Galway gridlock a big issue for voters

Traffic congestion in and around Galway is one of the main issues being raised by voters across the city’s three electoral areas.

It’s a constant theme for so many people because the gridlock faced by commuters continues to worsen and shows no sign of easing anytime soon. It is crippling the city on a daily basis.

Officials have grappled with the problem for decades.

Plans for a city bypass were initially approved in 2008, only to be overturned on appeal to the European courts on environmental grounds some years later.

By 2014 proposals for a ring road through the city were being worked on.

They resulted in plans for an 18 kilometre route, with single and dual carriageways, running from the end of the existing M6 to a location west of the village of Bearna.

In 2018 a formal planning application was jointly lodged by Galway City and County Councils, along with Transport Infrastructure Ireland.

Planners expressed confidence that they had future proofed the route to avoid any environmental pitfalls and that the road would be under construction by the early to mid 2020s.

An oral hearing was held up by the onset of the Covid pandemic but in late 2021 the plan was given the green light by An Bord Pleanála. It seemed the efforts of the design teams had borne fruit.

However, the development was on the skids less than a year later after it emerged the planning board had failed to determine if the project complied with the State’s Climate Action Plan.

High Court challenges by a number of parties did not progress, after An Bord Pleanála conceded the error.

Local authorities backing the route still maintain it is a vital part of the effort to get Galway moving again. They are continuing to gather data which will be presented to An Bord Pleanála by September, after which time, officials there will review the application and – this time – check how it complies or conflicts with our wider climate commitments.

There is no timeframe for how long this will take but it is certain that whatever the adjudication, the final ruling will be subject to legal challenge here and perhaps, ultimately, in Europe.

All that means that the city’s inadequate infrastructure will not be changing anytime soon.

Plans for better bus routes, more active travel initiatives and improved pedestrian and cycle facilities require something to give. Those in favour of the ring road argue that it is the first step in freeing the city from the hundreds of cars that are forced to traverse the centre of Galway, to move across the Corrib.

Deirdre Mac Loughlin, the interim CEO of Galway Chamber, says the ring road is of vital importance in securing Galway’s social and economic future. She says the status quo is not sustainable and that traffic congestion will ultimately result in the region losing investment and employment, as companies opt to locate elsewhere.

For her, the proposed route would lay the foundation on which a transformed Galway could develop. A city with fewer cars, more bus lanes and much more frequent public transport services.

But environmental groups, including An Taisce, contend that the ship has well and truly sailed on the idea of building a road to take private vehicles, given the increased emissions it would generate and the knock-on fines the country would face for failing to properly address the climate crisis.

Peter Butler has been keenly following the issue for the organisation. He argues that planners should ditch the ring road and instead focus on what short term measures they could take to improve on existing infrastructure, in an effort to bring some relief to the city.

He is convinced that the plans in their current iteration will almost certainly be rejected and that the growing momentum for action on emissions means the project is doomed.

In the middle of all these discussions are thousands of voters and a range of interest groups, each with their own take on best way forward. Journey times, poor cycle lanes, unreliable busses, choked approaches to the city… the list of complaints is long. The task of devising a workable solution is difficult.

It bears an uncanny similarity to the lead in to the last local elections, and the previous contest in 2014. Little has changed transport-wise since then.

Right now, few would wager that the city’s infrastructure will be markedly better in another five years.