How to solve congestion and pollution overnight at minimal cost

Eric Cartman

Thisonedone wrote: »

Every company that allows at least 90% of their workforce to work from home gets a 500 euro tax credit at end of year. If they allow them 2 days working from home they get 1000 euro credit. We are going to be paying massive fines to the EU soon for failing to meet emissions targets so why not just give that money to companies instead while improving the lives of employees at the same time?

For those who don’t get to benefit from working from home they at least get to benefit from much shorter commutes instead due to less cars on the road.

Do you agree with the national broadband plan ?

Public transport should be improved, but it’s been neglected for so long that it’s difficult to fix it now.

Even in Dublin it’s terrible, suburbs are not linked.
No obvious way to get from blanch to Clondalkin, or Clondalkin to Tallaght etc.

Whatever genius designed it obviously assumed that everyone only needed to go to city centre.

What the OP mentions is a great incentive. In 2020, a huge number of jobs can be done from home. Yet people travel for hours a day to go the office.

Employers are a big part of the problem obviously. They don’t trust their staff to do work at home. It’s generally frowned upon to work from home. Would be interesting to see if incentives could help with that.

ZX7R

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Not having a clue where you live but let me take a guess.


Footpaths if you have them are in a shocking state of repair. Dipped corners and tactile paving are hit and miss, there are cars parked all over the footpath and at the school gates cars are parked anywhere. Pedestrian lights are either non existent or have multiple phases which add a lot to said walking time. If you have a 30 k limit it's basically ignored, the council don't bother cleansing the footpath. Corners are have a large radius allowing cars to take them at speed. As it's an estate you have to walk out of your way to leave it as it has shocking permeability and pedestrians have priority no where

No to nearly everything you said.
There just bloody lazy.

maninasia

xckjoo wrote: »

Exactly. People keep proposing these mad plans that have so many layers of complexity, but ignore this far more simple and workable solution.

Now excuse me while I exit this thread before the lunatics kick-off...

Public transport cannot handle the volume of people going into the city. That's an extremely difficult challenge. Cutting the demand for travel into the city is smart.

Jizique

maninasia wrote: »

Public transport cannot handle the volume of people going into the city. That's an extremely difficult challenge. Cutting the demand for travel into the city is smart.

We could just vote for PBP and SF in sufficient numbers to put them into govt and there would be a sharp fall in employment creation.
The fastest way to solve congestion is a big recession

Irishphotodesk

How to solve overnight pollution and traffic congestion?

Stop taxing start giving incentives (difficult to find in reality).
- remove plastic bags (paper bags only)
- charge companies for packaging waste
- reduce the cost of electric vehicles to an affordable level (€10-15k for a new car that can cover 200km on a charge)
-build kinetic roads to charge electric vehicles as they drive, if they are fully charged the generated electricity goes into the grid.
- allow bus lane travel for electric vehicles, allow free parking for electric vehicles.
- review and change public transport infrastructure to facilitate travel instead of numbers, as mentioned not all people want to goto city centre, have routes that bypass city.


Meh.... Can't be bothered doing more suggestions, if the government really wanted to avoid massive EU fines, they should have acted when they agreed to target emissions limit, our problem is those that can make the decisions won't always do so because they look at the short term reaction (job losses or their friends cousins might loose his income stream) so they are happy to continue.

Why not make it that if a department is fined by EU, that department needs to take the money from every member of staff that works in that area... incentive to actually make the changes they agree to and encourage realistic agreements/targets.

LeinsterDub

Irishphotodesk wrote: »

- allow bus lane travel for electric vehicles, allow free parking for electric vehicles.

We need less cars not encouraging more. We need ANPR to force cars out of the bus lanes and to remove parking for vehicles.

LeinsterDub

ZX7R wrote: »

No to nearly everything you said.
There just bloody lazy.

What pedestrian utopia do you live in? Because most places match my description.

Thisonedone

maninasia wrote: »

Public transport cannot handle the volume of people going into the city. That's an extremely difficult challenge. Cutting the demand for travel into the city is smart.

Exactly, fixing public transport will not be cheap and can not be done quickly.

To solve a problem like this you look at the quickest and easiest methods of doing so first, and work your way down. The priority should be:

1. If someone doesn’t need to make a journey, don’t force them too! A quick, easy solution that can be implemented straight away with minimal cost. It would take cars off the road and take massive pressure off our creaking public transport system in one go.

2. Next walking and cycling should be incentivised. The main way this can be done in Dublin for example is having safe segregated routes into the city from the north, west and southern suburbs. I drive from Swords to Connolly each day and it takes 1 hour on a good day, or 1.5 hours if it’s raining, more if there is a crash. If there was a segragated cycle route into the city I would have a guaranteed journey time of 30 mins max on an electric bike or electric scooter and would do that most of the year apart from winter. Having these cycle routes into the city would be extremely cost effective compared to improving public transport.

