Not a Bridge Too Far: Why the Salmon Weir bus corridor could transform students’ lives

A congested Salmon Weir Bridge against the backdrop of Galway Cathedral

If you’ve ever been ghosted by the 404, left waiting in Cappagh for the 412 or pushed to the brink of punk-rock by the 411, a plan recently put forward by Galway Commuter Coalition is of major interest to you. The conversion of the Salmon Weir Bridge into a bus corridor between the hours of 7am and 7pm on a trial basis was recently advanced out of a Project Development Committee of Galway City Council and could be brought into action by the start of 2027. This development could transform the lives of commuting workers and students across our city, and understanding how we got here is of interest to all students who brave Galway buses.

The Salmon Weir Bridge lies at the centre of the student experience of University of Galway. It stands as the most significant bottleneck for buses cutting across the Corrib, and at peak times after students return to university, one in three buses on University Road are cancelled due to traffic. Thousands of students rely on public transport to get to college and are regularly let down by an irregular and undependable service, costing thousands of hours of commuters’ time a year. Solutions have been mooted for years, and you may not know that the Ring Road (hailed by some as the ‘silver bullet’ to our traffic woes) was only approved on the condition that public transport measures within the city would be funded.

The BusConnects Galway Cross-City Link project is one of those measures and features wide ranging changes in bus lanes and road usage from the College Road (beside Connacht Rugby) all the way to the University and UHG. The Cross-City Link received planning permission in 2024, but it may take years for funding to appear for the project.

This is where we enter; Galway Commuter Coalition, a public transport advocacy group, which has just successfully brought a proposal to Galway City Council to bring forward just one of the measures included in the Cross-City Link project; the conversion of the Salmon Weir Bridge into a bus corridor. Years worth of data and research, combined with the success of Dublin’s BusConnects scheme, has indicated that converting the bridge for limited hours could possibly take 3,000 cars off of our roads in the long run.

Last Tuesday, we had our breakthrough when the Project Development SPC of the City Council advanced our proposal to the next stage via a unanimous vote following a presentation made by our Chairman (and OnaG Alumni), Cathal Lawlor, and myself. There’s a palpable hunger in the air for something to tangibly change the traffic situation in Galway, and this Salmon Weir proposal could do just that, in a cheap and timely manner too. For now, we’re two steps away from a full council vote on the trial run of this proposal, which could take place in early 2027.

Traffic is already a defining experience of university life in Galway, but some of the ‘solutions’ put forward will also have a major impact on the university. The ring road route, as proposed, will cut straight through the rugby, GAA, and soccer facilities at the Dangan end of our campus. The use of Eamonn Deacy Park for staff and student parking has been in the air since at least last Spring but progress remains to be made. For now, the Salmon Weir plan could bring real change within months, rather than waiting on silver bullets and sluggish schemes.

As we continue out fight to stop the Government’s proposed public transport fare hike (that could reach as high as 30% for students in Galway), the Salmon Weir project proves that community activism can turn into action within established systems. The people of Galway rallied to stop the Eglinton Canal and Claddagh Basin being turned into a road and carpark in the 1960s. Now, in 2026, we have a chance to change Galway’s transportation for the better by changing how we use our roads, rather than relying on building more