The National Transport Authority ( ga, Údarás Náisiúnta Iompair) or NTA is the transport authority for

Greater Dublin The Greater Dublin Area (GDA; Irish: ''Mórcheantar Bhaile Átha Cliath''), or simply Greater Dublin, is an informal term that is taken to include the city of Dublin and its hinterland, with varying definitions as to its extent. As of 2022, its e ...

and the public transport licensing agency for

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

. It was established under the provisions of the ''Dublin Transport Authority Act (2008)'' and the ''Public Transport Regulation Act (2009)'', on 1 December 2009. The NTA took over certain functions from the

Department of Transport The Department for Transport (DfT) is a department of His Majesty's Government responsible for the English transport network and a limited number of transport matters in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland that have not been devolved. The d ...

and the entire role of the Dublin Transportation Office. It has also taken over the functions of the Commission for Taxi Regulation when Part 4 of the Public Transport Regulation Act (2009) commenced on 1 January 2011. The NTA operates under the consumer facing brand Transport for Ireland.

Organisation

The act establishing the NTA made it a body corporate consisting of the City Manager of

Dublin City Council Dublin City Council ( ga, Comhairle Cathrach Bhaile Átha Cliath) is the authority responsible for local government in the city of Dublin in Ireland. As a city council, it is governed by the Local Government Act 2001. Until 2001, the council was ...

, the

Chief Executive A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

and a member of the senior

management team Senior management, executive management, upper management, or a management is generally individuals at the highest level of management of an organization who have the day-to-day tasks of managing that organization—sometimes a company or a corpo ...

, and a

chairman The chairperson, also chairman, chairwoman or chair, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the grou ...

and six other members appointed by the

Minister for Transport A ministry of transport or transportation is a ministry responsible for transportation within a country. It usually is administered by the ''minister for transport''. The term is also sometimes applied to the departments or other government ag ...

. The NTA has charge of public transport in the

Greater Dublin Area The Greater Dublin Area (GDA; Irish: ''Mórcheantar Bhaile Átha Cliath''), or simply Greater Dublin, is an informal term that is taken to include the city of Dublin and its hinterland, with varying definitions as to its extent. As of 2022, its ...

, which is defined legally for the first time in the Act. The counties covered are the

City of Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 cen ...

, Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown, South Dublin, Fingal, County Wicklow. County Kildare, and

County Meath County Meath (; gle, Contae na Mí or simply ) is a county in the Eastern and Midland Region of Ireland, within the province of Leinster. It is bordered by Dublin to the southeast, Louth to the northeast, Kildare to the south, Offaly to the ...

. An advisory council, consisting of local government officials and councillors, representatives of the

Garda Síochána (; meaning "the Guardian(s) of the Peace"), more commonly referred to as the Gardaí (; "Guardians") or "the Guards", is the national police service of Ireland. The service is headed by the Garda Commissioner who is appointed by the Irish Gover ...

, the

Irish Congress of Trade Unions The Irish Congress of Trade Unions (often abbreviated to just Congress or ICTU), formed in 1959 by the merger of the Irish Trades Union Congress (founded in 1894) and the Congress of Irish Unions (founded in 1945), is a national trade union centr ...

and business and community interests, was also established. The Public Transport Regulation Act retains this structure, though it provides that its functional area in respect of the additional functions that it is granted under that Bill its functional area is the entire state. The NTA subsumed the activities of the former Dublin Transportation Office, which was dissolved on 1 December 2009. John Fitzgerald is

chairperson The chairperson, also chairman, chairwoman or chair, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the grou ...

of the NTA, and Anne Graham is

chief executive officer A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

Activities and services

The National Transport Authority (NTA) is in charge of most

public transport Public transport (also known as public transportation, public transit, mass transit, or simply transit) is a system of transport for passengers by group travel systems available for use by the general public unlike private transport, typical ...

within Greater Dublin. Unlike authorities such as Transport for London and RATP, it does not normally operate services itself, although there is provision for it to do so in certain circumstances. It operates public service obligation contracts with transport operators, including Córas Iompair Éireann,

Transport Infrastructure Ireland Transport Infrastructure Ireland ( ga, Bonneagar Iompair Éireann) is a state agency in Ireland dealing with road and public transport Public transport (also known as public transportation, public transit, mass transit, or simply transi ...

and private operators. It was originally intended that the Railway Procurement Agency would, like the Dublin Transportation Office, be subsumed into the NTA, but a lobbying campaign by the agency led to it retaining its separate status. The CIÉ companies (

Dublin Bus Dublin Bus ( ga, Bus Átha Cliath) is a State-owned bus operator providing services in Dublin. By far the largest bus operator in the city, it carried 138 million passengers in 2019. It is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Córas Iompair Éireann. ...

, Iarnród Éireann and

Bus Éireann Bus Éireann (; "Irish Bus") is a state-owned bus and coach operator providing services throughout Ireland, with the exception of Dublin and the Greater Dublin Area, where bus services are provided by sister company Dublin Bus. It is a subsidia ...

