Dublin City Council Report on 123 Bus Re-Routing

Dublin City Council Report on 123 Bus Re-Routing

Please see below the report submitted to Dublin City Council's Area Committee on the re-routing of the 123 Bus in Marino:


__________________________________________________________________
North Central Area Office,
Northside Civic Centre, Bunratty Road, Coolock, Dublin 17.

Oifig Ceantar an Lárthuaiscirt,
Oifig Cathartha an Taoibh Thuaidh, Bóthar Bun Raite,
An Chúlóg, Baile Atha Cliath 17.

15th June 2010.

To the Chairman and Members
of the North Central Area Committee.
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Report Re: Site visit to examine issues with the 123 route in Marino.

Following on from discussions at the May 2010 North Central Area committee meeting between the Councillors and Mr Donal Keating of Dublin Bus it was decided to arrange a site visit to investigate the various issues discussed. The Area Committee Meeting was held on Monday the17th of May and the resulting site visit was arranged for 10am on Wednesday 26th of May. Present at this meeting where, Donal Keating, Derek Dixon and a Dublin Bus driver. As Dublin Bus are in the process of retiring all of their single decker vehicles a double decker vehicle was used to fully experience the difficulties stated by Mr Keating. Subsequent to the site visit Mr Keating issued the following account of the recent history of the 123 route.

In September 2008 the service was rerouted for a period of 9 months, following safety concerns associated with safe access at several locations. Dublin City Council in conjunction with Dublin Bus and local representatives carried out various works (road markings) in an effort to create a safer environment for buses to operate in this area, where the road network is far from ideal for vehicles of this size to operate.

Despite the efforts made the situation has improved very little and we are back to where we were in 2008. Normal residential and business activity in the area means that the buses are forced to negotiate already tight junctions, compounded by parked vehicles which restrict driver’s sight lines and actually cause blockages.We are mindful of the age profile of our customers in this area and we do not take this decision lightly.

The route is currently served by a fleet of single deck buses which are nearing the end of their serviceable life.The replacement buses will be larger and will add to the access difficulties currently being experienced on Brian Road and Morrogh Terrace.
An additional bus stop will be erected on Philipsburgh Avenue as soon as the legal requirements are completed.

In addition Dublin Bus will be reducing the running time on this route to reflect current operating conditions which will mean that delays caused by illegal parking will have a detrimental impact on the schedule.
For all of the above reasons we believe that our current alignment outbound using just Philipsburgh Avenue is the best course of action with the proviso that concerned customers can stay on board and alight on the inbound journey through the scheme.

It was clearly observed during the site visit that the Double Decker had considerable difficulty negotiating the Right Turn out of Morrogh Terrace even with no illegal Parking. There was also the need for a car to reverse back out of the way during one of these manoeuvres. There was also the need for stop start movements on Brian Road during the visit.

Derek Dixon
Senior EngineerNorth Central Area