3. It’s only now that you should look at public transport. The quickest way to solve it is to order a massive fleet of new electric or hybrid buses to significantly improve the service, increase journeys at peak hours, lower wait times and increase the amount of routes there are now. Cameras would need to be installed in bus lanes with significant automatic penalties sent out to cars caught driving in them. This would go a long way to improving public transport and would be the quickest way of improving it but even this would take years in terms of receiving delivery of the new buses, training drivers, red tape etc, and would cost billions.

lawred2

Irishphotodesk wrote: »

How to solve overnight pollution and traffic congestion?

Stop taxing start giving incentives (difficult to find in reality).
- remove plastic bags (paper bags only)
- charge companies for packaging waste
- reduce the cost of electric vehicles to an affordable level (€10-15k for a new car that can cover 200km on a charge)
-build kinetic roads to charge electric vehicles as they drive, if they are fully charged the generated electricity goes into the grid.
- allow bus lane travel for electric vehicles, allow free parking for electric vehicles.
- review and change public transport infrastructure to facilitate travel instead of numbers, as mentioned not all people want to goto city centre, have routes that bypass city.


Meh.... Can't be bothered doing more suggestions, if the government really wanted to avoid massive EU fines, they should have acted when they agreed to target emissions limit, our problem is those that can make the decisions won't always do so because they look at the short term reaction (job losses or their friends cousins might loose his income stream) so they are happy to continue.

Why not make it that if a department is fined by EU, that department needs to take the money from every member of staff that works in that area... incentive to actually make the changes they agree to and encourage realistic agreements/targets.

minimal cost

caff

Irishphotodesk wrote: »

How to solve overnight pollution and traffic congestion?

Stop taxing start giving incentives (difficult to find in reality).
- remove plastic bags (paper bags only)
- charge companies for packaging waste
- reduce the cost of electric vehicles to an affordable level (€10-15k for a new car that can cover 200km on a charge)
-build kinetic roads to charge electric vehicles as they drive, if they are fully charged the generated electricity goes into the grid.
- allow bus lane travel for electric vehicles, allow free parking for electric vehicles.
- review and change public transport infrastructure to facilitate travel instead of numbers, as mentioned not all people want to goto city centre, have routes that bypass city.


Meh.... Can't be bothered doing more suggestions, if the government really wanted to avoid massive EU fines, they should have acted when they agreed to target emissions limit, our problem is those that can make the decisions won't always do so because they look at the short term reaction (job losses or their friends cousins might loose his income stream) so they are happy to continue.

Why not make it that if a department is fined by EU, that department needs to take the money from every member of staff that works in that area... incentive to actually make the changes they agree to and encourage realistic agreements/targets.

How would any of that reduce congestion? Just replacing ice cars with electric cars? Still cars on road still have congestion?

lawred2

Thisonedone wrote: »

Exactly, fixing public transport will not be cheap and can not be done quickly.

To solve a problem like this you look at the quickest and easiest methods of doing so first, and work your way down. The priority should be:

1. If someone doesn’t need to make a journey, don’t force them too! A quick, easy solution that can be implemented straight away with minimal cost. It would take cars off the road and take massive pressure off our creaking public transport system in one go.

2. Next walking and cycling should be incentivised. The main way this can be done in Dublin for example is having safe segregated routes into the city from the north, west and southern suburbs. I drive from Swords to Connolly each day and it takes 1 hour on a good day, or 1.5 hours if it’s raining, more if there is a crash. If there was a segragated cycle route into the city I would have a guaranteed journey time of 30 mins max on an electric bike or electric scooter and would do that most of the year apart from winter. Having these cycle routes into the city would be extremely cost effective compared to improving public transport.

3. It’s only now that you should look at public transport. The quickest way to solve it is to order a massive fleet of new electric or hybrid buses to significantly improve the service, increase journeys at peak hours, lower wait times and increase the amount of routes there are now. Cameras would need to be installed in bus lanes with significant automatic penalties sent out to cars caught driving in them. This would go a long way to improving public transport and would be the quickest way of improving it but even this would take years in terms of receiving delivery of the new buses, training drivers, red tape etc, and would cost billions.

First few things that need doing that wouldn't cost much

At least a €15 congestion charge on all private motor cars in all Irish cities
Remove at least 90% of on street parking spaces - imagine how much space there would be for bicycle lanes then
No taxis in bus lanes (taxis are just as poor a use of public roads as private motor cars)
Bicycle lanes should be widened and separated (if only by bollards) from traffic

If buses could move about town freely then more buses could be put on very quickly..

