Galway's Roundabouts

Life outside a car in the "City of the Tribes"

Galway's Roundabouts

On multilane roundabouts of the design favoured by Galway corporation cyclists have an injury accident rate that is 14-16 times that of motorists. Motorcycle/Scooter users are only marginally better off at 10-13 times the injury rate. They are also a nightmare for pedestrians. Many of them were built at a time when over 39% of permanent private households in the City didn't have a car. While for short urban journeys within the city, foot and cycle use outweighed motorcar milage by a factor of almost two. [1]

Ballybrit

A view of a "pedestrian crossing" on a roundabout showing the nature, position, and type, of signage used by Galway Corporation at some such locations. The implications for pedestrian safety should require no further explanation. A Foras Forbartha report from 1987 specifically concluded that "signs should not be sighted where they might reduce drivers vision". (R.286 1987).[2]

Headford Road Roundabout

This shows children crossing the road with bicycles at an unprotected crossing on the Headford road roundabout in Galway city. Points to note are the lanes of entering vehicles in the background and the car accelerating off the roundabout into the exit which these children are in the process of crossing. Also of note is the position and height of the signs on the deflection island, these obscure pedestrians crossing in the other direction from the view of the exiting motorists. This "crossing" is on the main route between a large area of residential housing and the city's main cinema, largest toyshop, largest computer store. two large electronic outlets and the nearest McDonalds outlet. In 1997 and 1998 Ireland had the highest child pedestrian death rate in Europe.

Ballybrit.

Parents with baby buggies running from behind obscuring signage to cross a roundabout exit as quickly as possible. The need to be able to break into a run at such locations is a function of the high-speed geometry of the roundabout. A routine failure to indicate by circulating motorists puts pedestrians in the position of having to guess when to cross.

Ballybrit

This picture is another view of the above crossing, the path in the background leads to a large area of residential housing and this path is the main pedestrian route between these houses and the local industrial estate.

Terryland Roundabout

Mother with children at an unprotected "crossing" on the Tirellan (Terryland) roundabout.  Again this roundabout is adjacent to a large area of residential housing estates and is the main route between these and both the nearest shopping centre and the city proper.  In the second picture we see that the woman with the buggy can't even use the dropped area of the kerb to get up onto the path (it's blocked by the truck).

We have heard several independent reports from this area of elderly pedestrians simply standing in tears at the side of the road crying with fear and frustration at their inability to get across.

Safely across (this time).

On the recently constructed Western Distributor Rd. Galway corporation has chosen to make roundabouts of a similar design the only means of access to urban housing estates.

Tuam Road

Pedestrians at a "crossing" on the Tuam road.  If you can't run you might be in for a long wait.

This picture also show one of the large "ghost islands" that have been marked adjacent to the deflection islands. As originally intended in the UK these were smaller and supposed to push circulating cyclists/motorcyclists out into a more prominent position so as to reduce the risk of collision.[3] (At roundabouts 50% of car/cycle collisions involve entering motorists crashing into circulating cyclists, who have right of way.) [4] As used in Galway they merely provide a third lane which motorists use to overtake circulating cyclists on the left. These nearside overtaking manoeuvres are frequently carried out at speed while the cyclist is in the process of turning left off the roundabout. This is a refinement, which is believed to be peculiar to Irish roundabouts, and which gives good reason to believe that Irish roundabouts are both substantially more dangerous and more intimidating than their UK equivalents.

The Officially Available Guidance on Roundabouts

A Foras Forbartha study on cycling in Galway in 1979 specifically raised the issue of the safety of cyclists and the roundabouts that were then being proposed for the city. At that time, in afternoon traffic in Galway, there was 19km travelled by bicycle for every 100km by car. [5] The national design manual RT 181 Intersections at Grade itself queries the suitablity of using roundabouts at locations where there might be cyclists turning right. [6] (It doesn't specify whether a University town with 12,000 third level students might fit this description.)

A study on roundabouts in Swords in county Dublin in 1987 (R.286) found that two-wheeler casualties were five times higher than expected.  "The high incidence of two wheeler accidents on the Swords bypass allied with similar findings in the major accident study carried out by the TRRL on roundabouts shows that roundabouts on high speed roads do not provide a safe environment for two wheelers and consequently give serious reservation as to their use where high numbers of this road user class is expected". [2] In terms of pedestrians R.286 states that for the Swords by pass "The low level of pedestrians involved in personal injury accidents on the by-pass primarily relates to the provision of overbridges and signalised control facilities away from the roundabout and should not be taken as indicative of pedestrian safety at roundabouts in general".  There are no overbridges in Galway and only one signalised crossing, the situation for pedestrians on Galway's roundabouts is best demonstrated by examining the attached photographs.   It is arguable that using any high capacity roundabouts in a town like Galway shows at best incompetence and at worst a considered contempt for the most vulnerable residents.    It is clear that there are serious questions to be asked regarding how it is that any roundabouts were ever constructed either in, or near, Galway city.

If you have other photographs showing typical road design practices used in Galway. Pass them on and we'll include them in the site.

Galway Cycling Campaign July 2001