Driving in Ireland

Unless you are very comfortable driving a manual I would pay the extra cost and get an automatic. You will be driving on the left hand side of the road, sitting on the right of the vehicle and shifting with your left hand. Always remember to turn left and stay left and when you are on a narrow road and there if oncoming traffic just pull over and stop. The round about are clearly marked with directions both in signage and on the pavement but if you miss it the first time around there is no shame in going around again! Some roundabouts are dual lane so be sure to be in the left hand lane if you are exiting. Also, regardless of where you are picking up your car there is no "training" area. They hand you the keys and off you go. Good luck and be safe!!!

Thank you very much. Yes--I already paid for an automatic. My sense is there are a lot of very narrow roads in Ireland, (and Europe in general.) I assume the traffic signals are pretty much the same as they are in the US, correct?

Thanks again.

David
New Jersey

I am here now and driving quite a bit. In the country, minor roads are sometimes only one cars width wide. You must drive carefully and look for turnouts so when two cars meet, one can reverse to, or wait in a wider place and allow the other car to pass.

For the most part, drivers are courteous. I have yet to hear the sound of a horn. Most drivers are not in a great hurry and will give you a pass

I brought a GPS from home. It is a necessity! Also, make doubly sure that your are covered by adequate insurance.

Good luck

take at look at your route on google earth street view, it will give you an idea of the roads.....automatic for sure as you will probably be doing some backing up on single lane roads on inclines and working the clutch can be a challenge. The street view wont give you a very good feel for up and down climbs on the roads. I took my garmin from the usa and it did not have UK maps when I bought it. I bought UK/Ireland map on ebay, probably not legit, for like 10 dollars, the map from garmin was going to be $89. My gps has a slot for mini card and I just inserted the card and was off and running. The GPS was helpful for viewing "where are we now" but I used the ordnance survey road atlas for my go to map. Most all of the roads were shown on the GPS but not all of them had names or numbers. because some of the roads in west Ireland have the irish names as well as English it does take a bit of concentration to figure out where you are. my go to advice for driving in the UK is get a car one size smaller than what you think is reasonable!! We used a four door city car, Seat brand, and it was small but for two of us was perfect and had all the pep we needed, you will appreciate the small wheel base for turning around on missed turns and for parking (which is a challenge)...I also bought the super coverage insurance which I did not actually need/use but the extra couple hundred bucks (2 weeks driving) was worth it for me.

All:

Thanks for your responses--great tips! For the highways--is it drive on the left and pass on the right? Also, I assume the traffic signal colors are the same as the US. Also, getting gas--is it self-service, or does the attendant come out and service the car?

Thanks again.

David H.
NJ

Yes, on the highway (motorway), drive on the left and pass on the right. Also, the onramps and off-ramps are on the left.
Red and green lights are the same. Most traffic signs are the same or similar as the US, or you can pretty easily figure out those that are unfamiliar. (The paper map from the rental car company should have a little cheat sheet on it.)
Gas (petrol) is mostly self-service. It works as in the US too, though some pumps wouldn't take our chip/pin credit card, so we had to go inside to pay. (But that's OK, because most gas stations had fresh-baked scones!)

You'll do fine. Have fun!!

You should be able to just download Google Maps Ireland to your phone before leaving and then you can just use your phone as a GPS. We did that and it worked awesome. Remember it doesn't use data if you have your mobile data turned off it just uses your GPS built-in on your phone.

Does drain your battery so you will want to make sure you take a car charger.

You will notice that every Road in Ireland with the exception of the 4- Lane highways like our interstates, have rock walls and no shoulders or ditches. I mean literally every single Road whether it's out in the middle of nowhere or one of the main thoroughfares from town to town have rock walls.

It just amazed me at how many rock walls there were. Every business has a rock wall in front of it every house has a rock wall in front of it every mountain and Hill and pasture has rock walls all over them.

It can be nerve-racking and it does take awhile to get used to staying on the left hand side particularly when you need to turn right but if you take it slow you'll be just fine.

I assume the traffic signal colors are the same as the US.

Actually I'm trying to remember if there were any stop lights. I really dont recall many. Especially once you get out of the major cities.

