Fuel protests: Westlink demonstration a damp squib, as afternoon blockade fails to happen after Belfast's earlier Sydenham drama - though fear of disruption reduces traffic to a trickle
A planned fuel protest that would’ve cut the Westlink to a crawl failed to materialise in Belfast this afternoon.
But traffic was still down to a trickle of what it would normally be on the busy urban dual carriageway, as motorists stayed away rather risk getting caught in more disruption.
The Westlink demonstration was supposed to start at 2pm. Just over an hour earlier there had been dramatic scenes as a tractor convoy gummed up traffic on the Sydenham bypass in the east of the city, which even saw crowds walking down the dual carriageway to get to its nearby airport.
By comparison the Westlink was an oasis of calm, with the number of cars on the usually packed route down to a fraction of what they would normally be.
The same was true in the city centre from lunchtime until at least late afternoon; although traffic flowed freely, during the middle of the day most of the vehicles in the heart of Belfast consisted of Translink’s Metro buses.
There was a police presence at both the York Street and Divis Street junctions of the Westlink, though officers were left with little to do but shelter in their cars, avoiding the cold and wet conditions of the grey day.
Perhaps because of the weather, only a small handful of curious onlookers arrived to catch a glimpse of the non-existent protest; the few who showed didn’t stay long, and were outnumbered by the media.
While truckers did honk their support as they passed people standing on a Divis Street bridge overlooking the Westlink, it seems likely they mistook increasingly damp members of the press for protesters.