MUCH of the current controversy over the Dublin light rail system is "insufficiently informed", the chairman of the Dublin City Centre Business Association has said.
In a veiled criticism of the Dublin Chamber of Commerce, Mr Michael Ryder warned yesterday that the capital was contracting "arteriosclerosis", and its inhabitants could suffer terminal illness without a "long term" cure to the traffic problem.
This cure had to be full implementation of the Dublin Transport Initiative (DTI), he stressed.
Mr Ryder was speaking on the property implications of Luas the light rail system, at the annual conference of the Irish Property and Facilities Managers' Association (IPFMA) in University College Dublin.
The DTI represented "the medical equivalent of a quadruple bypass" for the capital, he said. The recommendations had been adopted by the Government after eight years' work and one of the biggest consultative exercises in the history of the State.
Some 50 business and community groups had contributed, all meetings had been held in public, and it "ill behoved" people now, to say that there had been insufficient evaluation, he said.
The two to three year construction period would be "minor" in the commercial life of a building or residence, Mr Ryder said. The alternative, "gridlock", was no solution, he said.
The Dublin Chamber of Commerce did not want to be labelled with an "opposition tag" to the light rail scheme, Mr Noel Carroll, the chamber's new chief executive, said. "We are not opposed to public transport, and welcome over £200 million in investment."
Business in the capital was going to be "dramatically affected", and debate on the specific Government decision had not yet started.
Serious issues such as cost, timing and management of disruption, and compensation for businesses under threat had to be evaluated, he said.
Comparisons with the Sheffield: light rail system were "misleading", Mr Alan Jones, associate of the DTI planning consultants, Steer Davies Gleave, told the conference. Sheffield never had an integrated transport plan, whereas Dublin did now.
"There are 300 light rail systems worldwide, and for every one that doesn't work well there are 25 that are a success," he said.
Disruption would be "controllable" with careful planning, he claimed. Media reports of streets being closed for years were "a red herring." Sections would be closed for months, rather than years, and CIE would have to ensure that access was maintained.
Residential properties within 10 minutes walk of Luas would increase in value by upwards of 10 per cent, Mr Aidan O'Hogan, managing director of estate agents Hamilton Osborne King, forecast.
. The north side Luas line must be included in phase one of the project, and extended to the airport, Mr Bobby Molloy, the Progressive Democrats' spokesman on transport, said in the Dail yesterday.
He said that a three line system was affordable, provided that proper use was made of available resources. It was also essential that the Dundrum line was extended to Sandyford industrial estate, he added.
