Following a recent Special Meeting of Wicklow County Council at which its Roads and Transportation Programme 2007 was presented to public representatives, Green Party councillor, Deirdre de Burca, has called for a much greater level of investment in public transport in County Wicklow.

“The wider context in which we are discussing any Transportation programme is that of Climate Change and rising levels of Greenhouse Gas emissions” says de Burca. “It’s not just the Green Party that’s pointing this out now - economists, scientists and other experts are agreeing wholeheartedly and saying that we need to change our behaviour if we want to avoid catastrophic weather events in the future like flooding, hurricanes and severe storms. Transport is one of the biggest contributors to Greenhouse Gas emissions and yet the programme that was presented today is all about Roads and more Roads. This is very short-sighted of the council, and of the Government, which continues to give six times more funding to roads projects than to public transport”.

De Burca says that the building of new roads only encourages more car-use and that traffic congestion, gridlock and rising carbon dioxide emissions are inevitable. “The NRA figures presented to us by the council engineers today show that in 1997, an average of 7,554 vehicles used the N11 every day. In 2001 the use of the N11 reached capacity in July. In 2004, a daily average of 14,205 vehicles a day used the N11, and the road was operating over capacity during “peak” months. In 2005 there was an 18.2% increase in the amount of traffic on the N11 and the road was over capacity from February through to December. In 2006 an average of 19,162 vehicles per day were using the N11 which operated at 139% of its capacity for the full 12 months of the year”.

The Green Party councillor says that the building of more, and bigger roads is only encouraging a greater use of individual motor cars. She was particularly critical of the proposed Dublin Outer Orbital Route (DOOR) project which has been included in the Government’s Regional Planning Guidelines for the Greater Dublin Area and which is planned to cross County Wicklow. “It is suggested that this Outer Orbital Route should stretch from Drogheda to Navan to Naas and through to Arklow” says de Burca. “This will undoubtedly involve tunnelling through the Wicklow Mountains. In my opinion this is sheer lunacy when that money could be spent on upgrading the Dublin to Rosslare Rail line. I suspect that the residents of Arklow, Rathdrum, Avoca, Wicklow Town, Rathnew, Newcastle, Kilcoole, and Greystones would much prefer to see that money invested in opening up some of the closed railway stations on the Rosslare Line and providing a regular, reliable and efficient train service to Bray, and on to Dublin”.

De Burca says that delivering on better Public Transport for County Wicklow, both bus and rail, should be the priority for Wicklow County Council and not building more and bigger roads. “The future is one of high energy prices” says de Burca. “It will become a lot more expensive for us to get around and so it makes sense now for us to invest in more energy efficient public transport systems that will take everybody- young and old- where they want to go. This is why it is important for the extended Luas Line from Cherrywood to come out to meet the Rosslare Rail line in Bray, rather than avoiding the town altogether” says de Burca. “It should be possible for people in South County Wicklow to travel into Dublin in one or two streamlined train journeys, using a fast, regular and efficient transport service. If this is not a reality within the next ten years, then the fault will lie with the political parties and officials who have continued to channel the investment available into increasingly questionable roads projects which apart from opening up land for developers are doing very little else”.