Cycling access restored between St Stephen’s Green and College Green

Signs prohibiting cycling north of the Duke Street junction on Dawson Street, beside a new Luas stop, have been removed.

On the previous signs, the exception plates only allowed buses and trams to pass the no entry sign, but the new signs are no entry “except buses trams and bicycles”. This is also painted on the ground.

IrishCycle.com understands that officials from Transport Infrastructure Ireland (formerly the RPA) were behind a push to ban cycling on this route between St Stephen’s Green and College Green, but Dublin City Council, the Dublin Cycling Campaign and I Bike Dublin were against the move.

The National Transport Authority said it will design an advisory “cyclists dismount” signs to be placed at the Dawson Street Luas stop — these signs would only be suggestions and would not be compulsory to follow.

IMAGES: Thanks to Colm Moore


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6 comments

  1. Did common sense break out or was this a legal loophole (not possible to ban bikes)?
    Either way, it’s a pretty poor turnout for such an important link – I’ll predict the RPA come out with a “I told you so” when a cyclist gets injured by the track on this section.

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  2. If they used the rubber inserts in the tracks at the few areas likely to be crossed isn’t the whole thing just irrelevant? As in other cities. Trams will just have to proceed at the pace of the slowest user (probably the tram itself if the video they released of their route is believed).

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  3. It will be vital for all drivers of permitted PT (buses, coaches, trams) vehicles to be given specific instruction/training on how to safely interact with people who cycle in these zones.
    Keep well behind the rider and be prepared for the rider coming to a halt in order to change direction so as to cross the rail-groove at a near right-angle.
    But composite rail-flange inserts should be deployed at these critical direction changes. These direction-change points should be marked on the road surface after consultation with Dublin Cycling Campaign/Cyclist.ie.
    Expense should not be the excuse to not use the inserts.

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  4. Agree that Luas and bus driver training is required. I had an Aircoach follow me very closely on the Dawson St to College Green section during the week. Pedestrians also need to get used to two-way traffic where it was one-way before.
    I researched rubber flange fillers for train and tram tracks last year and could find no successful examples of their use. Both Goodyear and a Swiss firm developed products but both failed in use and were removed. There is one system that has been used on railway crossings but it has to be installed before the tracks and their supports and cannot be retrofitted. I did see a suggestion somewhere that the infrequently used link sections between the different Luas lines could have inserts fitted that could be manually removed if the link was in use but I’m not sure how practical this is.

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  5. A lot of people don’t seem to know that those “cyclist dismount” signs aren’t compulsory. I can see why, they are phrased as an order. A certain number of motorists seem to think they have the right to punish supposed wrongdoing by cyclists by using their vehicles to intimidate. The two things do not combine well. I would prefer they do not have any ‘advisory’ cyclists dismount signs at all.

    A “Cyclists take care around tracks” sign, maybe via iconography like they use in other places, would seem far less likely to cause confusion. Of course I wouldn’t be surprised if they were hoping people assumed the dismount signs were mandatory.

    Reply

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