Bradley Bytes – A sort of political column by Dara Bradley

Take a stroll through Thornberry, Creagan, Carraig an Iolar, or any other estate in Bearna, and you’ll find driveways with high-end cars.

Parked up outside expensive homes, are top-of-the-range Audis, Range Rovers and other SUVs, ‘Beamers’, ‘Mercs’ and the odd banger too.

Like Maigh Cuilinn and Oranmore, Bearna is unrecognisable compared to what it was 30 years ago.

No longer a village crossroads out in the countryside, with two rural pubs, a school, post office, church and Clarke’s shop, Bearna is now a thriving – dare we say it, sophisticated! – satellite suburb of Galway City.

Old characters from a different era are sadly dying off and while native families there for generations remain, its population has soared.

Many newcomers – ‘blow-ins’, as they’re still called – attracted to its location, by the sea and close to the city, are high net-worth individuals. Think hospital consultants and CEOs of high-flying private enterprises.

They own expensive cars. And even though some of these are electric, a challenge for policy-makers serious about climate change – and tackling traffic congestion – is how to coax people out of those trophy cars and onto buses.

Right now, you can’t. People living in Bearna, except those who are totally reliant on buses to get to town, would be mad to leave their cars at home.

That’s even true for people who would prefer to take a bus. Because Bearna village may have moved on, but its bus service is stuck in the seventies.

And as for cycling. Forget about it. You’d want a death wish to cycle the R336.

Bus Éireann’s 424 Galway to Conamara bus that serves Bearna and Na Forbacha is a joke these days.

A victim of its own success – it carried 329,210 passengers last year, an annual increase of 30% – it must be the most unreliable service in County Galway.

Every other day passengers are stranded on the side of the road, because when the morning bus arrives from Conamara, it’s full. People are packed in like sardines, and it’s unsafe to allow more passengers on. So, the drivers just plough on, without stopping in Bearna. Same problem on the outbound bus – passengers are left at the station or Spanish Arch.

Workers are being docked pay for being late. College students are missing their first lectures of the day. Secondary school students are punished for arriving late to class. Patients are late for hospital appointments. People who have no alternative – those who can’t drive or don’t own cars – must pay taxis. Some travellers miss onward train and bus connections.

Oranmore, the east side equivalent of Bearna, is part of the city bus service. The 404 departs every half hour. One of Galway’s most popular routes, it is not perfect but is infinitely superior to Bearna passengers’ 424 experiences.

The powers-that-be bang on about BusConnects, park and ride (20 years waiting), and a ring road (will we ever see it?). But if they are incapable of – or couldn’t be bothered – sorting out a high-frequency bus service to Bearna, then residents will be wedded to their cars forever.

Pictured: Barna, where the bus service is so bad people have to rely on their cars to get to and from the city. PHOTO JOE O’SHAUGHNESSY.