Ireland to switch to right-hand driving?

From Reuters - Ireland debate switch to right-hand side driving

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Ireland should consider giving up driving on the left to reduce accidents by foreigners accustomed to right side motoring, a senior politician said Friday.

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"We have all of these people coming in from Europe and from America and (because of) the roads that they are used to driving on in their own countries it is a huge difficulty when they start driving here," (Senator Donie) Cassidy told public broadcaster RTE.

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Has anybody heard about this? It seems pretty impractical to me.

Or is it a non-story? I've never heard of Senator Cassidy.

It's happened before (Sweden in the 60s). Sounds another pointless change just for the benefits of Europe though (changing speed limits, changing the emergency phone number, stuff like that). The notion that we should change to benefit foreigners who still make up a small minority of the country is nonsensical.

Obviously, the Brits won't go for it, which'd make the border with the North a nightmare, which seems to be exactly the opposite of what we're trying to achieve.

Nonsense. Such a change would be a logistical nightmare. I don't know how Sweden managed it, although the volume of motorists would have been less back then.

Perhaps even more ludicrous is the senator's suggestion that people from countries that drive on the right hand side of the road have a lower speed limit?:confused::confused:

Sounds like Senator Cassidy is looking for a bit of attention.

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Originally Posted by Poor Student

although the volume of motorists would have been less back then.

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I'd say that had a large part to play.

Also, they already had borders with two right-hand drive countries, which probably encouraged them. It was either that or have a system for changing over increasing volumes of cars at each border crossing.

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Originally Posted by Poor Student

Sounds like Senator Cassidy is looking for a bit of attention.

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My thinking too. There's little merit in the suggestion.

Never mind that clown Donie Cassidy its this kind of rubbish that has him in the senate and not the dail!!

styupid suggestion, really sick of our country looking after foreginers rather than their own.

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Originally Posted by bellavistaman

styupid suggestion, really sick of our country looking after foreginers rather than their own.

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In fairness, it wasn't a suggestion from "our country" , it was a hair-brained notion from a half-arsed excuse for a senator that very few take seriously.

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Originally Posted by osarusan

Or is it a non-story? I've never heard of Senator Cassidy.

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Donie Cassidy, Osarusan, is a Midlands businessman & former musician & Showband magnate (with, understandably, close ties to the Albert Reynolds old guard) who has a dubious bright ginger mop of "real" hair, despite his advanced years. He has a fairly strong 'man of de peeple' reputation in the small farming area around Mullingar, but the rest of the country see him for what he really is: A failed Fianna Failer who cant cut it at senior level . One who occasionally wakes from his slumber to make a large amount of noise in the hope of seeing his name in the papers.

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Originally Posted by Poor Student

Nonsense. Perhaps even more ludicrous is the senator's suggestion that people from countries that drive on the right hand side of the road have a lower speed limit?:confused::confused:

Sounds like Senator Cassidy is looking for a bit of attention.

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This coming from a member from a party that demands you vote yes to Lisbon. :mad:

This just one of the many unworkable, and nonsensical ideas that will happen, if we're forced to give up our sovereignty by doing what FF/FG and co insist we do. They want everyone to be the same in Europe, so in this instance, we'll have to cater for the customs of our immigrants, instead of the other way around.

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Originally Posted by mypost

This coming from a member from a party that demands you vote yes to Lisbon. :mad:

This just one of the many unworkable, and nonsensical ideas that will happen, if we're forced to give up our sovereignty by doing what FF/FG and co insist we do. They want everyone to be the same in Europe, so in this instance, we'll have to cater for the customs of our immigrants, instead of the other way around.

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Name some more please.

And did you ever get around to reading that treaty?

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Originally Posted by mypost

This coming from a member from a party that demands you vote yes to Lisbon. :mad:

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Me or Senator Cassidy?:confused: I ask because his actions seem congruent with someone who's party would support the treaty so I don't get your comment.

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Originally Posted by Poor Student

Me or Senator Cassidy?:confused: I ask because his actions seem congruent with someone who's party would support the treaty so I don't get your comment.

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Glad you boys are supporting Tony Blair for President of Europe.

On topic I think we should go for it. I mean think of the fun you'd have crossing the border. You're passing the carrickdale hotel. You're on the left hand side, you know a few hundred meters up the road there's on coming traffic on your side that has to get onto the other side at the same point that you do. Think of the adrenaline rush. It would be a huge boost for tourism in the border counties!