) have retained their existing services, but they are now subject to directions from the NTA within Greater Dublin. In 2011, the NTA oversaw the development of the

Leap card The TFI Leap Card is a contactless smart card for automated fare collection overseen by Transport for Ireland (TFI). It was introduced in the Greater Dublin area in 2011 for Luas, DART, Iarnród Éireann and Dublin Bus, but acceptance has sig ...

scheme which introduced integrated ticketing in the

. During 2012 and 2013, a rebranding of services took place on taxis all over Ireland, and on some of the fleet in both

and

, using the new name Transport for Ireland. This continued over several coming years. In December 2013, the NTA announced that around 10% of routes then operated by Dublin Bus and Bus Éireann under their direct award contracts would be subject to competitive tendering, with a view to services commencing in 2016. Also in late 2013, the NTA published a plan for a cycle network in Greater Dublin, with greenways, cycleways and cycle paths which would potentially make the city and its surrounds accessible by bicycle – the Greater Dublin Area Cycle Network. The cycle network plan has not been implemented and, as of 2021, the NTA noted that the organisation was then "in the process of updating the GDA Cycle Network Plan" and that it planned to publish this update "later in 2021". As of 2022, the NTA had partially implemented an infrastructure program, titled

BusConnects BusConnects is a transport infrastructure program, managed by the National Transport Authority (NTA), focused on the bus networks in several cities in Ireland. Described by the NTA as intended to "improve bus services across the country", as of ...

, with a focus on the

bus network A bus network is a network topology in which nodes are directly connected to a common half-duplex link called a bus. A host on a bus network is called a ''station''. In a bus network, every station will receive all network traffic, and t ...

s in several cities in Ireland. Described by the NTA as intended to "improve bus services across the country", by mid-2022 the BusConnects program was in "implementation" phase in

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...

, "

consultation Consultation may refer to: * Public consultation, a process by which the public's input on matters affecting them is sought * Consultation (Texas), the 1835 Texas meeting of colonists on a proposed rebellion against the Republic of Mexico * Cons ...

" phase in

Cork Cork or CORK may refer to: Materials * Cork (material), an impermeable buoyant plant product ** Cork (plug), a cylindrical or conical object used to seal a container ***Wine cork Places Ireland * Cork (city) ** Metropolitan Cork, also known as G ...

, with the

projecting similar initiatives in Galway, Limerick and Waterford.

Establishment timeline

The name of the body, under the Dublin Transport Authority Act 2008, was originally to be "Dublin Transport Authority". However, in the budget announced in October 2008, the Irish government announced a major review of public service bodies, with bodies being amalgamated where it was felt savings could be made. A separate national transport regulator was originally intended to be set up to license public transport, but an annex to 2009 budget revealed that the government intended to incorporate both this body and the Commission for Taxi Regulation into the DTA. In an interview in ''

The Irish Times ''The Irish Times'' is an Irish daily broadsheet newspaper and online digital publication. It launched on 29 March 1859. The editor is Ruadhán Mac Cormaic. It is published every day except Sundays. ''The Irish Times'' is considered a newspaper ...

'' on 14 January 2009, the Minister for Transport at the time,

Noel Dempsey Noel Dempsey (born 6 January 1953) is an Irish former Fianna Fáil politician who served as Minister for Transport from 2007 to 2011, Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources from 2004 to 2007, Minister for Education and Scien ...

, confirmed this would be the case. In January 2009, the Public Appointments Service advertised the position of

of the DTA. The advertisement noted the government's intention to "assign national responsibility to the DTA for bus market regulation and the procurement of public transport services under public service obligations" and for the DTA to take over the duties of the Commission for Taxi Regulation. In September 2009, former Dublin city manager John Fitzgerald was appointed chairman designate of the NTA, with Gerry Murphy appointed

chief executive A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

designate. Also in September 2009, the Public Transport Regulation Bill (2009) was published. This gave it responsibility for licensing road passenger transport services throughout the state. It also provided for the abolition of the Taxi Regulator and the transfer of its functions to the renamed National Transport Authority. This is in addition to its Dublin-specific functions granted under the DTA Act, which it retained. In October 2009, the Minister announced that the Commission for Aviation Regulation would be merged with the new authority, with certain functions of the

Irish Aviation Authority The Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) ( ga, Údaras Eitlíochta na hÉireann) is a commercial semi-state company in Ireland responsible for the regulation of safety aspects of air travel. It is also responsible for providing air traffic control serv ...

also to be transferred. However, neither of these proposals actually made it into the Public Transport Regulation Act 2009, which was

promulgated Promulgation is the formal proclamation or the declaration that a new statutory or administrative law is enacted after its final approval. In some jurisdictions, this additional step is necessary before the law can take effect. After a new law ...

on 27 November 2009. The ''Public Transport Regulation Act (2009)'' proposed to change the name of the organisation to the National Transport Authority, and this was done with effect from the establishment day of the Authority under the ''Public Transport Regulation Act 2009 (National Transport Authority) (Appointed Day) Order 2009''.

References

External links

The Seanad Éireann "Dublin Transport Authority Bill 2008"Official site – National Transport AuthorityOfficial site – Transport for IrelandOfficial site – Dublin BusOfficial site – Iarnród ÉireannOfficial site – LuasOfficial site – RPA
(archived 2004) {{Authority control CIÉ Bus transport in the Republic of Ireland Transport companies of the Republic of Ireland Transport in County Dublin Local government in County Dublin