Green Party leader says Dublin is in the "transport dark ages"

Eamon Ryan says that Dublin City Council’s response to leaked NTA documents is “shockingly conservative”.

EAMON RYAN HAS accused Dublin City Council of “keeping Dublin in the transport dark ages”.

Ryan said that the council’s response to leaked National Transport Authority (NTA) plans is “shockingly conservative”.

The Green Party leader said that the council’s response shows “all that is wrong with our local government”.

The NTA document on the future of Dublin’s traffic and transport was reported on in The Irish Times on Wednesday and suggested a number of changes to traffic flows in the capital.

However, Ryan says that the fact that private cars are such a big part of the plan highlights mismanagement at council level and called on the NTA to release the full document.

“For once we had some transport experts willing to imagine what the city might be like if we designed it for people rather than for cars. The instinctive and immediate reaction from the officials that such plans would be unworkable, shows up the woeful management of our city.

Their own transport plans don’t even work. The first sign of economic recovery is going to be gridlock on the M50. Their failure to deliver a better transport system for Dublin is the greatest threat to the economic viability of our city.

Speaking at a recent meeting of the council’s transport strategic policy committee, head of technical services Brendan O’Brien said that the council were aiming to make the city more friendly to both cyclists and public transport.

Read: Plans to reduce services in Dublin Bus and Bus Éireann contracts

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