Public transport is not nearly as dangerous as people think it is, the Commuter Coalition has argued. 

The NTA’s annual report has found that 46% of people believe that antisocial behaviour on buses, trams and trains has increased this year. 

On Lunchtime Live, Commuter Coalition spokesperson Lochlann Gallagher acknowledged the “trend” in public opinion that he said has been in place for some time. 

“The perception of safety on public transport can be quite bad, not just in Dublin, but across the country,” he said. 

“So, it was a national survey, but it focused on public transport and then it had an additional focus on Dublin in places. 

“But what we made of it mostly was that, actually, it shows very little change year on year, at least within the margin of error in the survey, which shows that things, they're certainly not getting better.”

Irish Rail trians in County Louth. Picture by: Alamy.com. 

However, Mr Gallagher noted that despite people’s fears, antisocial behaviour remains rare on public transport. 

“Then, the other thing that we made of it was that headline question of 50% of people feel unsafe at some stages,” he said. 

“It's kind of a little misleading in places because if you dig into the reports, the question is, have you ever felt unsafe on public transport? If you're a commuter or you regularly take public transport, you're probably making 500 journeys a year, maybe more. 

“The likelihood that you one time see something that qualifies as antisocial behaviour is quite likely, frankly. 

“But if you're a much less regular user, you might not see those.”

Mr Gallagher also noted that regular users of public transport “perceive it as much, much safer than those who never or very rarely take public transport”. 

“The vast majority of the time, if you are getting on a bus or a train, you will not experience antisocial behaviour, beyond someone listening to TikToks loudly on their phone,” he said. 

“That's incredibly annoying, but it's unlikely to cause you any personal damage, although it pisses me off, I will say.

“But there are very severe incidents and I think those do need to be addressed, but we need to be realistic about where we address them and where we're actually intending on solving this issue.”

Main image: A Garda standing next to a Luas. Picture by: RollingNews.ie