I think he's looking to raise his profile a bit. Managed to get himself on two radio shows on friday where his logic was shredded quickly enough.

Never mind road markings and signage ...how do you sort out that many of the off ramps and on ramps on our motorways and dual carriageways simply haven't been built in a way that'd facilitate a switch.

Even if it could be done it wouldn't make our roads safer. Enforcing the laws that are there would and looking at best practice elsewhere would too.

Topic moved from Current Affairs.

I don't see any value in such a change. As mentioned above would lead to difficulties on north/south border.

I don't think it would help foreign nationals to drive as Irish driving system is a lot to blame for that.

Don't get why you moved the topic Pete???

I think a phased in change would work. Start with cars and lorries this year, cars the next....

I don't see why this is off topic either. This is a policy suggestion from the Leader of the Senate. Every recent announcement from Gay Bryne and the other spoofers in the RSA and from Government politicians is all about shifting the focus away from what they can change, namely our road infrastructure.

Where are the proper road markings, cats eyes, road signage on out secondary roads?
Where are the rumble strips approaching dangerous bends?
Where is the road works to take out dips that give blind spots?
Where are the teams resurfacing the roads that are full of potholes?

There's a bend near me, where every couple of weeks a car flips after not making the bend. One crappy sign that's normally covered in dirt so it isn't even reflective anymore and no road markings. It should have proper signage, rumble strips etc.

tbh the blame the drivers is a cop out when there is so much wrong with the road network. Likewise, shifting all reponsibility to county councils, when it's clearly a contributory factor for our death rate is a cop out from central Government. There should be another classification of National Roads and leave the real backroads to the county councils...

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Originally Posted by Macy

tbh the blame the drivers is a cop out when there is so much wrong with the road network. Likewise, shifting all reponsibility to county councils, when it's clearly a contributory factor for our death rate is a cop out from central Government. There should be another classification of National Roads and leave the real backroads to the county councils...

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I don't take everything they say as gospel but according to the most recent Garda stats -poor road conditions (that is to say -inadequate infrastructure as opposed to poor driving conditions caused by weather etc) was a major factor in only about 3% of fatalities on our roads.

By a long chalk the greatest cause was poor driving -the most common manifestation of which being inappropriately high speed in the conditions present.

That was actually one of the annoucements that I was thinking off as in shifting the blame. Of course driver behaviour is a major factor, but then signage and road markings are all about informing the driver to modify their behaviour for the upcoming dangerous stretch of road.

Using the bend I used as example again - it obviously catches out a lot of people, so the warnings clearly aren't good enough. However, when (more likely if) the cops investigate the cause of a car not making the turn and flipping over, what are they going to put down? Odds on it'll be inappropriate speed (which it is) but they are not looking at the factors that helped contribute to that inappropriate speed (i.e. lack of warning signs/markings).

I don't know why this was moved either. It's a stupid "current affair" because it's so badly thought out by the proposer, but it's a current affair nonetheless and I'm sure Foot.ie citizens can come up with better reasoning than "sure twould be grand for the foreign fellas".

adam

Not mentioned in the link above, but as well as 'Johnny Foreigner' having speed restrictions of 50mph, he reckons that 'Johnny Foreigner' shouldn't be allowed buy cars from auction that are 10-15 years old.

If you replace foreigner with young driver these proposals are pretty similar to what that ****wit Gay Byrne has been coming out with since he got sick of not being on the radio.

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Originally Posted by Schumi

If you replace foreigner with young driver these proposals are pretty similar to what that ****wit Gay Byrne has been coming out with since he got sick of not being on the radio.

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I don't think even Gaybo suggested that young drivers should drive on the right.

Anyway, as a 24-year-old learner driver, I've been less than impressed at the wonderful grown-up drivers we have, and there are far more of them than 'boy racers' or 'fordners'. There is a huge number of factors influencing our accident rate, and everyone keeps complaining about the corner cases.

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Originally Posted by BohsPartisan

Glad you boys are supporting Tony Blair for President of Europe.

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Who boys?

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Originally Posted by John83

Anyway, as a 24-year-old learner driver, I've been less than impressed at the wonderful grown-up drivers we have, and there are far more of them than 'boy racers' or 'fordners'.