Everything is a roundabout. They are everywhere. This is where your GPS is really really nice. Because you can generally tell which exit to take a head of time. Otherwise it would be very stressful and you would certainly take a wrong road pretty often.

This is where it's really nice to have a co-pilot Manning the GPS and giving instructions

Can you recognize a speed limit sign that you will see on the roads in Ireland? They look nothing like those in the US.

Take a look at the linked site below for a quick tutorial. No need to memorize them all, just get comfortable with what they look like in general and you will be able to identify most of them without too much thought. They are at least more US like than those in the UK. ;-)

http://www.drivingtesttips.ie/Irish-Road-Signs.php

Drive on the left, pass on the right. Fuel is self service.

One issue is if you are crossing the border, which is likely, the Republic is km/h, the North is mph. A car hired in the Republic is likely to only have km/h speeds on the dial. You will need to learn the rough equivalents.

30 mph = 50 km/h
50 mph = 80 km/h
60 mph = 100 km/h
70 mph = 110 km/h

Most cars in Ireland are equipped with an ‘eco’ system designed to save gas and reduce emissions. One of the characteristics of this system is that, when the car is stopped for a short time (traffic lights, stop signs, etc.), the engine shuts off. This can get very annoying. There is, however, a switch ‘somewhere’ on the dash or console that will turn off the eco system. Because the system automatically turns on every time the car is started, you have to turn it off every time.

Also, one of most useful highway signs is a series of three signs that tell you when an exit is coming up. The first sign has three diagonal lines; this indicates the exit is 300 meters away. The next one has two diagonal lines for 200 meters, and the last one has one diagonal line for 100 meters. These are great for figuring out when you need to ‘get over’ for your exit.

There are eleven toll roads in the Republic of Ireland, ten of which have booths where toll charges are paid in cash or via an electronic pass. It’s easiest to just pay cash at each booth. Keep change at hand. The M50 motorway on the outskirts of Dublin City is a barrier-free toll. When you pick up the car, ask the attendant about paying the toll. Typically, people driving a rental car are not required to pay the toll during their trip…usually, the rental car company charges your credit card for the toll at the end.

Thanks again for all these useful tips.

David H
NJ, USA

Get the super CDW and rent an automatic. Be very thorough in inspecting the car before the rental. Sometime are you a tired or impatient and just want to get going, but force yourself to inspect closely and document it with the agent. Even if their processes make that difficult, which they probably will be (i.e. long distance to walk from the counter to car pickup). Rental car companies can be extremely lax at documenting damages before a rental, they just shrug it off but when you drop it off they suddenly become be very observant. It feels like their processes are built to let them charge for the same scratch multiple times, when it's minor enough that they would not even bother to get it fixed. We were glad we had the super CDW. On the plus side, the incredibly narrow roads thing is way overblown in my experience having driven there twice. They do have speed cameras there but the speed limits tend to be very generous (not like England where they are sometimes way slower that you might otherwise go). I did not the need to pass anyone except maybe slow moving farm vehicles, the locals all were passing me. The density of traffic is very low most everywhere, but a good tip in general is to not arrive in a town during the evening rush hours around 5 p.m. when things can get pretty busy in towns. The route you take can make a big difference in how long it takes to get from point A to point B. Map it out the night before on Google Maps using a tablet and your B&B Wi-Fi.

Is there a handy web page illustrating Irish road markings? I'm pretty sure in the UK they use white for center lines and yellow for the outside edge, which is opposite of the US. Does Ireland follow this pattern too?

Yes, road markings are similar. Here are illustrations:

http://www.drivingschoolireland.com/regulatory-signs.html

Our B&B host in Kilkenny told us, "Drive on the left and between the ditches."

I just got back from a 2 week driving trip in Ireland. I must say it was harder than I thought it would be. The roads are so narrow over there. I thought I would have problems driving on the left side but I got used to that. But It was harder to deal with the narrow roads.

I'm not trying to scare people but tell the facts. When we returned our rental car to Hertz there was 6 cars there being returned. 3 of them was damaged. 2 cars had left front end damage and one car had a damaged left front tire. So out of 6 cars returned 3 was damaged. That's a 50 % damage rate . I would buy the extra insurance to help protect you.

