Dun Laoghaire Traffic & Commuting Chat

He has done absolutely nothing positive for public transport. The cycling infrastructure along Kill Lane slowed buses down even further, with the (already useless) stretch of bus lane coming to an even more abrupt halt before the business park, with no priority given to buses attempting to change lanes (not even a simple yellow box). In the evenings, it can take up to half an hour for a 46a to get from the Dart Station to Foxrock Church.

In the mornings, heading towards Dún Laoghaire, the short bus lane on Kill Lane is always clogged with private cars, with buses left with no choice but to either queue behind the cars or bizarrely drive down the outside, as shown in this tweet:

https://twitter.com/deNudge/status/1463431750063902723

Good riddance to him. I hope his successor doesn't share his hatred of public transport.

Re that tweet, how is it his fault that motorists are breaking the law? Surely it's more the responsibility of the Gardaí to be enforcing it?

When they made one of the lanes from Kill Lane to Clonkeen Road right turn only there was nowhere else for the cars to go except into the bus lane. The alternative is to go down the right turning lane and stop at the end of the bus lane and indicate to merge into the left lane. This is the legal and correct way to do it but the fear is that you won't be let in by the cars illegally in the bus lane. It really is a mess. The right turn lane was created without any thought of what may happen to the bus lane and straight ahead traffic.

The other main problem is the right turn into Supervalu car park. Once anything is trying to turn right there it causes a build up of traffic behind across the junction and towards Foxrock church. The whole junction is really a disaster but I am not sure what the solution is..

Saw absolute murder there this morning, a guy tried to drive into the back of someone cutting in. Ended with lots of shouting a car horns!

I was on my bike thank god

I think we are in agreement in this. Ballybrack village is the same. One car turning right m abs no one is getting through the lights.

Absolutely.

In both cases, Ballybrack and Deansgrange alike, there are alternative routes for people to reach their destinations, with a bit of forethought, without needing a right turn at the main junctions, eg, if you're going to Wyattville Road, it should be approached from the dual carriageway and if you're going to Clonkeen Road it should be from the N11 end.

I know in Deansgrange that banning all right turns, especially when it comes to the business park and Super Valu, would go down very badly, but really I know as many people that don't go to that Super Valu at all because of the stress of it, and I think if it was regularised as a left-in left-out, it would smooth out the access and egress for everyone and actually improve custom.

Also, the active travel routes are going to need safe priority through the junctions so it will be necessary in any case.

Yes, it's very poorly designed and I don't entirely blame people for joining the bus lane before it ends. The bus lane should end slightly sooner, and the bus stop should be moved back from the junction (ideally, it should be placed at the very end of the bus lane, which would give cars more space to merge while buses are stopped). Also, buses should never have to pull in out of the way to let passengers on/off. The bus stop

If I was running early or was out of service, I used to mischievously "park" my bus at the end of the bus lane with hazards on, just before the yellow box, for a minute or two (or at least until I saw another bus or taxi in my mirrors) to give priority to drivers who were doing the right thing. It left the cars behind in the bus lane stuck in a very awkward position.

The right turns into the SuperValu car park, the church and the business park beside it, need to go. No business (or church) should have a god-given right to dictate the flow of nearby traffic for their own convenience. It's a shame there isn't room for a large roundabout at Baker's Corner, and an even bigger shame that they got rid of the one at the top of Mounttown Rd.

A well-designed roundabout is absolutely not an inherent hazard - driver behaviour is. We don't design them very intuitively in this country, and many drivers don't use them very well. If vehicles are forced to approach and negotiate roundabouts very slowly, indicating correctly, and with good priority given to pedestrians and cyclists, they become safer (and also more free-flowing) for everyone, including cars.

Its not just down at the Deansgrange end of the road that's poorly designed, Bakers Corner is woeful too. Lat Thur it 20 min to get from Honey Park to turn left at Bakers, all because of the right turn onto Abbey Rd.

It would be much more logical to have no right turn there and use left lane to go left, right lane straight/buses.

Also would be very interested to know how many cyclists use that stretch of the road daily. Have no problem with protected bike lanes but if you are going to impact on several thousand drivers, someone should be benefiting. (Leave the house at 0530, so no cyclists and would always come back down Monkstown Ring Rd to avoid Cill Ave in the evenings)

Even at rush hour, there isn't a huge volume of cyclists. I'm all in favour of improving cycling infrastructure, but this is quite a frivolous and wasteful example. It would involve road realignment and acquiring some extra land, but a shared bus/cycle lane would be a far better use of that space. It would benefit more people.

Having driven buses and cycled bikes... yes. Since there often isn't room for individual infrastructure for both, I do think shared bus/cycle lanes are a good compromise. Cyclists are allowed to use the few bus lanes we already have anyway. It requires patience and tolerance on both sides. And any properly trained bus driver should know how to deal with blind spots.

On the road between DL town and Foxrock Church the vast majority of it is single lane. I really can't see how creating bus lanes, bike lanes or right turning lanes is massively impacting the flow through the area. To my mind it is busy as it is one of 3 main routes out of DL, there are a lot of car users locally and it also has a lot of schools and employment locations near it. Re: the bus lane on Kill Avenue I think it is hard to do the right thing as a motorist here. Maybe a hard separator as used for the cycle lanes might help keep the cars in the right lane.

The problem with "doing the right thing" and staying out of the bus lane is that it feels slightly cheeky to effectively overtake a string of traffic and then attempt to push your way in at the end of the bus lane. It's easier (especially when it's completely unpoliced) to just blindly follow the queue. I used to often stop my bus, handbrake and hazards on, at the end of the bus lane to give the brave people in the right lane a chance to skip the queue and get through the lights.

It wasn't a comment on speeding, it was a comment on grasses.

I accept my obligations to observe the rules of the road at all times, on my bike or in my car, and can expect to be subject to enforcement action by An Garda Síochána, who have jurisdiction, if I do not.

What I don't accept is the self-appointed jurisdiction of snitches and busybodies, who nobody appointed under any law to do anything,

In any case, the point I made above was looking for consistency and adherence to the statutes from local authorities, not anything else.

As someone who, by their own admission, spends their time cycling on the M50 looking for people using handheld phones just to report them, I find it all a bit rich coming from you.

Am I a snitch if I report a planning violation to the planning enforcement team? Am I a snitch if I report a littering offence to the litter warden? Am I a snitch if I report an assault that I witness to the Gardai?

Well yes, you are.