Operation Freeflow, the annual strategy to keep traffic moving around Dublin, faced its first challenge today in the shape of the morning rush-hour.
Nicola Hudson of AA Roadwatch told The Irish Timesthere were no major incidents to report and that traffic volumes were "standard" for a Monday morning.
She said public transport was the key to keeping the city moving and that gardaí will be focusing on keeping bus and cycle lanes clear.
To that end, 166 probationary gardaí have been drafted in to supplement the Traffic Corps.
The Garda Traffic Control Centre in Harcourt Square will be the hub for the daily management of the operation with live video conferencing with Dublin City Council's traffic centre in the civic offices on Wood Quay, which will help regulate the flow of traffic throughout the city.
Shoppers are being asked to use public transport while party-goers should familiarise themselves with the later operating hours of most of the public transport services.
Gardaí also issued a warning to motorists yesterday that a seasonal clampdown on drink and drug driving is already under way and will be in place until January. A Garda spokesman said mandatory alcohol-testing checkpoints will be held regularly throughout the freeflow period
As part of Operation Lifesaver, which is being run in conjunction with Freeflow, checkpoints will particularly target inappropriate driving, excessive speed, failure to use seat belts and heavy goods vehicle offences.
While urban centres outside Dublin do not have an official version of Operation Freeflow, motorists have been warned that Garda Traffic Corps units throughout the country will be stepping up enforcement.
To ease traffic year-round, Fine Gael MEP Gay Mitchell called for the new lane on the M50 to be made available solely to car poolers and buses.
"According to figures from the 2006 Census, over 261,154 people in Dublin use a car daily for travelling to work, however only 20,011 people are passengers in these cars. This means that there is anything up to 241,143 single-occupancy cars commuting to work each morning around Dublin,” he said.
He said the extra lane on the M50 should be used as a high occupancy vehicle lane between the hours of 7am and 9.30am and 5pm and 7.30pm to encourage commuters not to travel alone to work. Those who did car pool would enjoy a shorter commute to work using the new lane.
"I am calling on the Department of Transport and four Local Authorities to establish a system whereby car pools can be officially registered and recognised.
"Each car in the car pool would be given unique ID (to that car pool) and tamper-proof stickers to be placed on the windscreen of the car allowing them to use the 3rd lane on the M50 and the QBC s during peak times and prevent abuse of the system,” he said.
Meanwhile, there was good news this morning for regular M50 users. Travel times on the ring-road have been reduced by barrier free tolling, according to new research published today by Mapflow.
Since the barriers were removed on August 30th, the average travel time in either direction has been reduced by 5.5 minutes.
The average southbound journey time has improved by almost six minutes while the average northbound journey time improved by nearly five minutes.
Southbound journey times on the M50 between the Finglas exit and the Naas Road Exit were just over nine minutes, an improvement of nearly six minutes against the 15 minute average journey time which existed before barrier-free tolling.
The average travel time for the same distance in the opposite direction reduced from 21 minutes to 16 minutes.