Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

It is very welcome to get this opportunity to discuss both the metro and BusConnects projects. I will start with the metro. I very much appreciated the briefing we got yesterday following the NTA's announcement of its latest preferred route alignment. I want to focus on the southside, as a southside Deputy.

I am aware that the preferred alignment from the NTA in regard to bringing the metro onto the green line goes back quite some time - 20 years - to the original decision to build the bigger bridge to cater for it and to widen the tracks. The difficulty we ran into on the section from Dundrum to Ranelagh - it is not just a Ranelagh issue - is that I understand the NTA wants to use a driverless segregated system which would affect the accessibility of the line. This is a real issue. Some people depict people in certain areas as being just NIMBYs but there is a fundamental transport principle around trying to promote pedestrian and cycling accessibility as best we can, as I am sure the NTA would agree. This presented real difficulties. From the NTA's own research, it is clear there is a difficulty in that the potential closure of the line for two years would have huge knock-on consequences for the rest of the network.

I was very glad the Taoiseach, in response to Dáil questions yesterday, indicated the Government's position that, given that circumstances, rather than just delaying 20 years before we carry out the possible works to connect the metro to the green line, we should and could consider alternative route alignments.

I have advocated from the outset that we look to the south west, while other Deputies have acknowledged that areas such as Blanchardstown are a nightmare. The south-west quadrant is a nightmare too, in transport terms, and there is potential for keeping the tunnelling machine going to the south west to serve it.

The Taoiseach favoured running to the south east instead, to UCD, and I hope we will come back with some ideas on this during the consultation period. It has the advantage that UCD and other areas such as Stillorgan, where a big development is planned, could connect to Sandyford. This would solve the long-term capacity concerns on the green line because we would be able to divert traffic coming from Cherrywood on to the direct metro route. It would be a good engineering solution because the entire line would be designed with a driverless segregated system in mind. It would pick up on very busy transport destination points where significant growth is projected.

I have seen the plans for UCD and they include massive development with an increase in student population. The president of UCD was quoted in newspapers this morning as stating that it also brings the prize of connecting the north side and south side and connecting three of our universities, namely, DCU, Trinity College and UCD, with an immense strategic benefit to the city. The president was right to refer to the precedent of Boston where they connected Harvard, MIT and the city centre and it took off as an innovation hub as a result. We should think of creating an enterprising, connected city and this would do that.

I wish to encourage the NTA in this regard. We are in a consultation phase and it is fully appropriate in such a consultation to consider alternatives. We cannot hold a public consultation on a fait accomplior to consider small technical changes. We should be able to look at a realignment, which is a significant change but would deal with the technical problems we have run up against and would bring huge benefits for connectivity within the city. We will have a tunnelling machine coming south of the Liffey in six, seven or eight years' time and we have to work out what we are going to do with it. Alternative alignments make sense in this context. I would like to get the witnesses' response. I acknowledge there will be all sorts of legal and planning difficulties. The transport plan is to upgrade the green line but we can change plans and our system has to be flexible enough to adapt, rather than waiting five years for another plan and starting again. We cannot stop and wait 20 years either, because there would still be difficult engineering problems that would require us to restrict pedestrian access in a way we do not want or close a line for a period.

I support the approach which has been referred to, which might be difficult because it comes from a political system, while the witnesses have to adhere to legislation etc. and ensure the authority is not caught up in the courts over planning challenges. I want to flag the point that the political system may have to give very clear direction in the coming year or six months. That was a lengthy cry for consideration of that alternative.

As for BusConnects, I have been to many public consultation events and have seen Mr. Creegan at a large number of them. I appreciate the calm, reasoned and open approach which I have seen from the NTA. The consultation process has been a good exercise and it has not been not easy as there is a lot of anger and concern out there, which is valid. I am very supportive of the BusConnects project as we have a critical transport crisis in our city, which is not being helped by widening every approach road to Dublin. That does not make any sense to me. Every motorway is being widened and to exaggerate a little, thought was given to chopping down every tree and cutting down all front gardens. We must stop widening the approach roads to Dublin and stop the traffic coming in. What are we doing?

In respect of the bus network, the public consultation meetings have been very detailed and useful in terms of a couple of corridors in my constituency, namely, those in Rathfarnham and Kimmage. We have a problem with the continuation of the four-carriageway design, which is a six-carriageway design if one includes cycle lanes. Real difficulties are being presented on the Kimmage Road Lower, from Sundrive Road to the KCR, and on Terenure Road East, Rathgar Road and Rathfarnham Road. A very extensive removal of front gardens and trees is proposed, as is the creation of a streetscape that I fear means it will not remain a street at all, but become a major distributor road. Living on a distributor road in urban villages and residential communities is a totally different experience from living on a street.

At the same time, we need to protect the bus fleets and improve bus times and services and I am 100% committed to that. There may be a technical solution. I welcome the plans to reduce the amount of through traffic on the two corridors to which I referred, without blocking access. We need to take an approach along the lines of the proposal for the main street in Rathmines, which will be a one-way system for cars, the plan to restrict traffic from Bride Street onto Heytesbury Street and the plans for a bus gate in Harold's Cross, though there are local difficulties around this last plan. These proposals recognise that we are at peak car and cannot cope. We have to restrict traffic while trying to maintain access. Instead of a four-lane approach on the roads I mentioned, we could look at a staggered three-lane approach. We could make sure a bus gets through the light every time and make other reductions in traffic. It should be possible to run the bus at the correct speed and to the correct timetable without having to provide a bus lane for the first 500 m of the road. The buses would always be ahead of the traffic and it would be a general shared lane. With a staggered approach, we may be able to reduce the amount of curtilage that must be taken, as well as diminishing the road's character as a major distributor route, thereby retaining some of the urban and residential character of the areas in question. Do the witnesses see this as an option? It would also have an effect on Nutley Lane and loads of other areas where there are similar difficulties but the effects would be particularly significant in the corridors to which I refer.