Sir, - I am surprised that there has been no reaction to Dublin city councillors' restoration of the controversial Eastern Bypass to the city's draft development plan. I am even more surprised that our Lord Mayor, Senator Joe Doyle, who presumably has the long-term interests of the city at heart, should have been one of those proposing the amendment.
I am at a loss to understand how those local representatives who actively opposed the proposal only six years ago, in 1992, on environmental grounds, should have done a complete U-turn, without, as far as I am aware, any consultation with their constituents to find out what they might need. Will they find themselves in another six years reversing direction once again?
What is at stake is one of our city's greatest natural assets. No other capital city can match Sandymount and Merrion strands. In recent years the miles of seascape which Dublin's citizens enjoy has been dramatically enhanced by the development of the Irishtown Nature Park by the Corporation.
As a walker, cyclist and motorist living in Dublin south-east, I am concerned that we appear to be at the mercy of bungling bureaucrats who produce pie-inthe-sky solutions to traffic management whilst the basics which are commonplace elsewhere in Europe continue to be ignored.
In my experience most traffic problems are not caused by commuting motorists, who obviously are anxious to arrive at their destinations as soon as possible, but by obstruction which could be minimised by following good practice long established elsewhere: all city deliveries to stores and pubs and all refuse collection to be completed by 7 a.m.; no rubbish skips to be placed where they impede traffic movement; rapid policing of double yellow lines; instant response to breakdowns whether they be accidents or traffic lights; and, most important of all, co-ordination of all roadworks to ensure that they are carried out at maximum speed as far as possible on weekends and at night. -Yours, etc., Michael Gorman,
Park Avenue, Sandymount, Dublin 4.