Patrick Street - should it be reopened (3 - 6:30 closures)

Cuttlefish

Just driven through JLT west bound and the line of traffic eastbound is you unreal both lanes bumper to bumper

Just wondering what Corkonians think bout it and would re-opening Patrick Street ease this in anyway?

What do people think

TheChizler

So they can reach the same overloaded roundabout from the other side?

Chris_5339762

Traffic was very bad this evening, it stayed backed up eastbound through the tunnel almost to 7pm. Opening Patrick Street would not help. What would help is if the government would get the finger out with Dunkettle and fast track the re-tender somehow, or better still, to have sucked it up and not re-tendered.

Cuttlefish

Living on the east side of the JLT and having to commute for work/ college etc must be hell, the tunnel is a no go area at certain times of the day and as mentioned above is was backed up until 19:00hrs!

Crazy


Yes the relayout of the Dunkettle interchange is vital and with each passing week it is becoming more and more apparent

05eaftqbrs9jlh

Pana ban is excellent. I thought it was a terrible idea at first but the city is lovely during the day without all the traffic. Makes cycling around town even nicer.

What's really needed is a way of getting to Glanmire from Blackrock. Not the tunnel, not through town. Build some sort of bridge, run a ferry, whatever. This would ease congestion in around 8 different locations.

namloc1980

The tunnel was a traffic nightmare long before the Pana ban.

the beer revolu

Pana ban should be 24 hours. Then people might actually comply with it, mostly.
I drive a car and I live in the city centre.

AwaitYourReply

I think if anything the ban on private vehicles using Patrick Street will probably be extended in due course (i.e.) to commence at an earlier time of day as this is what was originally intended and they compromised by delaying it until 3:00pm. They tried it, then pulled it, then re-introduced it again amid opposition from some quarters including some businesses in the city centre for various reasons. My guess is something like 12noon - 6:30pm next and after that further restrictions may come in time and more streets included like Grand Parade, South Mall.

With climate change and cutting of CO2 emissions, local authorities like our own Cork City Council & central government will be seeking funding from European Union agencies to improve the public realm and this is likely to be based on how green is your village/town/city?

Cuttlefish

AwaitYourReply wrote: »

I think if anything the ban on private vehicles using Patrick Street will probably be extended in due course (i.e.) to commence at an earlier time of day as this is what was originally intended and they compromised by delaying it until 3:00pm. They tried it, then pulled it, then re-introduced it again amid opposition from some quarters including some businesses in the city centre for various reasons. My guess is something like 12noon - 6:30pm next and after that further restrictions may come in time and more streets included like Grand Parade, South Mall.

With climate change and cutting of CO2 emissions, local authorities like our own Cork City Council & central government will be seeking funding from European Union agencies to improve the public realm and this is likely to be based on how green is your village/town/city?

Yes fair point about cutting C02 emissions nonetheless people need to get around the city and the JLT is choked up at peak times

Agree they will more than likely extend the hours of access restriction to Pana.

bingo9999

Am I right in saying that the pana ban is the first tiny baby step towards having Patrick cleared for use of the Cork LUAS and a dedicated bus corridor? Assuming so it will have to be extended (slowly over the years it takes to bring this forward) as you shouldnt go from traffic one day to closed the next. But if thats the case then the CLUAS will make up for the need to get around the city greenly that miight take some heat off of the roads

namloc1980

Cuttlefish wrote: »

Yes fair point about cutting C02 emissions nonetheless people need to get around the city and the JLT is choked up at peak times

Agree they will more than likely extend the hours of access restriction to Pana.

Opening up Pana is not the answer to traffic congestion at the tunnel. Why would you want through traffic jamming up the main street in the city? If that is the answer then we're truly banjaxed.

Cuttlefish

namloc1980 wrote: »

Opening up Pana is not the answer to traffic congestion at the tunnel. Why would you want through traffic jamming up the main street in the city? If that is the answer then we're truly banjaxed.

Agree doesn't sound like the answer I just putting it out there

It is just the congestion is crippling and yes the Dunkettle Interchange needs to be addressed ASAP and until it does then the JLT will be a sore point for all commuters

RINO87

Chris_5339762 wrote: »

Traffic was very bad this evening, it stayed backed up eastbound through the tunnel almost to 7pm. Opening Patrick Street would not help. What would help is if the government would get the finger out with Dunkettle and fast track the re-tender somehow, or better still, to have sucked it up and not re-tendered.

The Dunkettle scheme is just going to move the problem further towards bloomfield/douglas... It might make things even worse, at least the lights at the roundabout regulate the flow thru the tunnel somewhat. If its going to be free flow from all sides, then bloomfield/douglas flyover will be absolute carnage.

On Patrick st, I agree with the poster who said it should be permanently closed. Remove all ambiguity.

As Cork City grows city life for the private car will not be getting any easier I imagine. Throw in the environmental concerns etc etc.

zilog_jones

I think the ban should be 24 hours.

Kennedi Sparse Stewardess wrote: »

What's really needed is a way of getting to Glanmire from Blackrock. Not the tunnel, not through town. Build some sort of bridge, run a ferry, whatever. This would ease congestion in around 8 different locations.

Could a road bridge around there be more feasible once the Tivoli docks are gone?

bingo9999 wrote: »

Am I right in saying that the pana ban is the first tiny baby step towards having Patrick cleared for use of the Cork LUAS and a dedicated bus corridor?