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Its easy to blame it all on the "boy-racers", it gives the rest of society an excuse so they can absolve themselves of a more approriate level of personal responsibility ....."no need to improve my driving, its them young feckers causing all the problems".

Young male drivers are certainly a problem, its well documented, but I agree with John83. Make a mental note of the category of driver you see doing something dangerous or illegal over the next month, you'll soon build up your own picture of who's driving needs to improve.

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Originally Posted by John83

'fordners'.

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:confused: haven't heard that term before, can you enlighten me?

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Originally Posted by KevB76

:confused: haven't heard that term before, can you enlighten me?

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I was attempting to represent phonetically a common Irish pronunciation of foreigners. Sorry, should have been a bit clearer.

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Originally Posted by Lionel Ritchie

By a long chalk the greatest cause was poor driving -the most common manifestation of which being inappropriately high speed in the conditions present.

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I'm not disagreeing with your point, but I would argue that the poor state of our roads are a major factor in the "conditions present".

The reason I say this is because I did my test in the UK and when i eventually re-patriated, I soon began to find that in order to avoid any scrapes, I had to reduce my driving speed from that which was normal and safe in the UK.

A big factor is the state of the road verges here;
On your typcial country road the verges tend to become part of the road, you get loads of dirt dragged onto the road which makes things much slippier when its wet. Also the road-edge tends to break up and the "usable" portion of road becomes narrower as more and more of the tarmac surface breaks away.

Trouble is it's inconsistent, the road is grand in parts, then (usually just as an oncoming car approaches) you get the broken verge/pothole, and you either go crashing through it and break your suspension or stop until the other car passes, but when you try to stop all the muddy crap thats been dragged onto the road makes you skid and you still go crashing through the pothole and half wreck the car.

You only need to be travelling at 50mph or less for serious implications to this everyday scenario. So your speed is inappropriate for the conditions present but you're not actually doing anything out of the ordinary.

Even the main routes suffer the dirt problem, particularly at this time of year. I was travelling along the N7 one eving last week, and i had use the screen washer 2 or 3 times a minute even though i was a good 3 - 4 seconds behind the lorry ahead. You dont get anywhere near this level of dirt on UK roads (just take a look around any car park and notice the state of most of the cars, its just not like that across the water).

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Originally Posted by John83

I was attempting to represent phonetically a common Irish pronunciation of foreigners. Sorry, should have been a bit clearer.

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Dublin - Fartiners
Bog* - Furridners

Generally preceded by "Bleedin" and "Bleddy" respectively.

Agree on the accepted stereotype of the bad driver being incorrect. Driving around Dublin, I personally have noticed that when it's not ME causing the problem, it's white males between the ages of 35-60 and women of indeterminate age (who all seem to suffer from Stillorgan syndrome : Permanantly startled look, aged somewhere between 16 and 60, too much make up, €500 sunglasses perched on €500 blonde hair, ski pants, ugg boots...You know the type) who make the most obscene errors.


*where Im from

Sounds good to me ;)

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Originally Posted by BohsPartisan

Glad you boys are supporting Tony Blair for President of Europe.

On topic I think we should go for it. I mean think of the fun you'd have crossing the border. You're passing the carrickdale hotel. You're on the left hand side, you know a few hundred meters up the road there's on coming traffic on your side that has to get onto the other side at the same point that you do. Think of the adrenaline rush. It would be a huge boost for tourism in the border counties!

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More true than you know:
http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a4_242.html

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Originally Posted by Macy

I think a phased in change would work. Start with cars and lorries this year, cars the next....

I don't see why this is off topic either. This is a policy suggestion from the Leader of the Senate. Every recent announcement from Gay Bryne and the other spoofers in the RSA and from Government politicians is all about shifting the focus away from what they can change, namely our road infrastructure.

Where are the proper road markings, cats eyes, road signage on out secondary roads?
Where are the rumble strips approaching dangerous bends?
Where is the road works to take out dips that give blind spots?
Where are the teams resurfacing the roads that are full of potholes?

There's a bend near me, where every couple of weeks a car flips after not making the bend. One crappy sign that's normally covered in dirt so it isn't even reflective anymore and no road markings. It should have proper signage, rumble strips etc.

tbh the blame the drivers is a cop out when there is so much wrong with the road network. Likewise, shifting all reponsibility to county councils, when it's clearly a contributory factor for our death rate is a cop out from central Government. There should be another classification of National Roads and leave the real backroads to the county councils...

