[Article] Port tunnel changes may cost up to €60m

Victor

http://home.eircom.net/content/irelandcom/topstories/721710?view=Eircomnet

City centre ban on lorries too large for Port Tunnel
From:ireland.com
Tuesday, 13th May, 2003

Large lorries which are too big to travel through Dublin's Port Tunnel will not be be allowed through the city centre either, it emerged yesterday.

More than 360 heavy goods vehicles a day will be affected by the restriction, which will effectively mean they have no exit route from Dublin Port.

The Dublin Port Users' Group described the proposal as "the impossible situation".

The planned city centre restriction on lorries was revealed by the Minister for Transport, Mr Brennan, at the launch of a manual on traffic management guidelines.

He said all lorries importing goods to the Republic through Dublin Port "will be required to use the Port Tunnel when the tunnel opens in 2005".

Mr Brennan said the requirement for lorries to use the port tunnel was in line with State policy.

Describing the €700 million tunnel as probably the largest current construction project in the EU, the Minister said its primary purpose was "to give Dublin back to the pedestrian, train and bus".

Asked afterwards if the Minister's position reflected an intention to introduce an outright ban on lorries using the city centre once an alternative route was in place, a spokesman said he understood such a proposal formed the basis of Dublin City Council's reason for having the tunnel.

The spokesman added that the larger trucks had problems beyond the port and port tunnel in that many of the State's road and railway bridges were well below the port tunnel clearance of 4.65 metres, and could not in any case facilitate larger lorries.

"In other countries they have local deliveries by smaller trucks; some of these large trucks are terrifying and the Minister is not making any apologies. He doesn't think Ireland wants these supertrucks."

Dublin City Council's port tunnel project manager, deputy city engineer Mr Tim Brick, confirmed "there shouldn't be any doubt that there will be controls and restrictions on where and when you can use a heavy goods vehicle (HGV) in the city" once the port tunnel is open.

Mr Brick told The Irish Times that "it could never be envisaged . . . that we would allow 9,000 trucks to trundle through the centre of a medieval-style European city" once the port tunnel was opened.

He cautioned that a lot of negotiation - "probably tortuous" - with interested bodies remained, but said: "The Minister has focused on the primary aim, the primary objective, which has been to get these trucks out of the city centre."

The proposal was, however, greeted with dismay by the Dublin Port Transport Users' Group.

Its spokesman, Mr Jerry Kiersey, said at least 360 and maybe as many as 720 trucks a day would be height-barred from using the tunnel, leaving them "not able to go anywhere". Mr Brennan also announced proposals to double the number of Quality Bus Corridors (QBCs) in Dublin from nine to 18 "within about a year", and to introduce QBCs to Cork and Galway.

Victor

http://home.eircom.net/content/irelandcom/breaking/724514?view=Eircomnet

Hauliers say 'supertruck' ban will drive inflation
From:ireland.com
Tuesday, 13th May, 2003

Inflationary pressures will "inevitably" increase if a ban on extra-large "supercube" container lorries using Dublin city centre is imposed, according to the Irish Road Hauliers Association (IRHA).

The Association also warned that the number of conventional lorries passing through the city could treble if the Department of Transport plans were to take effect.

The IRHA has called for an urgent meeting with the Minister for Transport, Mr Brennan, following confirmation yesterday that "supercube" trucks - too large to use the Dublin Port Tunnel when it is complete in 2005 - would not be allowed pass through the city centre.

IRHA spokesperson Mr Jimmy Quinn said there would be "massive financial repercussions on both the haulage and retail sectors through increased distribution costs" if the ban was imposed. "And that would inevitably be passed on to the price of goods in the shopping basket," he continued.

He said there were "unquestionable" advantages to the use of such vehicles pointing out that the use of smaller trucks to deliver into the city would increase traffic. "Supercubes" are between one and two feet taller than conventional articulated trucks but can hold twice the capacity.

"For example, if you take one supercube out and replace it with 28 one-tonne vehicles then the consequences are obvious," he said.

At present, it is estimated that an average of 16 supercubes per hour pass through the city centre.

When the final part of the Southern Cross is complete most trucks will be routed around the city anyway but there would still be a need for some supercubes to service businesses within the M50, he added.

Victor

I wonder how this works "'Super-cube' vehicles are on average 30cm taller than existing trailers and due to methods of packaging can accommodate 50 per cent more than their smaller counterparts." If a container is say 3m high and you increase it by 30cm surely that is only a 10% increase?

http://home.eircom.net/content/irelandcom/breaking/768907?view=Eircomnet

Hauliers call on Brennan to lift 'supertruck' ban
From:ireland.com
Wednesday, 21st May, 2003

The Irish Road Haulage Association (IRHA) has called on the Minister for Transport to abandon his "ludicrous" plans to ban large lorries from entering Dublin city centre after the opening of the Port Tunnel.

