City Centre that didn't come with flexible hours/work from home options and free onsite parking. I wasted far too many years standing around at bus stops/platforms for buses/DARTs that didn't come and taking the "scenic route" to and from work - even allowing for traffic I could do it in half the time by car.

For all those who are happy to get dropped off somewhere in town, and then have to walk or make another connection to your eventual destination, fair play to ye. It's just as a much a choice as driving the car and if you have that kind of time and patience then why not?

For me though I value my time, comfort and flexibility more and public transport doesn't offer any better - or even comparable - alternatives on those fronts.

I think it boils down to the fact that the only public transport option that you would accept is one that offers you want door-to-door transport for your precise journey, and that frankly is impossible for most options.

Thankfully most people don't share that view and don't mind a short walk at either end of the route.

I also seem to recall that some of your trips were not exactly straightforward such as Virginia to East Point, or were orbital which don't always lend themselves to public transport due to the unique nature of most people's trips. Simple radial journeys into/out of the city centre do lend themselves to public transport however.

_Kaiser_

hardCopy wrote: »

That post is absolute manure of the highest order. What have cars and gridlock got to do with Irish culture?



This was irish culture before Dublin City Council made sh1t of it.

Actually I'd say that was Irish Culture in a time where money and jobs weren't exactly plentiful. When that changed so too did people's expectations and ability to do something about it.

Where the Council/Government (and indeed the CIE group) failed was not investing in better quality services and infrastructure until it was too late - now they have to do it half-assed as usual (LEAP, BRT vs full underground, and the belated joining of the LUAS lines etc)

bk

I heard a representative from the Dublin Car Parks Association talking on the radio and it had my blood boiling!

Basically he said that instead of a complete car ban from College Green, they would prefer London style congestion charging.

So reading between the lines, they want rich feckers in their Mercs and BMW's to continue to be able to drive into the city, pay an expensive congestion charge, pay in their car parks at €6 an hour, all so they can go shopping in Brown Thomas :mad:

To be honest what the NTA is proposing is much fairer to the majority of people who shop in Dublin. Remember, 81% of shoppers in Dublin City got their by walking, cycling, bus, Luas or DART. A mere 19% drove!

The reality is people who drive to Blanchardstown, Dundrum, etc. do so because of free parking. So unless the Dublin Car Parking Association plans to give away free parking, then this simply isn't going to change.

If Dublin City Center wants to compete, then it needs to offer something different to the Blanchardstowns, something that makes it worth leaving your car at home and getting the bus into town.

That difference is an attractive, liveable, city, where it is nice and comfortable to walk around, with lots of onstreet cafes, bar, restaurants, small boutique jewellery and clothing shops. A fun, comfortable and lively shopping and entertainment experience.

Just look at South William Street, around Pyg, all the outdoor bars and restaurants there that are usually jam packed with people. Now imagine how much better and friendlier that street would be if it had no cars on it crawling in and out of the stupid car parks there!

The problem we have in Dublin, is that car drivers only make up 19% of shoppers, yet they easily take up over 75% of the road space! That simply isn't fair and can't be allowed to continue. Their needs to be a rebalancing of road space to reflect the majority of people who actually live and use the city center.

Also the other big problem is that the population of the city is expected to explode over the next 10 years. There is absolutely no way the city with it's small medieval streets can cope with such an increase in car traffic, the city would simply grind to a halt. We are already seeing it with a massive increase in congestion over the last year as the economy is picking up.

This simply can't be left to continue, their simply isn't the road space. It doesn't matter if you like it or not, there simply isn't any other option at this point. The only viable option now to ensure the city doesn't grind to a halt with gridlock and can continue to expand, is by reducing the number of cars coming into the city and improve public transport by giving over more road space to public transport, pedestrians and cyclists.

There simply is no other option and I've yet to see anybody offer an alternative option to the problem of car gridlock.

The only question I've seen is should we simply ban cars from certain key streets like the NTA is proposing or alternatively introduce London style congestion charging like the Car Parks Association is looking for?

Given those options, I think what the NTA is proposing is fairer, as it equally effects everyone, while congestion charging tends to benefit the rich at the expensive of the less well off!

_Kaiser_

lxflyer wrote: »

I think it boils down to the fact that the only public transport option that you would accept is one that offers you want door-to-door transport for your precise journey, and that frankly is impossible for most options.

Thankfully most people don't share that view and don't mind a short walk at either end of the route.

