Potential for €10 congestion charge, parking increases of 400% and a 20kmh reduction in speed limits

The majority of the adult population drive regardless of going into Dublin or not. The majority of people commuting into Dublin do so as there is no viable alternatives for public transports or to live in a property in the county and most would be heading in as they work there. Behavior will only change when there is a viable alternatives, until then all it is an increased tax on people working in Dublin from outside.

We were at a rate of 446 passenger cars per 1000 inhabitants so when exclude those who are too young and too old to drive and those who commute via motor cycle. We have a lot of people who have a car. Now would you own and run a car taking into account the way motor tax, fuel prices, insurance prices etc have gone up and up and up - if you did not need to run the car? Those driving into the city center are doing so to work - why are you trying to penalise people trying to work.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/452019/ireland-number-of-cars-per-thousand-inhabitants/#:~:text=Ireland%3A%20number%20of%20cars%20per%201%2C000%20inhabitants%201990%2D2020&text=The%20motorization%20rate%20in%20Ireland,one%20thousand%20inhabitants%20in%202020.

We are at a rate of 446 cars per 1000 people back in 2020.(So when you take out those too old and too young too drive and those motor bikes a large % of the population drive) Now as I asked the other poster if you owned a car would you use it if you really did not need it when you factor in the price points of every aspect of motoring has shoot up through the roof.?? Also your stats are almost a decade out of date?

https://www.statista.com/statistics/452019/ireland-number-of-cars-per-thousand-inhabitants/#:~:text=Ireland%3A%20number%20of%20cars%20per%201%2C000%20inhabitants%201990%2D2020&text=The%20motorization%20rate%20in%20Ireland,one%20thousand%20inhabitants%20in%202020.

Maybe by making public transport more attractive. There are other ways to make public transport more attractive than taxing people onto buses.

Build the metro

Build the dart extensions

Build new luas lines

But no one is saying everyone has to stop using cars.

Of course the big 4/5 countries (and all countries) have to take measures too, big measures. And while Ireland is small, our per capita emissions are high - higher in fact than one of those 'Big 5' (India).

Or could be financed by sustainable finance, green bonds etc.

Instead all that sustainable finance has really amounted to so far is the greenwashing of financial products.

As highlighted already there are plenty of improvements that can be made to the bus service that aren't traffic dependent.

By all means fix our own country but don't do it by penalizing people who have no other option but to drive a car into Dublin as the houses for sale and rent are just non-existent in Dublin same goes with the public transport on offer. Also dont think we can just increase taxes we pay more then enough to have a first world public transport system. We had what 20Billion in corpo taxes last year 10 billion of that was unexpected. How much could be done with that with building infrastructure? Until our spend is brought into the lime light and a light shone on the waste that our elite political classes are spending nothing will change and of course there is no real punishment for any politician. They may get voted out but with an overly generous pension that us the mere mortals can come nowhere near affording.

and i don't think people would be happy with a massive park and ride and then getting on a train or whatever either if it took longer and was more inconvenient

Convenient where does Convenient end and necessity start. So I live just outside of a big town in Meath and have to get to work in Ballsbridge. I have to cater for 1 out of my 2 kids to get to school as he has autism and he cant use public transport (he has a meltdown and just cant use it unfortunately) and the only school available for special needs is over 20 km away the other kid uses a school bus . So how do I manage this without a car. I am sure I am not alone in cases that its just not a viable option to bus it or bike it when you have to work with the time pressure that brings and have other family commitments, but you want me to pay an additional tax to come to work on top of paying Income tax, PRSI, USC, motor tax, VAT on insurance, VAT/carbon tax on petrol, toll bridge, VAT on the car. So the "no option to drive a car" is true for a lot of people who have no other option but to use a car.

Now if successive governments has actually spent prudently.

I could live in Dublin and use public transport to get to work if they had built enough houses.

I could live in Meath and use public transport to get to work in Dublin if they had built the infrastructure to do so.

I could send my kid to a school that caters for special needs closer to home if they had put money into this area (which has been shockingly underfunded)

But alas the money I have paid into the social contract that sees me paying a lot of money in taxes for a delivery of a decent return on public services has been badly broken by government after government and your solution is let the sucker pay more. Thanks but no thanks

If we are serious about reducing emissions, we need to do a few things really, really well rather than trying to do lot of things really badly. Public Transport has struggled to recover in line with the increase in post-pandemic demand. I use PT several times a week to get into Dublin City and there is no capacity available to accommodate all the people who are in their cars. So unless we are about to receive significant deliveries of trains and busses I can't see how a congestion charge can do anything other than cause utter frustration and gridlock.

If transport is the key to emissions then the Government needs to do something to make its policies a reality and be consistent about it. In 2021, Eamonn Ryan wanted 1 million electric cars on the road by 2030. In 2022, Eamonn Ryan abandoned the 1 million target and said he wanted to reduce overall cars on the road. Which is it - and what will it be next year? Why would people invest in electric cars or use a congested public transport system when the Minister in charge can't even get his core policies straight?