Dear minister . . . Patrick Logueputs his thoughts on roads and driver safety into a heartfelt letter to the former (and future?) roads boss
Dear (outgoing) Minister for Transport, You romped home, blew the other candidates out of the water, and nobody would deny you a big knees-up, or even a short break in Dunmore East to celebrate a stunning election victory. The people of Waterford have appointed you their favourite son, there is no doubt, Mr Cullen.
So to hell with the begrudgers, those who complain about slinky young models launching road safety initiatives and those who might carry around cardboard cut-outs of yourself and Dick Roche. You've surely shut them up with 11,000 first-preference votes.
But us motorists have been wondering how you might have fared in a national referendum or a poll of the thousands of motorists stuck on that motorway in Dublin day in, day out. You may be the unofficial King of Waterford, but remember you have been Minister for Transport for the whole State for the past number of years. We are placing our motoring lives in you and your party's hands for another five years, by the looks of things.
And we know that it is, after Health, one of those poisoned chalices of government. I mean, what voter doesn't have at least one car these days? Every time there's a traffic jam, every time there is a spate of tragedies on the roads, every time €1 billion too much is spent on improving infrastructure, every time a car tax bill lands on the doormat, it's your fault.
Your party has been in government for 10 years, and you've been in Transport House for three of those years, so it is your fault. Right?
Maybe you or whoever is sitting in the transport hotseat on June 14th would be so good as to take some friendly advice from us, the motoring public, on how to keep us happy, as they say, "going forward".
First the praise. It's no mean feat to take on the crazies on the road and change their bad behaviour. Hats off - good progress has been made over the years. Take 1985, when there were just over 900,000 cars, vans, trucks, motorbikes and tractors on Irish roads.
Back then the height of road safety was switching your lights on at night and driving on the correct side of the road. The result was that 410 people lost their lives in that year. More than 20 years later, road safety is a hot issue. We have well over two million vehicles on the roads nowadays and road deaths last year were 368. When the government came to power in 1997, road deaths were running at about 470 per annum despite a smaller number of cars on the road.
So the death-per-registered-vehicle rate has been halved in 20 years, not least because of safer cars, safer roads and a greater awareness of the dangers. As you took over Transport in 2004, Mr Cullen, road deaths had begun to creep up after an initial dip when penalty points were introduced at the end of 2002.
They rose from 335 in 2003 to 374 in 2004, and up to 396 in 2005. But last year saw an improvement, with a reduction to 368 and this year is looking more positive, with 24 fewer fatalities than the same period last year.
The introduction of mandatory random breath testing is widely seen as being responsible for the current dip in road deaths, something that was first suggested by Séamus Brennan and finally introduced by your goodself in August 2006. It was, as it were, your plastic bag tax, your smoking ban. But there is a number of items that need you or AN Other's attention in the coming months and years.
There are still more than 300 drivers, passengers, bikers, cyclists and pedestrians being killed on the roads each year, while you and your Government don't even have a road safety strategy in place.
Of course you have taken certain courses of action and implemented some measures such as breath testing, contained in the last strategy. But you and the Road Safety Authority need to publish the 2007-2011 plan to make further improvements in the area of road safety. Remember, when the strategy is finally published you may need to bring forward legislation in the Dáil which can take an age, as you well know.
There are still items outstanding from previous plans that need to be put in place. We read in the papers for a number of years and see the same reports appearing that the introduction of a network of privately operated speed cameras is "imminent".
Meanwhile, country roads remain like rally circuits in the wee hours of the morning and not a bit of enforcement in sight. (This is not to say we will tolerate clamper-like tactics with cameras hiding behind 60km/h signs nabbing everything going 65. Sensible and fair enforcement only please). There are a few other items that need some work too. When will we be able to put our driving licences into our wallets instead of fumbling with the pink cardboard inside the plastic cover that's the size of a postcard?
When are we likely to see integrated ticketing between trains, buses and trams? When will the unfair VRT be scrapped on new car purchases? When will the ludicrous system of taxing cars based on engine size be replaced with a fairer tax on fuel use? (that's one for you, Mr Roche).
Another bone us motorists have to pick with you is this endless congestion we must endure driving (or trying to) around this fair isle we call home. You're finishing the motorway network, that's fair enough and you're adding a third lane to the M50. OK that's fine too, and you're getting rid of the toll barriers with a big pile of cash.
But why did I have to sit in traffic the other day next to an empty bus lane with no buses in it, taunting me with its emptiness. Whether it's more buses for Dublin Bus or a privately-run system, we don't care really. You'll just need to sort that out or simply open up the bus lanes if they're not being used.
And there's talk of an outer ring road to bypass the whole mess as well, running in a semi-circle from Drogheda to Kilcullen. Is that going to happen? If it is, just get on with it.
Talk too, backed by the Taoiseach himself, of moving Dublin port to somewhere north of Balbriggan which begs the question: why did you spend almost a billion of our precious tax euro building the port tunnel? Will it be a road to nowhere? We think more planning and an integrated approach to meeting our transport needs. Your new Dublin Transport Authority needs to be up and running as soon as possible.
Finally, for the love of God, Allah and the saints above will you replace the old signs for the N1 around Drogheda, since the road doesn't exist there any more. It's not the only example of strange signposting either, and it's confusing the hell out of the tourists.
Yours sincerely,
An Irish Motorist