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every so often a post comes up that I find my nodding furiously too (like a Bobblehead Ray on speed) or silently roaring "here here" too. This is such a post. Mrs Kingdom (whom I'll admit terrifies me when I'm in the passenger seat) travelled to West Sussex via Rosslare ferry at night last Thurs. I was sure I'd get a sobbing phonecall at the m25 junction outside London. Not one problem at all. Most comfortable she's ever felt driving a car. As soon as she got back to Wexford she'd taken a wrong turn due to conflicting road signs.
This country is a joke, and there are very few signs in my small part of it that things are changing.

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Originally Posted by KevB76

Its easy to blame it all on the "boy-racers", it gives the rest of society an excuse so they can absolve themselves of a more approriate level of personal responsibility ....."no need to improve my driving, its them young feckers causing all the problems".

Young male drivers are certainly a problem, its well documented, but I agree with John83. Make a mental note of the category of driver you see doing something dangerous or illegal over the next month, you'll soon build up your own picture of who's driving needs to improve.


:confused: haven't heard that term before, can you enlighten me?

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Dare I say it, but if you put the restricters back on "boy racer" cars how many complaints would you have? Very few genuinely I guess. I have to be honest I kinda admire the pride they have in their cars and the few that I know around where I live aren't into booze or drugs, they just pump every penny they have into their cars. Doesn't stop me from abusing the fcukers when the cars roar past the house at 11.00 at night. I find they're generally good drivers, they're just too facking loud for my liking! :)

Oddly, a lot of the signs when entering Waterford county read something like: "Welcome to County Waterford. Please drive on the left". Especially on a lot of the smaller roads. We obviously have a deep distrust of our neighbouring counties.

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Originally Posted by noby

Oddly, a lot of the signs when entering Waterford county read something like: "Welcome to County Waterford. Please drive on the left". Especially on a lot of the smaller roads. We obviously have a deep distrust of our neighbouring counties.

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Similar signs up the road from the Killimer Car Ferryport in Clare which only connects with Tarbert in Co. Kerry and on the southern outskirts of Charleville Co. Cork :confused:

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Originally Posted by Lionel Ritchie

Similar signs up the road from the Killimer Car Ferryport in Clare which only connects with Tarbert in Co. Kerry and on the southern outskirts of Charleville Co. Cork :confused:

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Plenty of them around. Most bizarre i've seen is just placed at random on a point on the cork-kerry road. and it is also in german. Did some mad german drive halfway to kerry on the wrong side of the road? fair play if he made it that far.

There's one on the road from Turnpike to Thurles, which is only a glorified country road. I assume it's for all the foreigners who may be driving happy as larry on the right only for the sign to remind them. Always struck me as a complete waste of time.

Cork Airport famously advised French people to drive on the right last year.

http://blog.rymus.net/2006/01/04/conduire-a-what/

Perhaps they were getting in ahead of the game?

adam

That's funny.
It's cruel putting a sign up like that before a roundabout. At least it doesn't look so busy.
I learned to drive on the right, the first time I came back driving in Ireland I was doing okay until I hit that big roundabout at Walkinstown, It was as if time froze (every car stopped dead in their tracks) and allowed me to get around and out.

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Originally Posted by pineapple stu

There's one on the road from Turnpike to Thurles, which is only a glorified country road.

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That the road that was listed as a European black spot and has the same speed limit as sections of the m50 and n7?:eek:

60mph? That's the one. Funnily enough, the last time I was down there, a doctor died in a car crash on the road.

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Originally Posted by pineapple stu

I assume it's for all the foreigners who may be driving happy as larry on the right only for the sign to remind them. Always struck me as a complete waste of time.

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I met a (probably German) camper van coming at me on the wrong side in Charleville last year. It had just pulled out of a petrol station forecourt.

In fairness, as anyone who's had to drive on the right can testify, it is very easy to get it wrong when you come to a junction. It really takes a lot of concentration to move onto the correct side, it goes against your natural in-grained routine, it can really throw you for a few seconds.

Sure those damn Europeans tried to make serving alcohol in pints and ordering a pound of rashers illegal last year, tho luckily for us the Brits stepped in and put those Frogs, Germans and the lot in their place. and now people suggest we give up driving on the correct side of the road. Errrrgg. Will Never happen thank god.