Driving in Dublin City possesses many challenges. You are going to encounter everything from dual carriageways and tramlines to driving in multiple lanes and one-way streets.

As you drive around the city you’re dealing with lots of pedestrians and pedestrian crossings. You’ll have to be very careful because you’ll soon find out that the pedestrians in Dublin and I guess the rest of Ireland do a lot of jaywalking. As you already know, pedestrians are very vulnerable and you should always give way to pedestrians.

The better you can anticipate and react to hazards and potential hazards the easier your drive around the city will be. Also around the city centre there are a number of one-way roads that can be very congested.
This means you will have to be very observant and keep an eye out for any information sign that may prepare you for what lies ahead.

With all of the congestion it can be hard to see the markings on the road, which makes it difficult, if there are directional arrows. Sometimes these arrows are guiding you into one-way streets and if you are in the wrong lane it can be hard to get back into the lane you want, but you just have to signal your intention, be patient and make sure you are aware of everything around you including your blind spots.

What else will you encounter as you drive around Dublin city? You are going to come across many bus corridors as well as the Luas tracks. Most of the bus corridors are time sensitive are generally from 7am to 7pm. This means you can not drive in the bus corridor between these times. If the garda catch you driving in a bus corridor between the restricted times you will incur two points on your driving licence and an eighty euro fine!

So then come the Luas tracks. You have to be very careful anywhere you encounter the Luas tracks. They are located through the heart of the city and into the South and West suburbs. In the city they are normally located on big junctions that are some of the busiest in the city. That means the traffic can move very slowly on these particular streets during peek times.
This in turn means that as you drive slowly down the street you have to be very careful that you do not enter a cross section that you cannot leave.

There have been a few accidents on the Luas line already because of cars that moved up with the traffic and ended up on the Luas track with nowhere to go. There are different ways of getting traffic news, which may help you avoid some of the congestion so listen out for traffic updates on the radio.

So as you drive around Dublin city and deal with the many different obstacles and scenarios that will undoubtedly be thrown up at you the message from Top Class Driving School is…….
Plan Your Journey and Drive Safely.