I also seem to recall that some of your trips were not exactly straightforward such as Virginia to East Point, or were orbital which don't always lend themselves to public transport due to the unique nature of most people's trips. Simple radial journeys into/out of the city centre do lend themselves to public transport however.

Indeed, maybe I'm just unlucky that I end up living/working places where public transport is at its slowest and most awkward .. but it's very simple to run a bus/train from A-B in a straight line. How many of these trips represent the average worker's journey or shopping trip though?

Edited to add: Oh, I actually did have the door-to-door option if I'd wanted it until a few months ago, but again it was slower, expensive and no advantage to me as I still need a car for longer trips. All it would have represented was more cost and lost time.

People put up with the additional walking, changing, and delays because they have to - that's entirely different from them happily buying into the idea though. If you gave those people the alternative, how many would jump at the chance and never look back?

Eugene Norman

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

Indeed, maybe I'm just unlucky that I end up living/working places where public transport is at its slowest and most awkward .. but it's very simple to run a bus/train from A-B in a straight line. How many of these trips represent the average worker's journey or shopping trip though?

Edited to add: Oh, I actually did have the door-to-door option if I'd wanted it until a few months ago, but again it was slower, expensive and no advantage to me as I still need a car for longer trips. All it would have represented was more cost and lost time.

People put up with the additional walking, changing, and delays because they have to - that's entirely different from them happily buying into the idea though. If you gave those people the alternative, how many would jump at the chance and never look back?

Plenty. The car park we have isn't full most days. Many people cycle. Or take public transport.

bk

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

People put up with the additional walking, changing, and delays because they have to - that's entirely different from them happily buying into the idea though. If you gave those people the alternative, how many would jump at the chance and never look back?

You mean if the 81% of people who currently walk, cycle and take public transport suddenly bought a car and drove into the city?

I think you would find they would be extremely unhappy sitting in gridlock traffic for hours on end if everyone did the same!

LXFlyer

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

Indeed, maybe I'm just unlucky that I end up living/working places where public transport is at its slowest and most awkward .. but it's very simple to run a bus/train from A-B in a straight line. How many of these trips represent the average worker's journey or shopping trip though?

Edited to add: Oh, I actually did have the door-to-door option if I'd wanted it until a few months ago, but again it was slower, expensive and no advantage to me as I still need a car for longer trips. All it would have represented was more cost and lost time.

People put up with the additional walking, changing, and delays because they have to - that's entirely different from them happily buying into the idea though. If you gave those people the alternative, how many would jump at the chance and never look back?

As I have pointed out to you multiple times before, although you choose to ignore it, the main bus route on virtually every QBC does (since Network Direct), once it has served the estates where people live at the outer end of the route (kind of important), now take a direct route along that QBC, in a straight line to the city.

There will always then be other routes that still serve local communities along every corridor.

Public transport is there to serve everyone, and not just you. It requires a mix of services to deliver a combination of direct and local routes.

cdebru

lxflyer wrote: »

Well actually officially that is a QBC but like most of the other ones it does have gaps in the on street priority.

None of our QBCs have 100% priority for the entire route.

There is a substantial amount of bus priority on that route.

which is exactly what i posted earlier, we start out with great plans then the car lobby or the car parks lobby or the retailers who want customers to be able to park outside the door come along, and we get a watered down version, with gaps and breaks and parking bays and loading bays that actually block the bus lane and it never achieves its potential ( and thats not even mentioning complete lack of enforcement) and the exact same process is starting here with College Green.

BTW
Can anyone tell me how is Keelings (http://www.keelings.com/) allowed to park a van blocking the bus lane on Bachelors Walk outside the winding stair from 7:30am to 8am monday to friday? There is a loading bay about 20 metres away or they could stop on the bottom of Liffey St and walk around the corner, or how about not delivering during peak rush hour traffic ?

LXFlyer

cdebru wrote: »

which is exactly what i posted earlier, we start out with great plans then the car lobby or the car parks lobby or the retailers who want customers to be able to park outside the door come along, and we get a watered down version, with gaps and breaks and parking bays and loading bays that actually block the bus lane and it never achieves its potential ( and thats not even mentioning complete lack of enforcement) and the exact same process is starting here with College Green.

BTW
Can anyone tell me how is Keelings (http://www.keelings.com/) allowed to park a van blocking the bus lane on Bachelors Walk outside the winding stair from 7:30am to 8am monday to friday? There is a loading bay about 20 metres away or they could stop on the bottom of Liffey St and walk around the corner, or how about not delivering during peak rush hour traffic ?

