The Automobile Association (AA) has rightly decried the myth which is Operation Freeflow on the streets of Dublin. Once again the Garda Siochana and the Dublin Transportation Office (DTO) are using the media to warn motorists that extra police resources will be employed from now to Christmas. But Dublin's motoring offenders are not dim. They know that the chances of prosecution are slim because there is no consistency of enforcement. And they won't be fooled by public relations bluff. If the Garda Commissioner, Mr Patrick Byrne, or the Director of the DTO, Mr John Henry, were to come for a mid-day stroll from the end of Pearse Street they would see a bus lane which is supposedly closed to private traffic. But every hour, they would see scores of cars merrily violating the law here without ever a garda intervention. At the junction of Tara Street they would see the cyclists brazenly whizz through the red lights in droves without ever an offender being pulled over. In fact, as the dark evenings close in they might not see them at all, for hardly any bother with lights or reflectors. As they came up College Street they would observe the juggernauts rumbling in from the industrial areas, many of them with broken tail-lights and without reflective strips or registration plates. To their right they would encounter the daily phalanx of private cars parked two and three deep outside Pearse Street Garda Station, just where it says in giant, white letters "official Garda vehicles only".
If they directed their steps along College Green towards Westmoreland Street they might find the crew of an official Garda car - or even, on occasion, a fire engine - abusing its priority status, parked on double yellow lines while pay cheques are cashed in the bank or a mortgage query is answered in the building society. If they turned into Fleet Street, outside the offices of this newspaper, they would encounter a daily, bumper-to-bumper queue of vehicles illegally proceeding down a narrow street where, according to the sign at the entrance, there is no general access. And their eyes would ache searching for a man or woman in blue who might bother even to issue a verbal warning.
This is in the centre of the capital, in an area which possibly sees more garda vehicles passing by and more gardai on foot than any other. (Pearse Street district garda headquarters is reputedly the largest in the State). This chaos is replicated throughout the city and is arguably worse in the suburbs. To speak of road traffic law enforcement in this context is an oxymoron. It is likely that one would have to travel to some of the cities of southern Italy or the Maghreb area of Northern Africa to find anything comparable. There is certainly nothing like it in Northern Europe.
The AA is right to be outraged. The success of Freeflow - in the few brief weeks when it was real - showed that Dublin's traffic problems are not unmanageable. Past experience confirms that resources will be allocated in the short term and then redeployed once a minimal degree of public consciousness has been achieved. Mr Henry is quoted as saying that a city of almost 1 million people cannot afford 100 gardai to monitor rush hour traffic all the year round. It is Operation Bluff and Bluster at best; Operation Codology at worst.