Government Capital Spending on Roads: 2016-2022

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Maybe there are a certain type of Dub but your real 'enemy' here is the 'we need to bypass every town and village and upgraded every road' brigade before we'll worry about those city slickers of Dublin, Cork, Limerick or Galway variety.

I just want to mention that making Limerick/Cork more economically viable would take some pressure off Dublin, therefore benefiting Dublin.

It's also worth pointing out that there is no more suitable alternative economic region in the country.

I genuinely don't understand the reticence at building the M20. Why on earth aren't we attempting to alleviate the stressed infrastructure in Dublin by trying to build a counterbalance? There seems to be no political appetite whatsoever. Why on earth not?

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

Should investing in transport spending in Dublin also alleviate the Dublin housing crisis, the jobs crises outside Dublin and the lop-sided economic output of the country?

Look, I'll lay my cards on the table: I think in arguing against the M20, you may be backing the losing horse.
By all means argue for more spending on infrastructure in Dublin, but at some point you will see that we can't keep hoping that the rest of the country will just "go away".

Im not arguing against the m20 , Im arguing in an era of very restrained budgets, priority must be given to Dublin

BoatMad wrote: »

Im not arguing against the m20 , Im arguing in an era of very restrained budgets, priority must be given to Dublin

I do understand your argument and I disagree with you.

We have been focusing on Dublin since the start of the recession, with good results. But Dublin is at breaking point now for the reasons I mentioned. We can continue to build Dublin or attempt to balance our economy.

We need to come out of "crisis management" mode and start long-term planning again.
This is in no way an anti-Dublin sentiment. But the greater Dublin region is massively subsidising the rest of the economy. If we continue to prioritise Dublin instead of looking at a second area (like the UK are/were attempting with the Northern Powerhouse idea) you end up with unbalanced economy, unbalanced political landscape, etc etc etc. The UK ended up with Brexit essentially because of geographical unbalance.

It actually doesn't matter where that second economic area outside of Dublin is, but as it stands the best placed to succeed is Cork/Limerick. And that area is held back massively by the lack of this road.

Deedsie wrote: »

M11 is a motorway to get to and from Dublin, M7 widening is a motorway to get to and from Dublin. Do you think anyone here doesn't think the M20 is more important than the motorway from the M6 to Tuam or the N25?

I said M17/M18 not M7. I'm in favour of the M20, the problem is it shouldn't be a case of choosing between M20 or MN/DU. Dublin needs infrastructural investment badly too.

jd wrote: »

Really? Current road projects are M11, N25, M17/M18.

Apologies, I should have clarified that I wasn't talking about infrastructural spending alone, I was talking about the economy.
In that respect, Dublin's been the focus, in order to float the rest of the economy.

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/news/66pc-believe-capital-is-racing-ahead-in-recovery-30336146.html

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

It's not a case of either/or, we're all saying both are needed.

We're arguing AGAINST the idea that "priority must be given to Dublin", which is BoatMad's opinion!

I agree with you then. I think John Moran has some interesting views, and I think resistance to what he suggests won't be from Dublin.

I'd actually say that the attractiveness of living and working in a city, is not whether you can get to the next city quickly, but (funnily enough) whether you can live and work and get around that city easily.

The lack of the M20 wouldnt stop me from moving to Cork, but the stories I hear of my sister in law working in one of the hospitals where people drive in for about 7am , to sleep in the car for a couple of hours to ensure a parking space, where the busses arent an option as they are too unreliable, where you cant take the main road out of Carraigaline and end up driving bohereens because of the traffic jams heading into the city, are the kind of things that would put me off moving back to Ireland, and in specific Cork.

Cork people should focus on sorting out their own city first before looking to have links to Limerick improved.

munchkin_utd wrote: »

I'd actually say that the attractiveness of living and working in a city, is not whether you can get to the next city quickly, but (funnily enough) whether you can live and work and get around that city easily.

The lack of the M20 wouldnt stop me from moving to Cork, but the stories I hear of my sister in law working in one of the hospitals where people drive in for about 7am , to sleep in the car for a couple of hours to ensure a parking space, where the busses arent an option as they are too unreliable, where you cant take the main road out of Carraigaline and end up driving bohereens because of the traffic jams heading into the city, are the kind of things that would put me off moving back to Ireland, and in specific Cork.

