PBP campaign for €1 public transport fares in December

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People Before Profit have proposed €1 public transport fares in Galway city for the month of December to tackle holiday traffic and reduce emissions.

The party has said that it has written to the National Transport Authority, Bus Eireann, and other bus companies involved in providing public transport to propose that for the Christmas shopping period Leap card fares be reduced to €1 on all Galway City bus routes.

Local PBP representative Joe Loughnane said that there are a number of reasons why they are putting this idea forward

“Firstly, serious traffic congestion is increasingly a problem in Galway City and is bound to peak during the Christmas shopping period, unless something is done to reduce the number of cars coming into the city and encourage people to switch to public transport.”

“Our local shops, restaurants, cafes, pubs, markets, cultural events etc will all benefit from people being more easily able to get into the city centre for the busy Christmas period.”

“Thanks to not having to pay for parking and fuel people will also have more money in their pockets to spend in our local businesses.”

Joe Loughnane said that €1 fares were trialed in Galway in July and that there was a significant jump in the number of people taking the bus during this time.

And getting more people to swap their cars for buses will help reduce carbon emissions and air pollution in the city he added.

In order to promote their campaign PBP have been holding stalls on Shop Street to talk to people about this proposal.

They say that people are interested in the plan in order to fight climate change and promote public transport.

“We believe our proposal makes a lot of sense for all parties involved. The benefits are clear to see for the public, the environment, local businesses and Galway’s economy,” Loughnane concluded.