Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I thank Sinn Féin for bringing forward this motion. It is not possible to separate land use from transport planning and we must look over a long horizon to see what the trends are. In the mid-1990s, there was scenario testing for how the greater Dublin area was going to develop. It was intended that there would be a greater concentration of development in the city centre and, further out, there would be balanced regional development. In 1996, Dublin city accounted for 13% of the national population. The combined populations of the Fingal, South Dublin and Dún Laoghaire areas accounted for 15% of the population, while the combination of Kildare, Meath and Wicklow accounted for 9% of the national total.

That combination largely makes up the greater Dublin area and we can see how it has changed if we look at the 2022 figures. Dublin city has reduced its share of the national population from 13% to 11% over those 25 years. Fingal, South Dublin and Dún Laoghaire make up 16% of the total, up from 15% in 1996, albeit it is now a much larger population. The three outer counties of Meath, Kildare and Wicklow make up 12% of the national population in 2022. That is an increase from 9% in 1996, which is the converse of what was planned for from a transport perspective. This is what has happened following the big investments that were made over that time.

We are dealing now with the reality rather than the ideal. The reality is that housing policy is responsible for the change that has occurred. Unfortunately, we are seeing that some of the investments being made do not really recognise that reality. Some of that failure is operational and some is on the design side but largely it is about how we match land use and transportation planning. Major investments have been made in BusConnects, for example, with three spines rolled out so far. The second, the C spine, runs along the N4 and into north Kildare. While that works for some people, it certainly does not work for others. There are a lot of people back in their cars and very frustrated with what has been provided. This is not just a bedding-in issue. It is the situation almost a year after the project was delivered. I reiterate that it works well for some commuters but it is most definitely not working for others. The NTA does not want to hear that.

Other speakers referred to the services provided by Go-Ahead Ireland. That company got the contract in Kildare for the first group of Bus Éireann services that were privatised. There has been nothing but complaints since that happened. We have seen people have to change their jobs, be forced back into their cars and miss medical appointments and we have seen students miss examinations. I acknowledge there were problems with all the providers, with fines being issued across the board, but the worst offender by far was Go-Ahead Ireland. While the service was less than perfect before, the unreliability since that company took over has been absolutely disgraceful. The service has improved in Kildare in recent weeks following constant complaints.

We are nearly afraid to even mention it because it has been a constant problem. It is the same in parts of County Wicklow. Places like Enniskerry and Newtownmountkennedy need to be linked to the larger urban areas like Bray and Dún Laoghaire if public transport is to be viable. If the links do not work, public transport does not work. I do not know what kind of assessment was done in advance of that service being privatised. A capacity review certainly seems to be lacking. I do not know what the NTA was thinking about. From the complaints I have received, I know that it has been a huge source of frustration. It is going to be very difficult for people to ever trust that service. When people go back to using their cars, it is hard to get them on public transport again.

It was reported last week that 30% of students arriving to UCD from within 6 km are arriving by car. Why might that be? I met with representatives of the Union of Students in Ireland and the welfare officer on the day that report was published in the media, and I specifically sought to talk to them about public transport. One of the key issues raised was the unreliability of bus services, including the number 17 service, which is provided by Go-Ahead. I was told that it is a service that is there in theory, but is so unreliable that students have given up on it or they are taking a much more circuitous route to college, and perhaps driving there. We have got to look at what is not working there. Due to the housing crisis, students are often travelling form further afield to all colleges, so the availability and reliability of public transport has become a key issue. It has even become a welfare issue. While the 20% reduction in fares and an even greater reduction for the under 25s is very welcome, it is not much use if it cannot be used.

I return to the C spine issue. When delivering a spine on the BusConnects network, we must get it right before rolling out the next one. We decided to do a survey in north Kildare to see if the complaints we were getting were representative. Some 1,200 people took part in the survey, online and in-person. The in-person aspect was interesting because quite a few people politely refused to take part because they said the bus service no longer met their needs. We submitted the results to the NTA, but I do not believe it has the inclination to change anything, given the reply it sent to me. More than 100 people turned to a public meeting a few weeks ago, and I received dozens of apologies. We would really rather not be doing this, but we have another public meeting planned for the anniversary of the introduction of the C spine, to which the NTA and Dublin Bus have been invited. One of the key issues to be raised is that the peak time services, both morning and evening, need to be expanded. The evening peak ends too early and the morning peak does not start early enough. There are capacity and reliability issues, with people being left at bus stops, real-time information does not reflect the reality, and some buses do not show up at all. The real-time information is provided from Broadstone, the link buses are provided from Phibsborough, and the spine services are provided from Ringsend. They are not talking to each other. They do not match up. The bus stop on Wellington Quay is regarded as unsafe. People are not using the bus services because of that safety issue. There are also other bus stop safety issues. Buses are very overcrowded at peak times, with limited space. The fact that train times are not linked with bus times and are not synchronised makes public transport unattractive. The alternative services that were there previously were meeting requirements, but some of them are not currently. I accept that there are plenty of people that the services work well for, but they have to work well for people in general. We cannot have locations where they do not work.

I reiterate the points that have been made in relation to disability access to public transport. There is a real challenge for people, particularly on rail services, where the lifts are frequently out of order. Safety on public transport has to be assured. Otherwise, people will not use it. On the services that are currently provided through the NTA, a desktop exercise is done in relation to the service provision, where previously, the likes of Dublin Bus used to go out once a year and count the number of people who were left at the bus stops. That does not happen now. It is a desktop exercise. Counting the number of tickets does not provide the other information about who is not getting on the bus. There is also a need to look at how many people are getting back in their cars as a consequence of issues with the public transport services provided. I must say that some of the things that I would have expected to be improvements have not been improvements. It is a huge disappointment to someone like me, who is very pro public transport.

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