AA Ireland says Dublin city speed limit plan ‘absurd’

Plans to cut speed limits to 30km/h throughout Dublin city and suburbs are

absurd and would undermine road safety, motoring lobby AA Ireland has said.

Dublin City Council has proposed bylaws which would limit speeds to 30km/h on almost all roads and streets as far as its boundary with the four other Dublin local authorities, excluding "arterial" roads.

"The AA does support 30km/h zones and Dublin city should have plenty of them, but when you use 30, it should be properly designed," AA director of consumer affairs Conor Faughnan said.

Consultation

The council has made the proposed bylaws available for public consultation until August 24th at dublincity.ie/speedreview.

Chairman of the council’s transport committee Ciarán Cuffe said the lower limits would save lives.

“Speed is a major contributory factor to road deaths in the Republic of Ireland, 21 per cent of all road deaths every year are caused by excessive speed with 54 per cent of those fatalities being pedestrians.”

The bylaws would be introduced in phases from the end of this year. Under the first phase the limit will be extended west of the current city centre 30km/h zone to cover most of the streets between the Royal and Grand canals.

The next phase, scheduled for 2017, will cover suburbs such as Sandymount, Crumlin and Drimnagh, Raheny, and parts of Cabra, Phibsborough, Coolock, Glasnevin and Drumcondra.

Under the final phase, the implementation date of which has yet to be determined, the limit will be extended to the remaining suburbs to the city council boarder.