Dublin Commuter Coalition Call for Emergency Meeting with Richard Shakespeare [about last minute changes to the Dublin City Centre Transport Plan]

7 comments

1. At some point we stopped using horses as the main mode of transport, and all the horse facilities disappeared. Carparks in the city centre will be next, and would open up space for either green areas or housing. Win-win

2. William’s much less successful brother.

3. BuT ThE pOOr cARpArkS!

4. Give it a fucking rest…..

5. Maybe try having functioning public transport first 

6. Good. More noise needs to be made about this, and a proper investigation really should be done (if not criminal, then journalistic).

   * This has been in planning for years, with a lengthy consultation process wherein all parties had every opportunity to voice their grievances. The lobbying groups here either chose not to participate, or their concerns were listened to and deemed to not be of high enough importance.
   * The benefits of pedestrianisation of areas like this are proven around the world, not least literally around the corner from this proposed area where Grafton Street became a much stronger retail hotspot and at one point was even the fifth most expensive street in the world to rent in such was the success. This stands to benefit not just the public, but the business owners in the area as well – just not a select few like car parks,
   * Dublin City Council in their very own literature have boasted of the absurd levels of public support that pedestrianisation of these areas has, at over 80%: [https://consultation.dublincity.ie/traffic-and-transport/draft-dublin-city-centre-transport-plan/supporting_documents/DCC%20NTA%20Transforming%20Dublin%20City%20Centre%20Report.pdf](https://consultation.dublincity.ie/traffic-and-transport/draft-dublin-city-centre-transport-plan/supporting_documents/DCC%20NTA%20Transforming%20Dublin%20City%20Centre%20Report.pdf)
   * TD Emer Higgins – [whose household has a history of corruption](https://twitter.com/TinaMax8/status/1778035479549452344) – ran on improvement of public transport. Yet only one week after being appointed Minister for Enterprise and Trade (April 10th, 2024) the Liffey Cycle route got cancelled instantly. It is hard to tell how much of a role she had in that or not, and I never questioned it up until Saturday when she came out strongly, from nowhere, against this pedestrianisation plan.
   * Emer Higgins is infamously slow moving, having taken months to change the name of a passport project and then acting as if it were a monumental achievement. DCC are lightyears more infamous on this front again, taking decades to do what is feasible in a few short years and taking forever to make decisions on simple matters. Yet mysteriously, they went from not making a single noise about this to being able to alter the entire plan so much as to effectively cancel it entirely (apparently only three buildings will now not have car access) and pulled all of this off in under 100 hours!
   * In order to get this all through so quickly, they took the shortcuts of avoiding any public engagement on it, avoiding any of the consultants that were active in the initial process, racing to get there while active members of the government including the Minister for Transport. They made an effort to race this through before anyone could blink, in the same way you see corrupt acts get passed by some government’s houses of governments via 3am votes that are announced at 1am of the same night.

   I have a very, very, very hard time believing that money or some form of untoward benefit has not crossed into the hands of Emer Higgins and Richard Shakespeare on this matter. Because exactly none of this adds up. We have seen the special interests of a handful of businesses put above the wellbeing of the other businesses in the area, the overwhelming opinion of the general public, and every indication of the economic benefits of doing plan in the manner that had formally been agreed upon by all parties (including one would assume, multiple economic experts during consultation).

   I hope On the Ditch or similar are digging deep into this one, because it strikes me as open and naked corruption hoping to fly on through ASAP during a reasonably busy news cycle and general time of year.

7. I listened to The Last Word bit on this, and was tearing my hear out at the guy repping the business side of the argument.

   Kept saying that “people are confused about what this means” and “we need to take people on the journey with us”

   It’s a fecking bus gate along two tiny stretches of road, why is this country so bloody paralysed by change??