To be fair - some of the locations on the QBCs would require significant CPOs to provide continuous bus lanes, while other locations are just simply not wide enough to facilitate them (including some of the locations mentioned by the other poster above).

It isn't possible to have continuous bus lanes on every route.

That's somewhat different to what you are talking about.

hmmm

A lot of this comes back to our failed urban planning i.e. rural once off housing, or endless low density semi-D estates, which have poor and infrequent public transport options, effectively forcing people to drive. It's all connected - house prices, planning laws, transport, access to city centre shopping, NIMBYs, local government etc. etc. If we had high density suburbs or city centre, it'd be an awful lot easier to have the public transport systems that could accommodate people and their shopping, and which would facilitate quick and reliable access to and from the city centre - I sympathise with the poster above giving out about the bus, it is an absolute pain in the ass trying to bring shopping on a bus.

cgcsb

hmmm wrote: »

it is an absolute pain in the ass trying to bring shopping on a bus.

It's, at worst, a first world problem.

cdebru

lxflyer wrote: »

To be fair - some of the locations on the QBCs would require significant CPOs to provide continuous bus lanes, while other locations are just simply not wide enough to facilitate them (including some of the locations mentioned by the other poster above).

It isn't possible to have continuous bus lanes on every route.

That's somewhat different to what you are talking about.

Some locations aren't suitable but some are just isnt the will to do it, like the cat and cage in drumcondra, it could be done but for years it compromised the swords qbc, other places the qbcs are compromised to facilitate on street parking etc

Spanish Eyes

hmmm wrote: »

I sympathise with the poster above giving out about the bus, it is an absolute pain in the ass trying to bring shopping on a bus.

Not if you have a trolley. Them wans with their trolleys have a great time on the Bus, Luas, Dart. They get on and usually get a seat too!

I think we should ALL get them. No more juggling millions of bags on the bus. Sometimes you just have to be creative!

I use a wheelie backpack. Sling it over the shoulder on the way in, and wheel on the way back. Carries all the heavy items and it's better than a sore shoulder.

But then again I really like Dublin city for shopping, browsing and eating and drinking. If I want DIY, Garden, Home stuff and the like, I'll drive to the shopping centre.

hmmm

cgcsb wrote: »

It's, at worst, a first world problem.

It doesn't matter what you describe it as, it is a problem and it is off-putting to people who will prefer to drive somewhere as a consequence - and the retailers know that if the drivers are forced out of the city, these people are going to drive somewhere else, not get on a bus and go into the city.

Personally I think the idea that we convince people to shift their shopping trips from cars to public transport is largely futile, the shift we need is to fix our planning laws and get people living in the city centre again and not commuting for an hour to outlying suburbs.

OldMrBrennan83

This post has been deleted.

bk

Here is the reality, most of those who want to drive to shop, already largely avoid the city due to the high price of parking and the congestion of medieval streets.

This isn't going to change this. This will just make the city much more attractive for the 81% of shoppers who walk, cycle and take public transport to get to the city.

Even if the city loses some people who want to drive to shop, it won't be any lose to the city retailers as I'm certain it will be more then made up for by the increase in shoppers coming to the city due to the more attractive and safe pedestrian environment.

dubscottie

hardCopy wrote: »

That post is absolute manure of the highest order. What have cars and gridlock got to do with Irish culture?



This was irish culture before Dublin City Council made sh1t of it.

And how many cafe/bars are there?? Note cars.. And what gridlock? Cyclists always complain about cars that "close" pass at speed on the quays etc. If it was gridlock they would be almost stationary right??? HMMM:rolleyes:

The "culture" that I was referring to is this desire to turn Dublin into another "cosmopolitan" European city full off endless half empty cafe/bars. Sure Wexford St is a great place to go if your a hipster but 90% of Dublin do not go to these sort places.

They go into the city centre to shop, cinema and maybe a costa coffee or similar. Any Sat/Sun have a look at how

You just have to look at the UK on how restrictions on cars have killed many a city/town centre. 100's of charity and pound shops is all that is left..

We are coming into the "back to school" time for shops. How many parents are going to drag the kid into town on the bus and back with all the shoes, football boots, trousers etc? None. The will go to some out of town place.

