Dublin City Council unveils plans for pedestrianised College Green plaza

The council hopes to “provide unhindered pedestrian movement from Stephen’s Green to the south quays”

NEWSDublin City Council Monday unveiled their new “exciting” plan for the College Green area of Dublin City Centre.

DCC now plans to provide segregated two-way space for cycling leading up to a wider plan plaza. The new plaza layout removes a large percentage of the major bus-tram-pedestrian traffic light conflicts.

The plaza will stretch from the Luas tracks in front of Trinity down between Bank of Ireland and the Abercrombie store ending at Church Lane and will cover 3,500 square metres.

The existing taxi rank between the Bank of Ireland and Abercrombie will be closed.

The council plan was presented during a live streamed meeting of the city council, and slides explained the traffic plans alongside a desire to “provide unhindered pedestrian movement from Stephen’s Green to the south quays”.

Brendan O’Brien from the council’s Roads and Traffic Department, described the plan as “exciting”.

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On twitter, councillor Ciaran Cuffe said that the plans “look well: car free and child-friendly”.

According to the plan, buses and taxis will not actually be banned from the area, but will only be able to travel along the direction of the two-way Luas route. It was said that the project could begin next year, in line with the Luas Cross-City project.

The design of the plaza is to be tendered for internationally.

Previously plans to relocate some of the many statues in the College Green area meant that designers had to come up with a new proposal. The proposal presented today retains the statues.

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Currently, College Green is a mess of roadworks, Luas works, taxi lanes and traffic restrictions (above).

What do people think of the plans to change this?

Image via Cllr Ciaran Cuffe

Matthew Mulligan

Matthew is Editor for the 62nd volume of Trinity News. He is a Sociology and Social Policy graduate and was previously Deputy Editor of tn2 Magazine.