college green/ o’connell street plaza and pedestrians

If only there were a Garda Station in the vicinity…

(Or, at least, one from which the view wasn’t blocked by a double line of parked cars.)

I don’t wish to hog a learned architectural forum with matters of buses, but the matter of putting the buses somewhere is vital to the whole picture. At present we are discussing running trams through the most congested bottleneck in the city, and to ask where the buses might go, will be answered with the retort that the buses are ‘outside the remit’ of the RPA. Dublin Bus, for their part, will enter any discussions on the basis of maintaining their self appointed ‘squatters rights’ on the city streets for the past eighty years. Look at all the shiny new bus stops going up, while the buses sit in the same old traffic jams, with the same old tram stages to denote the fares. Dublin Bus are not planning on vacating any time soon!

Independent Bus Terminals
I apologise for suggesting Parnell Square as a city terminus. On ‘mature reflection,’ of course, it is totally unnecessary. We have Summerhill Garage, which I visualise as being vacated by Dublin Bus, and taken over either by the city council, an independent transport regulator, or an independent private agency, to be operated as a combined bus terminal and passenger interchange, with cleaning, fueling and dormitory facilities for both the city bus operators, private or state, and also for visiting coach drivers, on long distance or private charter work. Those facilities outside of the basic bus terminal would be charged to bus operators on a reasonable basis, with discounted fuel, canteen, etc. All on street parking by buses would then be subject to heavy parking fines, rigorously enforced. That will get your parked buses removed from Mountjoy Square.

I see part of Donnybrook Garage providing a similar facility on the southside, and Conyngham Road Garage providing that facility for the west side. I wonder if Conyngham Road were a bus terminal, could some bridging facility be provided across to Heuston Station, either for the buses, or for intending passengers? Or perhaps CIE land at the back of Heuston would serve that role. Another interchange is planned for Strand Street, although I question the access to that for buses, and for Connolly.

Bus Garaging Outside the City
More bus garaging needs to be provided on the perimeter of the city, with buses operating from these perimeter depots, INTO and then OUT of the city. City terminals would then be just that, for disgorging, loading, and departing. Operators should be penalised for holding up terminal space. I am sure you don’t just park aeroplanes haphazardly round the apron at Dublin Airport!

I have looked at the frequencies of all the Dublin Bus routes, and the frequencies on the key corridors across the city. Having appropriated terminal facilities as suggested, on an INDEPENDENTLY operated basis, not beholden to any one bus company, the other priorities would be to organise new corridors across the city, allowing for the ingress of new tram lines.

Street Closures
O’Connell Street, College Green and Westmoreland Street would be lost to the buses. Those buses cannot simply be supplanted to Gardiner Street or Capel Street. It takes more thought than that. Dame Street too, if there are to be trams, will lose at least half it’s capacity, suggesting that what is left would be a one way street.

I see O’Connell Street, Westmoreland Street and College Green open for loading purposes only perhaps overnight. I would see tour buses and perhaps one centrally serving route (the single deck electric buses of my previous post) that links the main interchanges, but does not cross the canal.

New One Way Streets
I see Nassau Street, Suffolk Street, Church Lane, Dame Street and Lord Edward Street reduced to a ONE WAY corridor WEST bound, preferably with bus only daytime access between Dawson Street and Trinity Street. I see South Great Georges Street and Aungier Street become a ONE WAY street, SOUTH bound as far as Redmond’s Hill. This creates a much more freely operating bus circuit from Earlsfort Terrace to Kildare Street (rerouted NORTH bound) through Nassau Street, Dame Street and Georges Street, back towards the main southside arteries. I would see set down only stops at St. Stephens Green, Kildare Street, Nassau Street and Dame Street, with pick up ONLY in Dame Street. Remember, these bus routes would be intended to enter the city, run the circuit, and exit again as quickly as possible. There is nowhere available on this circuit for the laying over of buses, without resulting in congestion and inefficient operation.

