Visits to recreational spaces back to pre-pandemic levels, data shows

Visits to retail, hospitality and other recreational spaces returned to normal levels at the end of August, Google movement data suggests.

According to the mobile tracking data, trips to shops (excluding supermarkets and pharmacies), restaurants, cafes, cinemas and other recreational spaces have been increasing gradually since the start of February, when they were down 60 per cent on pre-pandemic levels. At their lowest point during the pandemic retail and recreational visits were down by 84 per cent.

Google’s Community Mobility Reports, which use aggregated and anonymised data from users who have their location history settings turned on, also show that workplace visits were down 26 per cent at the end of August compared to pre-Covid. At the height of the pandemic’s third wave in Ireland, at the beginning of January 2021, workplace visits had reduced by 60 per cent. The numbers returning rose gradually until May of this year and appear to have plateaued since then, according to the Google statistics presented as a seven-day rolling average by Our World in Data.

Check-ins at transport stations have also been growing slowly as restrictions have eased throughout this year, with a significant uptick around May. In January transport station visits had fallen by around 67 per cent, while last week they were down 28 per cent on baseline level recorded in January and February of 2020.

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Meanwhile, traffic data from Transport Infrastructure Ireland shows the volume of cars on Ireland’s roads significantly increased last week. Examining Wednesday morning’s traffic on radial routes into Dublin were up between five and 15 per cent compared to the same time the previous week. When compared to the same day and time during at the start of October’s Level 3 restrictions, traffic volume was up 17 per cent on the M1 to the airport and up 16 per cent on the M4 at Celbridge-Maynooth.

Around Galway, the N6 Bóthar na dTreabh saw nine per cent more vehicles last Wednesday morning than it did a week before, while traffic volumes on Cork’s N40 rose by 15 per cent.

Senior Transport Planner with Transport Infrastructure Ireland, Dan Brennan, said traffic volumes have returned to around 80 to 90 per cent of pre-pandemic levels. “It goes up and down, and it does depend on where you are on the network… When it was at its lowest, it was about 30 per cent of typical levels in April and May of 2020,” he noted.

The number of cars on the road has been increasing particularly since May when intercounty travel resumed, Mr Brennan said. The volume has largely plateaued since July, he said.

Meanwhile, Dublin Bus is advising customers to plan journeys in advance and allow additional time, as services are expected to be in higher demand in the weeks to come.

“With third-level institutions returning to on-site learning, we expect services to become busier in the coming weeks,” a Dublin bus spokeswoman said. However, she said there have not yet been any capacity issues on services since restrictions eased last week to allow for 100 per cent capacity.