Cork people should focus on sorting out their own city first before looking to have links to Limerick improved.

People working in CUH drive in for 7AM for free parking. Anecdotally, many of these are consultants.
Carrigaline has its own thread: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=214509

Neither have anything whatsoever to do with the M20.

And if all that weren't enough, your last paragraph takes the biscuit. Cork people should focus on sorting out all of the local problems first before looking for a critical all-island infrastructural spend to be started... what an utterly ridiculous statement!

What's your angle on this? Is it a "the smaller cities don't need infrastructure" type of response akin to "Qu'ils mangent de la brioche"?

What is the point of the N5 schemes through Longford, Roscommon and east Mayo?

Most of Roscommon is best accessed using the N61.

Once the M18 is in place most of Mayo will be best accessed from the south too.

marno21 wrote: »

[...] How often do these 26000 people need to go to Dublin??

[...]

Being one of those people I think I can tell you something. I need to go to Dublin quite often. But having in mind what the route looks like I do whatever I can not to go to.

Cannot give any reference at the moment, but it's proven traffic volume will go up once roads been improved.

BoatMad wrote: »

The issue is about the here and now. Given a limited " fiscal space" , we have to decide how to prioritise spending. To me , given the huge issues experienced in the capital every day, we should be directing spending there in the immediate future, not into underpopulated areas of the west. ( that is not to argue that they shouldn't get improved infrastructure , just not now )

Its not a question of fixing Dublin strategically , that would require billions and billions, cause even if we built DU, MN and more Luas, wed only be scratching at the surface. Remember this is a capital where NO new rails lines ( of any material significance ) have been built since 1900. Even DART was just a reworking of existing Dublin suburban. Yet we have the ridiculous expenditure of money on WRC and other follies

suggestions that we somehow abandon Dublin , as a bad experiment, as ridiculous in the extreme, the requirements of nearly 2 million people in the countries powerhouse have to be " somewhat" addressed . It certainly cant be ignored and it basically is at present

See I think you're on a different page of the book entirely here: we're all talking about linking Cork and Limerick, not an underpopulated area of the west.
And we're talking about doing that to alleviate the pressure on Dublin's infrastructure.
And we're not talking about this development INSTEAD of upgrading Dublin area infrastructure, we're talking about it ALONGSIDE upgrading Dublin area infrastructure.

Nobody is suggesting we "abandon" Dublin by building the M20. In fact you and others on here are arguing in favour of further isolating Dublin, by ensuring that it is the only economically viable region in the country.

I'm not sure if you realise it, but you're effectively arguing in favour of greater centralisation. You're arguing in favour of Dublin subsidising the rest of the country to a greater percentage in future.

Personally, I think that would be reckless. And several economic reports down through the years agree with me. We need to focus on the urban areas to drive our economy. No report we have commissioned to date states that Dublin should be the only economically viable area in the country.

Lastly, in what way do the aforementioned Cork inner-city traffic issues negate the need for the M20? Or was it - as I was generously hinting - just a ridiculous argument?

I'll put it another way for you: WHY do we need to invest so much in Dublin all of a sudden, just a few years after completing the M50, T2, Luas, Port Tunnel? Because it's growing very very fast. Probably one of the faster growing cities in the EU (I'm guessing). Why is it growing very fast? Because every other region in the country is becoming economically unviable due to chronic under investment. We have a two-tier economy. Once you accept that premise, the question is how to address it. Do we become a city-state, as is the current trajectory, with the rest of the country being designated rural/tourism, or do we implement some of the reports which urge us to build up either one or two other large urban regions. At the moment we're doing neither.

I'll put it another way for you: WHY do we need to invest so much in Dublin all of a sudden, just a few years after completing the M50, T2, Luas, Port Tunnel? Because it's growing very very fast. Probably one of the faster growing cities in the EU (I'm guessing). Why is it growing very fast? Because every other region in the country is becoming economically unviable due to chronic under investment. We have a two-tier economy. Once you accept that premise, the question is how to address it. Do we become a city-state, as is the current trajectory, with the rest of the country being designated rural/tourism, or do we implement some of the reports which urge us to build up either one or two other large urban regions. At the moment we're doing neither.

