Everyone must know by now that Dublin is facing gridlock because of the huge increase in the number of cars. As the AA has said, the appalling congestion on Monday, due to a fault in the traffic control system, merely underlined the city's vulnerability.
Because of unprecedented prosperity, travel demand in the greater Dublin area is now close to the levels projected for 2011. And while the Dublin Transportation Office has begun a "fundamental reappraisal" of its strategy in the light of such facts, the basic thrust will not change.
Since the early 1990s, when the strategy was devised, one of its main aims was to get a significant switch from the use of private cars for commuting to public transport, cycling and walking. This is the only sustainable approach and has succeeded elsewhere.
The basic problem in Dublin, however, is that so many commuters appear to be wedded to their cars. Car ownership rates have increased from 248 per 1,000 population in 1991 to 300 in 1996 and a projected 350 next year; moving closer to the European average of 450 per 1,000 population.
Other European capitals do not experience the same levels of congestion because they have good public transport systems which are reliable and convenient enough to persuade most commuters to leave their cars at home. Dublin does not yet have such a system.
One of the key elements of yesterday's DTO plan is to improve the lot of public transport in the city and its commuter belt. This will cost above what has already been committed, not just to fund an extra 100 buses but to provide Dublin Bus with an annual subsidy.
The Government cannot refuse this additional call on the Exchequer's resources, amounting to a mere £26 million. It will simply have to be provided for in the forthcoming Estimates and backed up by budgetary measures aimed at weaning commuters from cars.
Apart from the specific measures proposed by the DTO's plan, complementary policies are also put forward, such as increasing benefit-in-kind taxation to make company cars less attractive, imposing tax on free off-street parking spaces and considering road pricing.
The DTO is also seeking a 100 per cent tax credit for people who buy annual public transport passes or receive them free from their employers, as well as incentives for the provision of park-and-ride sites on the outskirts rather than multi-storey car-parks in the city centre.
Before the sustained growth in car ownership and use becomes totally unsustainable, the DTO's plan makes clear that "alternative modes of transport are provided and promoted, restrictions are imposed on car trips and both measures are applied simultaneously".
What it puts forward are measures - all part of the original Dublin Transportation Initiative's strategy devised in 1994 - which can be implemented before Luas and other major infrastructural projects, such as the Dublin Port tunnel, come on stream.
However, the plan pulls no punches about its main priority. "Without the provision of significantly increased bus capacity in peak hours, many commuters will have no alternative to the use of the car in the short term and, by definition, the entire plan will fail to achieve its goals."