Toll protest to hit port traffic

Residents of Ringsend and Sandymount in Dublin are to disrupt traffic heading to Dublin Port in protest at Dublin City Council's decision to allow lorries to use the East-Link bridge toll-free.

Motorists, particularly drivers of heavy goods vehicles (HGVs), face delays in getting to the port from next week if residents go ahead with plans to halt vehicles along the route to the port.

The residents are protesting at the decision to allow HGVs to travel toll-free across the bridge - it links the southeast of Dublin with the port - after the Dublin Port Tunnel opens this year.

The council took the decision last week to avoid possible legal action by hauliers over its draft HGV management strategy.

Under the strategy the council proposes to ban HGVs with five axles or more from the city streets from the end of this year.

Hauliers complained that this would have given a large number of drivers no option but to use the East-Link bridge, a tolled road in which the council holds a stake.

Local residents say the removal of the €4.80 toll for lorries will dramatically increase the volume of traffic travelling through the suburbs of Ringsend, Irishtown and Sandymount.

They plan to take to the roads and obstruct traffic by continuously activating pedestrian lights. The tactic has been used in previous protests and, they say, will bring traffic to a standstill.

"These are built-up residential areas not suitable for big trucks; we are already at and beyond capacity with them. If we don't do anything we'll be putting up with chaos," said Damien Cassidy of the Ringsend Sandymount Environmental Group.

"How is it possible that HGVs have to be tunnelled through the northside but can have free rein through built-up areas on the southside?"

He said more than 750 lorries use the toll bridge each day and this number would be certain to increase once the toll was removed.

Local representative Cllr Wendy Hederman (PD) believes the removal of tolls will benefit the community. "This change in the tolls, together with the changes I fought for on the closing of surface access routes from January 1st, 2007, will relieve East Wall and Ringsend/Sandymount from some of the heavy traffic now besieging those communities."