Emissions/Kilian Doyle: Something I heard last week knocked me for the proverbial six. Aul' Mr Brennan, with great aplomb, announced an "aggressive" new approach to tackling the congestion problems that are throttling our cities like unwanted kittens.
The main measure envisaged is the extension of Dublin's Quality Bus Corridors tentacles into twice as many suburban neighbourhoods, even outside the pale.
Anything to reduce the amount of people alone in cars, selfishly rotting our planet by being surgically attached to their steering wheels. And bus corridors are great ideas, as they only cost around 4 per cent of a comparable light rail system capable of carrying the same number of people. Or so I thought. Because then it slipped in, the fact that had me nearly pawning my PC to buy an enormous paintbrush and a few hundred litres of the toughest white paint known to man. Here it is: it costs €500,000 to install a kilometre of bus lane.
Yup, y'all read it right. Half a million smackeroonies. In old cash, that's around £400,000 a mile, give or take a few PAYE workers' annual tax contributions. My initial response is not suitable for publication in an organ as sombre as this. Suffice to say, it was one of extreme, briefly stated, disbelief.
I considered jacking in my out-of-date NUJ card, my half-baked opinions, my smug superciliousness, the lot, and offering my services as a professional QBC installer. ("I'll do it for 250 grand per km, Mr Brennan, you wonderful man, sir. Whaddya think?")
But I soon calmed down and had a wee ponder. It can't be as simple as slapping a few thick white lines on roads and propping up a few roadsigns telling drivers to sod off and get their own lanes, can it? I'm obviously missing the intricacies of the situation, there must be more to it than that, mustn't there?
Well, there's all the extra bus shelters with comfy seats and efficient protection from the rain to be provided for a start. And the secure car parks for all the people who'll drive from non-serviced areas to the beginning of bus routes. And the comprehensive, easily understood road markings.
And the fleet of brand-new well-maintained buses. And the expensive public relations training for the drivers.
And the undercover agents busting people for smoking and drinking and smashing windows and racially abusing bewildered immigrants.
And the increased Garda presence to enforce the bus lanes and nab taxi drivers who are abusing the system. Not to mention the army of clampers and tow-trucks to keep the lanes clear.
Ah, so that's where all our taxes went, I realised. On stuff that doesn't exist. Why am I surprised? It's like some warped version of that movie Brewster's Millions, where Richard Pryor has to spend $40 million in order to inherit $400 million. Except we don't inherit anything.
That said, one area where dosh is being spent is on cameras for QBCs. One of these is currently monitoring a north city route, checking bus progress and pinpointing areas where they're not moving as fast as they should be. There's even talk of using them in the rest of Dublin in the near future.
Or, in a bizarrely ironic twist considering the other camera debacle, will they just install dummy camera boxes all over the city to make slack bus drivers speed up?
Ah, sure don't the dummies only cost around €5,000 each to install. Five grand for a metal box on a pole - a bargain in the Irish public expenditure scheme of things, wouldn't you agree?
Forget the paint brush, I'm buying welder's kit and some sheet metal. I'll do 'em for two grand a pop minister, how's about it?