If cyclists could move about without being in a rat race with thousands of single occupancy vehicles then more people would take to their bikes..

I'd also seek to pedestrianize a lot more streets and make walking about cities the primary mode of transport around the city centre. Buses and trains to get in - then walk.

Politelymad

We're seeing some of these things already. Cars are steadily being de-prioritised within cities. Dublin could badly do with getting over it's city centre focused public transport and have some proper orbital routes.

lawred2

Politelymad wrote: »

We're seeing some of these things already. Cars are steadily being de-prioritised within cities. Dublin could badly do with getting over it's city centre focused public transport and have some proper orbital routes.

Glacial speed. And every move within Dublin city council to take the next step gets shot down by councillors.

LeinsterDub

lawred2 wrote: »

Glacial speed. And every move within Dublin city council to take the next step gets shot down by councillors.

Maybe by the last council. The current one has been pushing the Liffey cycling route, increased the cycling allocation. They are trying but central government have their arms tied

lawred2

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Maybe by the last council. The current one has been pushing the Liffey cycling route, increased the cycling allocation. They are trying but central government have their arms tied

Hamstrung by one of the worst transport ministers ever..

Giving him that brief signaled to pretty much everyone that transport was not a government priority.

md23040

md23040 wrote: »

So let me get this straight - having workers remote working is going to save the government on carbon targets.

So instead of 400 people working in one heated building there will be 400 workers in their houses with the heating on. Heating uses 4 times the kWh output compared to regular electricity (LETI report Jan 2020) so that will put the energy output through the roof would it not.

Maybe first thing in the morning on a very cold day but can't recall the last time I needed heating on when working from home but sure look the retrofitting will take care of the rest who have poorly insulated homes surely won't it?

Idbatterim

I would say providing a propert mass transit system, as discussed here for decades, would probably be the most practical solution in solving congestion :rolleyes:

Thisonedone

Idbatterim wrote: »

I would say providing a propert mass transit system, as discussed here for decades, would probably be the most practical solution in solving congestion :rolleyes:

As I said already, to significantly improve public transport will cost billions and take years minimum, this thread is about quick and cheap solutions

lawred2

Thisonedone wrote: »

As I said already, to significantly improve public transport will cost billions and take years minimum, this thread is about quick and cheap solutions

Giving money directly to companies achieves nothing.

Go Home Paddy Cat!!

I would love to see a charge introduced on all private cars driving into the city (NY has a congestion charge). The number of single occupant cars heading into the city centre every single day is scandalous. That money could then be invested in public transport and cycle infrastructure.

Fr_Dougal

Coronavirus did a pretty good job today.

Because of it 1,000 Dublin Indeed employees worked from home.

Thisonedone

Deleted User wrote: »

Maybe first thing in the morning on a very cold day but can't recall the last time I needed heating on when working from home but sure look the retrofitting will take care of the rest who have poorly insulated homes surely won't it?

Yeah my heating is off for about 8 months of the year. In work they have heating on for about 10 months of the year. And aircon on all year. Then heating and lighting on at tea stations, multiple toilets, massive canteen (which is near empty for most of the day), games room etc.

Then you have to consider that if more people were working from home that means less office space needed, therefore smaller spaces to heat.

Thisonedone

lawred2 wrote: »

Giving money directly to companies achieves nothing.

Giving money to companies if they change their behaviour works, that’s not even up for discussion. You really think a software company with 100 employees would say “nah we don’t want a 250,000 euro tax refund”

Thisonedone

Go Home Paddy Cat!! wrote: »

I would love to see a charge introduced on all private cars driving into the city (NY has a congestion charge). The number of single occupant cars heading into the city centre every single day is scandalous. That money could then be invested in public transport and cycle infrastructure.

Agreed, a congestion charge for single occupant cars is another great way to quickly reduce the amount of cars on the road. A 1 Euro charge per day for single occupant cars, those with 2 or more people get in free. Ring-fence the proceeds to put into bike lanes and public transport.

lawred2

Thisonedone wrote: »

Giving money to companies if they change their behaviour works, that’s not even up for discussion. You really think a software company with 100 employees would say “nah we don’t want a 250,000 euro tax refund”

And that's value for money!!? At the end of the year, what has changed structurally other than a recurring cost with little CBA!?

Thisonedone

lawred2 wrote: »

And that's value for money!!? At the end of the year, what has changed structurally other than a recurring cost with little CBA!?

Yes when we are paying hundreds of millions in fines or carbon credits to achieve the same thing!!!

Why not keep the money in the country to improve the strength of our businesses while significantly improving the lives of employees, taking the strain off our public transport system and taking cars off the road to improve the commute for others all in one go!!!!