And it wont make it more attractive to shoppers.. Vast open spaces. Look at Smithfield Sq.. The last place you would want to go. What happened to all the fancy bars etc?? The place being infested with bicycles will make people want to avoid the city centre.

BoatMad

IE 222 wrote: »

That's the problem there. Public transport is not just for people who don't have parking space or can't afford a car. Its there to crate convenient and suitable travel option for everyone to use.

Unfortunately if people choose not to use it because they want to use there car instead then there ain't much point investing in it. Use it or loose it.

The country went car mad from the 90s on. The biggest mistake was building all these motorways. But think how bad the roads would be if there wasn't any public transport. You could stay in town shopping with car all week cause you wouldn't be able to get out.

Also Dublin buses are not really designed for high end comfort. They are to move vast amounts of people from one point to the next.

to suggest that building a high quality motorway system was a " biggest mistake " is absurd, the vast majority of transport journeys are taken by car especially interurban and hence there was always a need to create a modern road network which this state had avoided for so long.

as for cars and shopping in dublin city , I agree, no cars in the greater city cent rem so there will be little shopping and the pedestrians, cyclists and public transport users can all cram in to the cute chai latte serving cafes , cause thats all will be there anyway.

Retail in city centres in over

BoatMad

Personally I think the idea that we convince people to shift their shopping trips from cars to public transport is largely futile, the shift we need is to fix our planning laws and get people living in the city centre again and not commuting for an hour to outlying suburbs.

absolutely agree, and we should be building larger out of town centres that can handle the car orientated shoppers properly. The mess in ireland is of course that we are removing cars from the centre and NOT providing any additional large retail centres. The SOuthside M50 is in dire need of a retail park on the scale of Blanchardstown

hardCopy

BoatMad wrote: »

absolutely agree, and we should be building larger out of town centres that can handle the car orientated shoppers properly. The mess in ireland is of course that we are removing cars from the centre and NOT providing any additional large retail centres. The SOuthside M50 is in dire need of a retail park on the scale of Blanchardstown

Like Liffey Valley and Dundrum?

We don't need anything else built near the M50. That's how you empty a city. We need to stop facilitating people's desire to drive to the door of shops, offices, schools etc.

I can understand BT's and Arnott's concerns but the answer to their concerns is not to continue allowing cars drive wherever they want regardless of the social cost, the answer is to stop allowing the development of alternative retail locations.

crushproof

Some of the view points above are truly staggering - I cannot believe some folk still believe in the car-centric viewpoints of the 1950's - 70s. More out of town retail centres, 95% of journeys taken by car, gigantic car parks and increased traffic? The mind boggles!
How people believe that a car choked city centre is preferable to a calm, quiet car free environment is beyond me.
Yes there is much to be done in terms of public transport (DU, LUAS, Metro, cycle lanes) before we can fully start to block off access. But until then little things such as Bus Gate will hopefully make the centre a more pleasant environment in the short term.
And please don't say, "oh we don't have the weather for pedestrianised streets" - Amsterdam is flipping freezing in winter and the streets are still packed with people.

IE 222

crushproof wrote: »

Some of the view points above are truly staggering - I cannot believe some folk still believe in the car-centric viewpoints of the 1950's - 70s. More out of town retail centres, 95% of journeys taken by car, gigantic car parks and increased traffic? The mind boggles!
How people believe that a car choked city centre is preferable to a calm, quiet car free environment is beyond me.
Yes there is much to be done in terms of public transport (DU, LUAS, Metro, cycle lanes) before we can fully start to block off access. But until then little things such as Bus Gate will hopefully make the centre a more pleasant environment in the short term.
And please don't say, "oh we don't have the weather for pedestrianised streets" - Amsterdam is flipping freezing in winter and the streets are still packed with people.

It all boils down to laziness and a lack of willingness to change.

shodge

IE 222 wrote: »

It all boils down to laziness and a lack of willingness to change.

It boils down to if they can afford it, people will take the car over public transport.
Step one to change this mindset is to have the Garda get on buses to check nothing untoward is going on, put the fear of arrest into the usual suspects.
Step two, Ban all eating on bus and bringing on of take away food, we all like a curry but we dont want to smell yours for the journey. The buses would now be clean, no more rubbish left behind.
I reckon these two things implemented and we would be over half way there to a attractive service that would get some out of their car and back on the bus.

Pete_Cavan

shodge wrote: »

It boils down to if they can afford it, people will take the car over public transport.

