Transport initiative - Grinding to a halt amid prosperity

ONE of the great expenses, both environmental and financial, of our time is private transport. Soaring parking costs in our cities and towns are adding to an already heavy burden.

Relatively easy access to private transport also means that many people are forced to commute ever-greater distances, so much so that one sceptical observer has described the traffic jams blocking some of our roads at peak hours as moving prisons.

Land that once interested no-one other than farmers is now assessed for its development potential no matter how far it is from any centre of population. This has led to all sorts of difficulties and strains in family life.

Rural schools may not have the capacity to offer places to the children of their new neighbours — a dilemma all too obvious in north Co Dublin. A dilemma made no less embarrassing in that it might well have been avoided if planners had taken note of their own predictions and prepared for the population growth they had anticipated.

Local water and waste disposal schemes are often not capable of coping with proposed developments leading to all sorts of opportunities for pollution and, as is seen again in Galway, contaminated water supplies.

Young people trying to buy a house in the area they were born and reared in can find themselves priced out of the market.

Rural public transport systems are sometimes so weak that private transport becomes an unavoidable necessity. Private car ownership is central to all of these situations and part of a vicious circle that needs to be broken.

This is European Mobility Week, an European Commission initiative aimed at encouraging sustainable mobility. It will be recognised in more than 1,300 cities and towns and will facilitate the debate on the necessity for changes in behaviour in relation to mobility and in particular the use of the private car in urban areas.

It will also bring the debate on the need to reallocate road space to other means of transport for improving the mobility in cities and towns to the fore.

This is another area where most Irish people would gladly consider modifying their habits if only they had an option.

How many of our satellite towns are served by a bus service — don’t even mention rail — that is reliable, frequent and moderately comfortable? No new commuter rail networks have been built outside Dublin for decades and deadlines for the reopening of defunct lines have been broken so often that they have become utterly meaningless.

Another European Mobility Week initiative is to explore the potential of a car sharing scheme in Cork. A feasibility study has concluded that, despite the city’s low density of population, such a scheme might work.

Under the scheme, club members would have access to cars without having to buy, insure or tax them. Members would go to a parking bay and open the car with a smart card and a PIN number. The car is returned to the bay when the trip is over. Developers have backed the plan as it would reduce the need to provide car parking at apartment blocks.

It is natural that our habits evolve and that things change but it seems that we are entering a period of great uncertainty on energy security and anything that can reduce our dependency on imported oil must be considered. If it can also cut the cost of running a car from a family budget so much the better.