It's a tram - let's not call it "Luas", we're not dubs! Luas is just a brand.

The whole point in trams is that they (generally) share roads with other road users, this is not the precedent to ban passenger cars there. The problem is chronic congestion impacting bus services - a problem happening now, not in the future.

mike_cork

The traffic core were out this evening on both ends of Patrick Street ticketing cars breaking the ban. First time to see it happen in a long while. As I walking by a small lorry driver was getting handed a ticket.

mean gene

Saw abt 4 cars getting tickets on daunt Square today

whisky_galore

I can't see how reopening the easily clogged Pana is going to help much.

Someone, City Hall, whoever, needs to knock heads together with businesses, CIE and other transport providers as private car use is clearly leading nowhere. The city is choking on its own success. The 1960s mindset that we can drive everywhere as we please has had its day.

macraignil

Cuttlefish wrote: »

Just driven through JLT west bound and the line of traffic eastbound is you unreal both lanes bumper to bumper

Just wondering what Corkonians think bout it and would re-opening Patrick Street ease this in anyway?

What do people think

I know someone who worked for the County Council planning department and they always said the long term plan for traffic flow management in the greater Cork city area was for a proper North ring road to be built so that there would be a functioning motor way going a full circle around the city. They even spent a lot of money planning the best route to go from Ballincollig over to Blarney and then on to Glanmire offering an alternative for traffic going from West to East that avoids the city centre.



The figures released by the city council when introducing the Patrick street car ban highlighted that most of the traffic in Cork city is actually traveling from one side of the city to the other and having the ring road completed and functioning as intended would be far better than just having the southern half of the Cork ring road taking all of the traffic. The Dunkettle junction upgrade was a cheaper option to make an improvement but even that turned out to be too expensive for Dublincentric government.


Patrick street feeds into McCurtain street which is currently reduced to two lanes so any change to Patrick street would make no improved movement from what I can see. Just walk in and out of the city myself and the traffic seems worse than I have seen it with cars tailed back much further than I have ever seen before. Whatever traffic management is being employed by the city council seems to be failing miserably with so much fuel being used for cars to be barely moving. The buses get stuck in the traffic as well and I see my best option for getting around the city is on foot since the cycle lanes don't go where I need to travel.

05eaftqbrs9jlh

zilog_jones wrote: »

I think the ban should be 24 hours.



Could a road bridge around there be more feasible once the Tivoli docks are gone?

It will definitely help when they're gone, although I've heard that a bridge isn't possible because it's too wide of a distance there. Perhaps another tunnel with pedestrian access too? It would be astronomical to calculate the cost of that though, a monumental undertaking which would solve loads of problems if done in conjunction with the proposed greenways and light rail lines. I'm not optimistic about any of it, given the seemingly intentional ignoring of the issues as they've piled up and made Cork into the most polluted city in the world.
https://www.echolive.ie/corknews/Cork-among-the-most-air-polluted-places-on-earth-30a5ce83-aef0-4db7-84a5-f62600072c7c-ds

bingo9999

Kennedi Sparse Stewardess wrote: »

It will definitely help when they're gone, although I've heard that a bridge isn't possible because it's too wide of a distance there. Perhaps another tunnel with pedestrian access too? It would be astronomical to calculate the cost of that though, a monumental undertaking which would solve loads of problems if done in conjunction with the proposed greenways and light rail lines. I'm not optimistic about any of it, given the seemingly intentional ignoring of the issues as they've piled up and made Cork into the most polluted city in the world.
https://www.echolive.ie/corknews/Cork-among-the-most-air-polluted-places-on-earth-30a5ce83-aef0-4db7-84a5-f62600072c7c-ds

First I have heard that the distance is too long? They were ready to go with the Water street and Eastern Gateway bridges in 2010 before the recession knocked all of Cork's plans out for well over a decade.
http://sp1ral.corkcity.ie/services/strategicplanningeconomicdevelopment/docklands/infrastructure/easterngatewaybridgewaterstreetbridgeandspineroutenetwork/

I do think this is crucial, along with the NRR (delayed until at least 2027 it seems and optimistic they would open by then if they were planning now, which theyre not), if you could traffic incoming from the SRR around the Elysian, up centre park road and across one of these bridges you could get it away from the city core.
And while I'm at it, build a LUAS. Its often said Cork people are wedded to cars - theyre not, theyre wedded to the best option for them. You could take thousands of cars out of the city by giving Mahon, Blackrock, UCC, Wilton, Ballincollig etc. a quick reliable route in and out of, and around, town.

shnaek

macraignil wrote: »

The figures released by the city council when introducing the Patrick street car ban highlighted that most of the traffic in Cork city is actually traveling from one side of the city to the other and having the ring road completed and functioning as intended would be far better than just having the southern half of the Cork ring road taking all of the traffic.

You're bang on point here. Usually I walk to town, most of the times I'm driving through town is to get to the other side. The north ring road should have been built a long time ago.
The sad thing is that Cork city was very well planned out in the past in terms of traffic and transport, but it has really dropped the ball in the last ten years. Now the best they can come up with is banning cars, an option that costs them nothing but is totally impractical in reality (I'm not talking about the Pana ban here, but the general thought process). No one there is able to stand up and make the hard decisions, but that's reflective of Irish politics and planning in general.