THE EU PRESIDENCY will cause a certain level of traffic and travel disruption, particularly in Dublin, Transport Minister Darragh O’Brien has confirmed. 

Ireland will take on the presidency between 1 July and 31 December 2026 and will host various formal and informal meetings of different Council bodies throughout that period.

The presidency of the Council of the European Union rotates among member states in turn every six months.

Ireland’s hosting of the presidency will be a huge operation, requiring a massive security presence.

As part of the some 250 events planned for Dublin alone, traffic plans will be rolled out in the capital, particularly when large-scale events are taking place, O’Brien told The Journal.

The European political community event, will see all EU leaders, plus delegations from another 20 countries gather in Dublin. In an interview with Minister of State for European Affairs Thomas Byrne earlier this month, he said this will be a “massive event” and one of the “biggest event of its type ever held in Ireland”.

The transport minister agreed that this particular event will be a “very big event” which he said will require a huge level of security. 

“I think, to be fair to people, they understand the security considerations of that,” he said. 

O’Brien told The Journal that the EU Presidency is going to be a “massive event” for a period of six months and that preparations are well advanced.

Special traffic plans

“The vast bulk of the meetings or events will be in Dublin, but there will be some spread across the country as well to minimise disruption,” he added, stating that there will be specific traffic plans in place for each meeting. 

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Speaking about Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visit earlier this month, the minister said the precautions were “right and correct” and taken out of “an abundance of caution”.

While some events might require the same level of security, other, smaller meetings of EU ministers, will be more contained and held in venues such as Dublin Castle. 

The timetable of events will published relatively soon, confirmed O’Brien who said his department, alongside that of the National Transport Authority, will outline the measures that will need to be taken around some of the events.

While he said he doesn’t envisage a great deal of disruption around some of the events, the minister said he understood that the public just want to be kept informed. 

From speaking to those in his own constituency, most of whom are commuters, the minister said what they want is “advanced notice”, so they can actually plan their journeys and to be made aware of the level of changes to road networks and public transport that will be involved.