Tackling the Traffic

Sir, - The Irish Times is to be congratulated for the space it gave to Frank McDonald to bring some light to the public debate…

Sir, - The Irish Times is to be congratulated for the space it gave to Frank McDonald to bring some light to the public debate on our traffic problems. In the concluding article (September 3rd), he described a "sea change in the whole philosophy of Dublin transport planners", who had abandoned a "predict and provide" approach to road-building and were now trying to prevent unsustainable transport patterns.

It was strange, then, to read your Editorial of the next day, which concluded with the view that "the solution involved providing a reasonable transport system for the 137,000 cars that hit the road every morning", that we need "the building of a proper ring road, the use of motorway-style flyovers in areas of chronic gridlock and the construction of major infrastructural projects like the Dublin Port Tunnel".

Perhaps it is a measure of the difficulties that our traffic planners face that some commuters to D'Olier Street are yet to be convinced of the merits of leaving the car at home. - Yours, etc.,

Cllr Eamon Ryan, Ashfield Road, Ranelagh, Dublin 6.