The most efficient form of transport in Dublin today is the rickshaw, according to Mr Jimmy Quinn of the Irish Road Haulage Association. It is followed by bicycles, buses, long-haul trucks, short-haul trucks, delivery vans and, finally, cars.
Mr Quinn, addressing the Chartered Institute of Transport's annual conference, said Dubliners would have to put up with the short-term pain of building the port tunnel to get trucks off the city streets. "The haulage sector has no wish to be in conflict with cyclists, rickshaw drivers, senior citizens in compact cars or indeed Dublin Bus.
"We need to be underground and give the city back to the people who live there," he declared.
Mr Georges Muller, technical manager of Strasbourg's light rail system, told the conference that one of the reasons for running it on the city's streets rather than underground - except for a short distance beneath the main railway station - was to take space away from cars.
Before finally deciding on an overground solution in 1989, he said Strasbourg's planners had visited several cities in Germany where they were warned not to "make the same mistake" as they did by putting their rail-based public transport systems underground.
Mr Muller said that on-street light rail was "more sociable and would appeal to more people, especially those reluctant to travel underground in the evenings due to fears for personal safety".
The conference was opened by the Minister for Public Enterprise, Mrs O'Rourke.