COMMUTERS SO CROSS WITH LUAS CITY LINES
Cars caught up in queue BEDLAM broke out in Dublin city centre yesterday morning as commuters came to grips with the new Luas Cross City.
People were faced with delays of up to 40 minutes going from O’connell Bridge to Trinity College as buses, trams, cars and cyclists got caught up in gridlock along the route.
And many took to social media to say they were late for work due to the chaos.
A number of signal failures and issues with traffic lights along the line are understood to have been to blame, with gardai eventually called to try and help ease the traffic flow.
One commuter wrote online: “Fortytwo minutes for my bus to get down O’connell St and past College Green?!?! Thanks for a terrible commute.” While Travel times were badly hit another said: “Took me 35 minutes to get from O’connell Bridge to College Green on the bus. Damn you Luas Cross City.”
And on the gridlock, one added: “Four northbound Luas Cross City trams on O’connell St including at least one blocking a pedestrian crossing.”
People using other forms of public transport in the city centre also hit out at the fact they too had been caught up in the congestion.
One wrote: “Didn’t even use the new Luas this morning and it still managed to add 30 mins to my commute. Causing absolute chaos for traffic around College Green.”
Luas Cross City drivers said the training given to them was “insufficient”.
Sharing pictures of the tailbacks, a passenger said: “First experience of Luas Cross City. Buses block trams, trams block other busses. Tram traffic jams to get over O’C Bridge. Give up and walk to work. Arrive late.”
Luas operator Transdev took to social media to say sorry.
It stated: “Green Line running with delays this morning, apologies for any inconvenience caused.”
And Dublin Bus also advised customers journeys were likely to take longer than expected.
The firm said: “We wish to advise customers of heavy volumes of traffic in and around the city centre. We are experiencing severe delays on our services across the city.”
A Transdev spokeswoman told the Irish Mirror: “This morning Monday, between the hours of 8am and 9am there was a traffic signalling issue in Dublin City at Trinity College.
“This affected the Luas Green Line Service and other transport services, resulting in delays to the Luas Green Line and traffic congestion in the city.
“Dublin City Council, Luas and the Garda traffic division all worked to deal with the signalling failure and the resulting traffic disruption.
“Luas is working with Dublin City Council, Dublin Bus and other parties to ensure this signalling issue is fully resolved.”
ON TRAFFIC CHAOS YESTERDAY
Didn’t even use Luas and it still added 30 minutes to my journey COMMUTER