Blog | Frank Crowley

Cork traffic woes: 'Even minor accidents are clogging up the whole city at this point'

This piece contains comments I made in relation to increased traffic congestion in Cork. You will find the original article here UCC economist Frank Crowley said that while a bit of congestion in a city can be a good sign of prosperity, Cork is clearly suffering from the growing pains of poor transport planning. “The city currently has over 70% car dependency and suffers from a complete underinvestment in public transport and cycling networks,” he said. Mr Crowley said that this is clearly an outcome of making poor political and planning choices at national and local level. “Even minor accidents are clogging up the whole city at this point, resulting in lost hours of productivity, increased

Why Ireland needs real decentralisation

This was first published on RTÉ Brainstorm Opinion: decentralisation will only work if local government can make decisions about raising revenues and spending on services Recent reports suggest that decentralisation is on the government’s agenda again. The Minister of State for the Office of Public Works and Flood Relief Kevin ‘Boxer’ Moran is leading the charge and tabling it as part of the negotiations for budget 2020. Specifically, he has identified Athlone and Sligo as ideal urban areas to act as civil service hubs and to accommodate different wings of government departments. By coincidence, one of the minister's constituency offices is located in Athlone. The minister has argued that de