Cross City Services
There is scope for cross city buses to use Winetavern Street to the Quays northbound, returning via Parliament Street, and for Westland Row both ways to be used as well. I would prefer to see less cross city services, but more user friendly availability of interchange between buses. For example, why not terminate the very busy 46A bus corridor at Leeson Street Upper, with an interchange stop there for cross city routes heading towards each of the northside N1, N2, N3 and N4 corridors? Peak hour buses could be allowed to run on into the Nassau Street / Dame Street circuit already described, for SET DOWN only. The Burlington would serve as an ideal interchange for buses coming FROM the city to interchange with buses bound for the N11. It can be done efficiently, and if less buses were to cross the city half empty, stuck in traffic, then the interchange would be enabled quicker than one bus can presently do the entire route, stuck in the endless traffic jams.

Dublin City Council
Unfortunately, the only way you are going to sell this to the city council, is by demonstrating that there will be no loss of revenue earning disc parking space, but rather, a freeing up of the streets, and the reallocation of disc parking with the possibility of MORE such space being available. This negates the purpose, but parking can be made available as long as access to the same area is prioritised to buses rather than cars. Keep the buses flowing, and the cars will wind their way into the parking when they really need to.

I have drawn up maps of the proposals, with estimated frequencies of buses on each of the corridors, to show how possibly it can be done, though this architecture forum is probably not the place for such a level of detail.

I am thinking in terms of a more immediate solution to the problem of bus congestion and the exclusion of traffic from College Green, etc. Apart from all the furore about closing off streets, which would die away in time, and the physical hardship of closing streets and repainting lines, and altering the street furniture, Such a scheme could be brought in in under a year if the WILL was there. In the current climate of post boom and cutbacks in public finances, the gains from reorganising the one way streets and the buses would cost far less, and provide some level of interim solution, rather than expensive long term plans which may or may not ever happen, because we might need the money for something else.

Bus tunnels would take years to plan and execute, and in any case, if we could build tunnels for buses, we might as well put faster and more capacious Metro trains in.

Thats great stuff Busman, lot of work gone into that. This is probably as good a place as any to post maps. This issue really seriously affects the urban design and future planning of the city centre.

Plus you never know who might be reading…..!

On GrahamH’s post re the shop on Dame St opposite city hall, the amount of pavement space taken up by sandwich boards and the like is really shocking. Its just visual clutter and adds to the sense of disorientation and mess on the city’s streets. Surely it must be an easy thing to implement the removal of these.

‘Top Gear’ is coming to Dublin. Permission to drive a British army tank across O’Connell Bridge and towards the GPO, however, has not been sought. Nor is it likely to be.

“It’s been a dreadful August, and I think it has to do with the amount of people driving electric cars,” Clarkson informed us yesterday, warming to this particular subject. “If the balance of nature is really as delicate as they claim, then all those people with [new] bicycles are probably causing summers to be cold and wet.”

http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/tv-radio/i-give-you-my-tanks-1467331.html

terminate on ground or terminate underground should we put a lid on line f ?
it could easily have a rain protected concrete lid and metro north underground pedestrian connection tunnel

That was my wish for the Carlton site and Metro.

What better way to say ‘Welcome to Dublin’ than arriving up the escalator to see the GPO, Spire, O’Connell Street, etc.?

Of course, the same could be said for a Metro stop in the new College Green Plaza- imagine coming up where the underground jacks is into a traffic-minimised square… *sob*

insert stone taoiseach’s in these false windows…

What about biffo cowan. His statue wont fit. :rolleyes:

Interesting picture.

Found a spot for Cowan Statue. He can have a large statue under the Right Arch as he is always right and stick Berties Statue on the Left as he’s a socialist and he’s has just left…. :rolleyes:

Any in the middle you can have a mega statue dedicated to Mary Harney. The Statue should have Mary eating Butlers Chocolates and at her feet, patients clinging at her trousers begging for help. 😉