Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Our first guest is Professor Brian Caulfield, Professor in Transportation at Trinity College Dublin. Brian, tell us about the survey you're conducting about the M50 and why.
So we launched a survey there yesterday to understand better what's happening on the M50. Obviously, we know it's very congested, but what we wanted to understand more about is what are the impacts of this congestion? What impacts is it having in terms of economics, in terms of jobs, in terms of, you know, well-being in terms of family life, that type of thing.
Chapter 2: What is the M50 congestion survey about?
The thing then that we did was we presented seven options that could possibly change the congestion on the M50. They include a carpooling lane, more investment in public transport, bus-based park and ride to increase motorway management to remove collisions as quickly as possible.
to increase the capacity of adjacent roads, and then finally to increase the number of tolling points, which is a controversial one, which TII themselves looked into. And sorry, then the final one is to give better information on it. So we're asking people to rank those in terms of what they think might be able to solve the problem.
Okay, just before we get to that, at present, the road is regarded as at capacity. How many vehicles travel on the M50 within any 24-hour period?
So on average, it's just below 190,000 vehicles. Since the motorway opened up, the population of the Greater Dublin area has increased by 20% and the population of cars in Ireland has increased by 40%. So right now, this vital artery, which it is for the region, is not working in terms of freight and in terms of passengers.
When did it first open and then tell us about the expansion that it's already had?
So stages of it opened up from the kind of mid-90s onwards, and then it was kind of more or less finished going into the 2010s. The very first thing they did with the M50 once it was finished was to expand it by an extra lane. That happened, alleviated the congestion for a while, and then what we called induced traffic happened.
So when you provide more road space, basically what happens is more congestion follows. So the cars fill up that space. Right now, the M50, it's not possible to add lanes either side because of the physical constraints on the motorway.
Well, one listener says there is an additional solution that's not on the list you just gave us, that we need a new outer ring road, just like they're talking about in Galway building on top of what they already have.
So it is. An increase in capacity on adjacent road networks is one of the options.
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Chapter 3: What are the impacts of M50 congestion on daily life?
It's not in there specifically as an outer orbital because that would have, I suppose, maybe complicated the question. It would have added in, you know, what side you put it. Do you put it to the west or do you do the eastern bypass? So extra road capacity is one of the options.
Okay. Now, let's go through some of the things. The example you gave, an introduction of a high vehicle occupancy lane, in other words, a carpool lane. How would this work?
So it's very popular in North America where they have lots of space to build extra lanes. So basically what happens is there will be cameras on the M50 that would check to make sure that there were people and there was more than one person per vehicle. And when that happens, people could get access to these faster lanes. So that is one solution that works in other countries.
Okay, and it would require policing or can that all be done via cameras or does it require policing of motorbikes with a motorway police on the roads?
Typically in North America, it's used with cameras. So cameras are able to detect when there are one or more people in the cars.
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Chapter 4: What solutions have been proposed to reduce M50 congestion?
But there's obviously ways to game that system. I've seen papers represented in North America whereby people come along with mannequins in the car with them as well. So there's ways to get around that if somebody was minded to.
Okay, listener wants to know, how much of the 190,000 daily traffic are paying tolls and where is all that toll money going?
So first of all, the toll money from the M50, and it was announced there during the week, I think it's doubled over the past decade. I think it's less than 30% of people that actually pay the toll because the toll is at one specific point. And it's there as a historical legacy because it was there to pay for the infrastructure of the M50, which has been well paid for at this stage.
So you have as an option, would it be fairer? Would it also persuade people to perhaps be more careful about their M50 use if possible, if there were multiple tolls at different points at a cheaper rate along the road?
So in theory, that could work.
So TII themselves, Transport Infrastructure Ireland, that run the motorway, did a report about a decade ago and they modelled this and they showed that if there were multiple tolling points on the M50 and the price could vary through the day depending upon demand, like it's done with the Port Tunnel, that they expected that there will be a drop in traffic and there will be a drop in congestion.
So that's always kind of been an option on that motorway. But for whatever reason, probably political, it's never been enacted.
Okay, you also have invest or introduce bus, park and ride services. You do have a Lewis stop at the Red Cow and there is parking available there. Is that the only such place on the M50?
To the best of my knowledge, yes, it is the only such place. That in itself, anybody that uses that facility will know that there's very high demand for those spaces. The idea will be something along those lines that some of the bigger interchanges on the motorway, that something like that will be there. Obviously it wouldn't be a Lewis, it would be a bus into the city centre.
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Chapter 5: How does traffic volume on the M50 compare over time?
Would it make sense to have a Luvis running alongside the M50?
I think more public transport, the better. Back in the Celtic Tiger, we did have a plan to build a Metro West, which was going to follow the curvature of the M50, similar to the Metro in the city with the same type of capacity. That project dropped off the planning when the bubble crashed or the market crashed.
But there is a plan now for a couple of outer orbital Lewis lines as that network starts to expand. But none of these, as we both know, will happen quickly. So some form of, I suppose, temporary or fast solutions around bus, I think would be appropriate.
Yeah, another one says, what about a raised monorail along the centre of the M50 would link everyone in the city, north, south, east and west and the airport? Another one says, you're doing comparisons with North America, but what about commercial vehicles only allowed on the M50 during certain times, from maybe midnight to 6am in the morning?
again both of those solutions would work and that freight solution has actually come up quite a bit in the in the uh the suggestions that are put in but then again i suppose you talk to the hauliers and ask them you know can they do that can they operate the road uh or can they operate their services at restricted times I'm not sure. We need to get a better handle.
And that's another thing that we're doing is we're analysing the traffic of the M52 to see what the percentages of freight vehicles are on the road to see if solutions like that could be possible.
Brian, just again to finish, where can people make their contribution? What's the website name?
So the survey I've shared on social media, I think I've sent it to your researchers as well. And it's all over my social media at the moment. And I'm happy to send it on again. And it will be great. The reason you said at the start, why are we doing this?
We're doing this to get some evidence and to go to public policy and say, this is what the people of the motorway or the people that use the motorway would like.
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Chapter 6: What are the challenges of expanding the M50?
Brian Caulfield, Professor of Transportation at Trinity College Dublin.
Thank you.