THE number of court prosecutions against lorry drivers flouting Dublin's city-centre truck ban has shot up by 60% on last year, according to new figures.

The statistics also show a dramatic decline in the number of on-the-spot fines, suggesting that drivers who break the rules are now more likely to face court.

According to figures released by gardaí, there were 76 fixed-charge penalties for travelling through the city centre without a permit last year, compared to just nine so far in 2009.

However, by the beginning of November there had been 23 court summonses compared to just 14 for the whole of 2008.

Dublin City Council has also revealed that, since the introduction of the restriction in February 2007, it has paid out around €1.6m, or €50,000 a month, in East Link tolls for trucks.

The toll charge is reimbursed by the council because it is the only way to link both sides of the city for trucks not permitted to get any closer to the centre.

This expense is offset slightly by the sale of €7 day permits which allow certain trucks five trips in and out of the exclusion zones.

These are designed to facilitate business deliveries and are issued only to trucks servicing an address or premises registered with the council.

With around 90 passes being sold a day – the biggest customer is Diageo which transports Guinness from St James's Gate – the permits generate around €230,000 a year.

The city council's head of technical services, Brendan O'Brien, says that apart from some rule-breakers, the system has been a significant success, with overall HGV volume down by around 95%.

"The reduction in the volume of trucks in the city has been staggeringly large in terms of these restrictions," he said. "Compliance with the permit systems is pretty high – that is the system that allows trucks to come in and out. We are not seeing any evidence that people are sneaking in or anything like that.

"Periodically we would record registration numbers on different roads and then check to see if they had permits. We keep an eye on particular roads and if we feel there is a particular problem we would notify the guards."

From 7am to 7pm, HGV volume on the East Wall Road approaching Dublin Port has been slashed from 1,300 to just 31. On the North Wall Quay, the number of trucks has decreased from 1,600 before the ban to just 70 today.