Gardai apologise for speed van parked in N11 cycle path

— ALSO: Domino’s to “look into” parking in cycle lane in Rathmines

A Garda Traffic Corps superintendent says the parking of a Garda speed detection van on a cycle path on the busy N11 was “totally unacceptable” and has apologised, according to a councilor who highlighted the poor parking.

Fine Gael councillor Barry Ward, who represents Blackrock in Dublin, yesterday posted an image of the Garda van parked on the southbound cycle path on the N11 before Foxrock Church earlier this week.

Garda speed camera van blockling the cycle lane on the #N11 near #Foxrock Church. @CyclingVillage @cyclingindublin pic.twitter.com/zibnBNTcrW

— Barry Ward (@cllrbarryward) April 22, 2014

While a private company, GoSafe, operates a large number of speed camera vans on behalf of the Gardai, the force still retains and regularly uses a number of their own vans. These are known to be “unmarked” or at least less marked than the GoSafe vans. The van parked on the N11 was a Garda van and had a “Garda sticker across the bonnet”.

Cllr Ward said: “In response to the photograph that I posted on this site, I was contacted twice today by Superintendent Goode from the Garda Traffic Corps in Dublin Castle. He expressed his dismay at the fact that the Garda speed van was parked illegally and that it did not have the usual Garda markings on the back (although they were on the front). He wanted to ascertain exactly when the van had been photographed so that he could identify the individual Garda responsible.”

Ward said he was told that the location where the van was supposed to be parked was not available so the Garda officer parked on the cycle path.

“Superintendent Goode made it very clear to me that he sees this as totally unacceptable and has apologised for both the fact that it was parked there and that cyclists were inconvenienced,” said Ward.

He said he accepts it was a mistake and that it won’t be allow to happen again: “As an experienced mistake-maker myself, I accept entirely what the Superintendent has told me and I believe it won’t be allowed to happen again; lesson learned.”

He also said that credit is due to An Garda Síochána Traffic Corps for treating this matter with the seriousness that it deserves and taking swift action to address cyclists’ legitimate concerns.

Meanwhile, Domino’s Ireland, which is a local franchise, said they will “look into” their delivery staff parking in the cycle lane on the Rathmines Road outside a Domino’s outlet on the street. The Irish Domino’s twitter account said:

@ccferrie@Loadamesoul@cyclingindublin@form_architect It is something we will look into. Thanks for notifying us. — Domino’s Pizza ROI (@Dominos_ROI) April 26, 2014 

That was in reply to this Tweet and attached image:

@Loadamesoul@cyclingindublin when is a cycleway not a cycleway? When @Dominos_ROI use it as a loading bay pic.twitter.com/zr5PrHSacY — Ciarán Ferrie (@ccferrie) April 24, 2014

Recently a Domino’s franchise in the US city of Portland — which has a comparable population and cycling modal share as Dublin — started to use cargo bicycles to deliver in built-up areas. Read that story on BikePortland.org.