Right, so don’t the majority of people already choose to park for free at an out of town shopping centre rather than pay high parking rates in the city centre? Pay for parking is likely to be a bigger deterrent to driving into the city centre than greater pedestrianisation and public transport priority. We already have the pay for parking, putting off the majority of motorists, pedestrainisation and public transport priority will attract more people who can shop/socialise/recreate without the car. The people who would be put off by these proposals have already abandoned the city centre.

The other thing is that the less restrictions on people driving into the city centre more people who will do it, thereby causing similar levels of hassle for drivers as if there were more restrictions. People who are determined to use their cars will lose out either way, at least with greater pedestrianisation and public transport priority there are thousands of other people who leave the car at home or who don’t have a car.

bk

shodge wrote: »

It boils down to if they can afford it, people will take the car over public transport.
Step one to change this mindset is to have the Garda get on buses to check nothing untoward is going on, put the fear of arrest into the usual suspects.
Step two, Ban all eating on bus and bringing on of take away food, we all like a curry but we dont want to smell yours for the journey. The buses would now be clean, no more rubbish left behind.
I reckon these two things implemented and we would be over half way there to a attractive service that would get some out of their car and back on the bus.

When I read comments like this I wonder if such people have taken public transport in over 20 years! I wonder if they are simply clinging to misconceptions in order to justify their addiction to their car!

I've been taking Dublin Bus daily for almost 15 years, and in that time I can think of only one relatively mild instance of anti social behaviour * and maybe 4 or 5 times someone brought smelly food on the bus.

And one of the routes I take would be considered one of the "dodgier" routes.

BTW bus drivers don't allow people with smelly food on the bus if they notice, it is only the odd person who manages to sneak it on.

My experience of Dublin Bus is nice, clean, comfortable modern buses, that are well maintained with zero gratify, etc. and where most passengers quietly sit there listening to music or play with their smart phones. Really, for the most part it is all very quiet and civil these days.

Sure, they would be the very odd group of noisy teenagers or Spanish students, but really nothing serious.

* The one time I saw sometime anti-social happen was when two lads down the back of the bus where loudly playing dance music. A passenger stood up and asked them to turn the music off, they in turn threatened to "cut" him. When all of the rest of the passengers then proceeded to turn around and give them the evil eye, they quickly shut up, turned off their music and jumped off the bus at the next stop.

To me this showed how much public transport has changed, where anti social behaviour is really not accepted by the rest of the passengers any more. Also don't forget that buses are jam packed with CCTV cameras nowadays and the bus drivers can quickly radio for the Gardai to come to help if anything happens.

I remember buses when I was a kid 25 years ago, when they were jam packed, with gratify all over the backs of seats and pools of water running down the windows in winter.

It just isn't like that any more. It is so much more civil and comfortable nowadays, it is such an incredible change.

BTW it also isn't true that those who can afford a car, always use one! I can easily afford a car (very good IT job), but I choose not to bother with one. I can get into town by bus in half the time it would take by car and then don't have to stress about finding parking, never mind the expense of it all!

Alun

bk wrote: »

BTW it also isn't true that those who can afford a car, always use one! I can easily afford a car (very good IT job), but I choose not to bother with one. I can get into town by bus in half the time it would take by car and then don't have to stress about finding parking, never mind the expense of it all!

Same here. I'm not a local, but all the time I've lived here in Bray (14 years) I've driven into the centre of Dublin exactly twice, in both cases to pick up some woodworking machinery from a shop in the city centre that wouldn't deliver for some reason. Both times it was an utter nightmare, and I vowed never to do it again if at all possible. I'm lucky I suppose in that the 145 goes past the end of my estate, only a 2 minute walk away, but even then, the thought of navigating the illogical maze that is Dublin's street layout would still deter me from doing it even if I lived further away from a bus route. Maybe if you've grown up with driving through Dublin in the 'good' old days, and have adjusted gradually to the changes and restrictions as they occurred you might be able to manage it without bursting a blood vessel, but for me it's just not worth the hassle.

rp

This article much sums up what needs to be said in this thread

Spanish Eyes

This kind of thing makes me quite angry. Yes it's a parking nightmare on a street that needs much more space. But I can't see anything changing here soon, because of the profession of the car parkers!

I hope they are not allowed in the Busgate too.

https://www.google.ie/maps/@53.3454182,-6.2557939,3a,75y,281.84h,95.25t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sn27vJbuf7nnvMpGzEOZjFQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656