You also need a person to help you navigate the roads. Help you drive. This helps reduce the stress about staying on the left. I had a Garmin GPS with me but it made allot of mistakes. Not sure why. I used the Garmin GPS in Germany and Norway and had no problems with it. But in Ireland it made 25 % errors.

I have driven in Germany and Norway and there roads was not as narrow as Ireland roads. I think as Ireland repaves the roads they widen them to make them wider.

They also have square curbs over there. I call them tire and wheel eaters. In the USA the curbs are round on top to prevent tire and wheel damage. In Ireland they are square. They eat tires and wheels up. I was looking at the curbs over there. They are full of black rubber marks with tires rubbing them all day. . Bad design.

I was in a gas station and looking at how the locals tires look. The car next to me had bent steel wheels and 2 others had black tire marks on the side of there tires. I think the roads are so narrow over there it causes tires to hit the curbs. Hard to avoid this.

Over all the question is risk versus reward. Yes the risk was high. But I feel the reward was worth the risk. Ireland is a pretty country.

Nothing that hasn't already been stated, but once off the main roads, I felt many roads were not all that well marked or the signs were fairly small. Like the one person stated, be prepared to stop and back up if you come upon another vehicle on one of the many very narrow roads.

A couple of people have mentioned getting the Full CDW, I will concur, even though it is expensive. As someone pointed out, the risk of damage is high.

Also be aware that if your plan was to use Credit Card coverage, most credit cards specifically exclude Ireland from coverage, you have to look at the fine print, you could call the credit card service number, but the people there only read from a script and are as likely to tell you bad info, If you really want to look into it, I would get the number of the insurance company that runs the credit card plan and talk to them.

Aside from that, other comments hit the high points, I found the turning thing the hardest, if you are at an intersection it is just too natural to turn into the wrong lane. It helps to have your passenger be an active navigator and look out for hazards, correcting you if needed, and looking for signs.

There's many comments in "Driving in Ireland" streams that I won't repeat but get THIS!

A sign that says:

oncoming traffic in the middle of the road.

What?!?!? I almost slammed on my brakes when I first saw it. What does it mean? What should I do? Help!!

In America the sign would read: ONE LANE BRIDGE. Wow. I think that's much easier to desipher than the Irish sign!

Especially when you think about how many tourists don't read English! ;-

Susan
ExPat in Ireland

I made an expensive mistake on our recent trip to Ireland. We rented a diesel car. When we went to gas up I remembered it was diesel and reached for the green nozzle. Green signifies diesel in the US, but in Ireland it signifies unleaded. Luckily I saw the word unleaded on the receipt, so we didn't drive the car. We did have to pay a "fuel rescue" service to pump the gas tank out. It cost us around $300 including the tank we had to refill with diesel and about two hours. The service man that pump the tank out said it is pretty common for US drivers to make that mistake. He and my husband chatted about life and Ireland for the 45 minutes it took to pump out the car. The Irish people that we came across on our trip were all so friendly and welcoming. They are the best attraction in their lovely country.

The best deal I've seen on CDW is on some (not all) American Express cards. I had it on a Costco card but then had to change to Everyday Cash (or something like that) when Costco changed. For one low price, depends on your state (some states don't allow it) but something between $25 and $40, you have full CDW for an entire rental up to something like 20 days.

I haven't had a claim yet, I guess that's the real test. I used it for one rental from Auto Europe and it wasn't picked up by the card automatically. I had to call and have them add the premium so I was covered. I've used it for other rentals from Hertz, Avis and Enterprise and it charged the premium automatically.

I've driven all over and, knock on wood, have yet to have a claim. I hate to spend hundreds on CDW that I never ended up using.

Janelle - a friend of mine did that when we were teenagers in the 70's with his dad's Mercedes Benz! Believe me, the color difference in Ireland and the USA stops me every time... I look and look and look!! I'm so afraid I'll switch them, too!

Another tip on rental cars -- AerLingusCars.com - i've not tried it, but as I flew today from Dublin to Heathrow on my way to Washington, DC I saw an ad for it in the airport!

Susan
Expat in Waterville

I've rented a car three times in Ireland. Three safety tips:

1. Right turns are hard and left turns are easy.

2. The driver is always in the center of the road.

3. Drive slowly.

You'll do fine if you remember those three things.