There is no evidence that Dublin is growing fast because of infrastructure development. There is clear evidence that Dublin is growing because the type of high tech industry its attracting like a famous style infrastructure where its peers are close and that Dublin as a place to live is attractive ( too a point ) to many young people that typically work there.

Add to this the natural draw to a capital for finance, and clerical operations and you have the growth

If anything Dublin has grown " despite " its lack if infrastructure

M50 was a 1970s planning decision , T2 is a countrywide resource , LUas is incredible limited in scope and the Port Tunnel was and is arguably a compete waste of money as its utterly under utilised and did nothing to help commuters

as I said we have a capital where no heavy rail project has been undertaken since 1900 , 1900 !!!!

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

Sorry, you're conflating two things: you're responding as though I said "Dublin is growing fast because of infrastructure development".
I said "Dublin is growing fast because of lack of infrastructure everywhere else in the country".

Like you say, the greater Dublin region's growing in spite of any infrastructural investment. But it is indeed growing faster than anywhere else in the country, is it not?

It seems a pretty simple decision to me: city-state or all-island economy. You can't have both unfortunately.
If you want the former, we invest heavily in Dublin. Give up on the 61% of citizens outside the greater Dublin region, let them move to Dublin: expand the city and be done with it.
If you want an all-island economy, you need some of the infrastructure elsewhere to broadly match Dublin's. Inter-city travel should be possible (by rail and motorway). Airports and ports should have viable infrastructure.

The issue is you do both , but transferring significant growth to non GDA regions has proven to be difficult and is probably a 30-50 year project

in the mean time, we need to fix key deficiencies in Dublin mass transit system within a fiscal space that is very limited by diktat. That requires prioritising spending in the Dublin region for a period. Then we can return to outside GDA investment on a longer term plan to de-emphaise the GDA.

Galway and Limerick have a rail link and will soon have a motorway linking them. The railway's a pointless waste of scarce resources though.

I can't understand why there's no motorway from Cork to Limerick though. Having a good link between these would give some pole to oppose Dublin.

I can't help but think even in the northeast with 3 "cities" linked by the same road and trainline, Belfast gets all the benefit.

BoatMad wrote: »

we have had decades of attempted spatial strategies, gateway towns , incentivised regional tax and investment incentives, ( BMW regions) , biased EU grant aid etc.

roadways in places like cork, are arguably better then dublin , many have extensive ring roads, bypasses etc. Dublin has had little road infrastructure added since the M50 a road that was planned in the seventies

repeatedly high capital cost rail projects in the city have been postponed , in order to ensure that rural capital projects were capable of being financed

I would agree that urban focused developments should be also made in other major centres, like Cork and limerick. I would de-prioritise rural and interurban development until major Dublin large scale capital projects are complete

I;m not saying that Dublin should be endlessly prioritised , merely over a 10 year period to ensure that strategic high capital cost projects are completed within the available fiscal space

I understand your point and I'm arguing that it's not reasonable to de-prioritise interurban development when one city currently has >6 interurban links, and all other cities only have one link: to that same city! In finishing the Dublin links and no others, we've basically implemented the perfect economic sink-hole.

We have one airport, which now needs to be expanded, the other two either after being asset-stripped, hamstrung by debt and controlled by their direct competitor, or sold as a lost cause. One urban light rail system, one motorway-linked city.

When you look at it like that, the miracle is that anywhere outside of Dublin is a net contributor to the economy at all. But you're arguing that we need to focus only on Dublin, for 10 years. I argue that in those 10 years, there would be no economy outside Dublin worth attempting to build up.

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

I understand your point and I'm arguing that it's not reasonable to de-prioritise interurban development when one city currently has >6 interurban links, and all other cities only have one link: to that same city! In finishing the Dublin links and no others, we've basically implemented the perfect economic sink-hole.

We have one airport, which now needs to be expanded, the other two either after being asset-stripped, hamstrung by debt and controlled by their direct competitor, or sold as a lost cause. One urban light rail system, one motorway-linked city.

When you look at it like that, the miracle is that anywhere outside of Dublin is a net contributor to the economy at all. But you're arguing that we need to focus only on Dublin, for 10 years. I argue that in those 10 years, there would be no economy outside Dublin worth attempting to build up.

if we dont focus on Dublin projects , we will have chaos in Dublin
instead we get WRC , while dublin based rail projects get cancelled