Sir, – Sarah Burns's article relating to the limited capacity on our roads to support BusConnects among other things, simply highlights that we need to start seriously thinking about prioritising road space for specific vehicles over others ("National road system may not be able to cope with Bus Connects plans", October 27th).
The State has decided that the bus will remain the workhorse for the next few decades as the pre-eminent public transport supply for Dublin. For the BusConnects proposal to work properly, the bus network will need absolute priority over all other modes of transportation which it currently does not have bar some laissez-faire priority bus lanes which appear and disappear in an illogical manner.
Our existing 1960s-style road system is designed to move vehicles of any sort around. This has become more difficult as the use of private cars in particular has exploded in the past decade. Surely a typical double-decker bus with a capacity of 70+ passengers should have priority space on our roads over say two private cars (carrying on average just a driver), which take up the same road space as the bus?
The same argument can be made for bicycles. Dublin City Council data among other sources has shown that along the Liffey quays, far more people are transported by bicycle than by car during the morning and evening rush hours.
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Yet buses and bicycles are seen as a some sort of radioactive solution to congestion when it comes to infrastructure prioritisation.
We do have space on many of our roads to facilitate improved people transporting capacity. However, we will have to have a serious debate if this precious road space should remain the domain of parked cars, delivery trucks and law breakers in the existing bus and cycle lanes. – Yours, etc,
TERRY O’FLOINN,
Bray, Co Wicklow.