Biggest concentration of crashes on M50 is around J7 Liffey Valley

LUCAN and Liffey Valley between 4pm and 5pm is the part of the M50 when motorists are most likely to be involved in a crash.

Analysis of accident statistics this year, from January 1 to August 31, revealed there were 1,088 incidents on the M50, of which 399 were collisions, working out at 50 crashes a month.

An examination of a sample of nearly 200 accidents on the M50 reveals the biggest concentration of crashes was around Junction 7 – Lucan and Liffey Valley, at 18 per cent.

The news comes as no surprise to motorists familiar with the area, including Lucan resident, Cllr Liona O’Toole, who has called on authorities to revisit old plans to open a new exit between the Red Cow (Junction 9) and Lucan.

“An Exit 8 was part of the plans 30 years ago, but they seriously need to revisit it,” said Cllr O’Toole (Ind).

“One of the reasons it didn’t go in at the time was because it is too short a distance, but the southbound side, from Red Cow to Ballymount, is a small distance between exits. I’ve had a Motion down on this many times, and again at the next council meeting.

“It would be easier to exit around the canal area into Clonburris, then have all the traffic converging onto the N4. Why it hasn’t been designed with all the housing planned for the Clonburris SDZ, and further plans for City Edge and other developments, I have no idea. There is a huge gap between Junction 7 and 9 at the moment.”

The analysis also found that rear-end collisions made up the vast majority of crashes on the M50 so far this year – 260 incidents recorded.

Recovery operators also removed 1,977 vehicles which had broken down on the M50 during the same period.