Otherwise the maximum permitted height for the tunnel must be raised, the group said.

It said the proposed ban - combined with the Dublin Port tunnel height restriction of 4.65 metres, would reduce competitiveness, increase pollution, increase traffic congestion, and increase costs for the consumer.

"Super-cube" vehicles are on average 30cm taller than existing trailers and due to methods of packaging can accommodate 50 per cent more than their smaller counterparts.

More than 360 heavy goods vehicles a day will be affected by the restriction, which was announced by Mr Brennan earlier this month.

He said all lorries importing goods to the Republic through Dublin Port "will be required to use the Port Tunnel when the tunnel opens in 2005". The restriction effectively excludes larger trucks from using the port.

"This is ludicrous," IRHA spokesman Mr Jimmy Quinn said.

"The use of 'super-cubes' in Ireland will cut down on traffic and help reduce pollution. It will also reduce distribution costs for products that are sent throughout Ireland. For the Minister to ban them from Dublin Port makes no sense.

"England is our biggest land trading partner and you can drive a 'super-cube' from Galway to John O'Groats and the only obstruction will be the Dublin Port Tunnel and the Dublin City centre. This issue needs to be addressed and I am calling on the Minister to revoke his proposed ban for everybody's sake," he added.

Victor

http://home.eircom.net/content/irelandcom/breaking/774364?view=Eircomnet

Dublin businesses support truck ban for city
From:ireland.com
Thursday, 22nd May, 2003

Business representatives in Dublin have weighed in behind the Government's proposal to ban trucks from entering the city centre when the Port Tunnel is opened in 2005.

The Dublin City Centre Business Association said only 1 per cent of heavy goods vehicles using Dublin Port exceed the height of the Dublin Port Tunnel

"There is no justification for Irish taxpayers' money to be used to facilitate a small group of UK and Irish hauliers operating outside the norm," the group said in a statement.

Hauliers opposed the ban proposed by the Minister for Transport are to meet Mr Brennan today to discuss the issue.

The Irish Road Haulage Association (IRHA) yesterday called on the Minister to abandon what they called his "ludicrous" plans to ban large lorries from entering Dublin city centre after the tunnel opens. Otherwise the maximum permitted height for the tunnel must be raised, the group said.

It said the proposed ban - combined with the Dublin Port tunnel height restriction of 4.65 metres - would reduce competitiveness, increase pollution, increase traffic congestion, and increase costs for the consumer.

...

Hairy Homer

Originally posted by Victor
http://home.eircom.net/content/irelandcom/breaking/774364?view=Eircomnet

We do NOT need supercube trucks to deliver goods to individual supermarkets and shops. They are used for long distance transportation between massive distribution centres from which smaller vehicles then deliver to the retail outlets in the area.

I wouldn't just ban supercubes from Dublin city centre. I'd ban them from the main roads linking Dublin to Belfast, Sligo, Galway, Limerick, Cork and Waterford. If you want high-volume transport to warehouses in these areas, we already have an inherently higher capacity means of achieving this. It's called the railway.

So why isn't this being done now?

Perhaps if we used the FOI to ascertain how much dosh government parties received in 'contributions' from private road hauliers, compared with the amount they received from CIE (bugger all cos they, I mean we, own it) we might get an inkling.

Of course, I could be wrong but I doubt it. :-)

Victor

Too late for your ban - they are already here - An Post have bought 10 of them..

Winters

Tunnel vision as An Post trucks to be banned

AN POST has just bought a fleet of supertrucks that won't fit into the Dublin Port Tunnel.
Not only will the trucks not fit in the tunnel, but they're to be banned from Irish roads by the Government on alleged safety and environmental grounds.
The astonishing revelation that An Post has just taken delivery of 12 high trucks from the North came in an independent report which shows that almost 160 trucks a day - 52,000 a year - will be too high to fit in the tunnel.
The An Post supertrucks, destined for its SDS parcel delivery service, are 4.75m high while the maximum permitted for the tunnel is 4.65m.
Only recently, the Taoiseach told the Dail that he hoped nobody changed the current height restriction of the tunnel to cater for a few large trucks "which have bedevilled my own community for years".
While An Post insisted yesterday that the new trucks would not use the Dublin Port Tunnel, it now appears that eventually they'll be barred from all roads. Transport Minister Seamus Brennan is planning to ban supertrucks by introducing a maximum height of less than 4.65 metres, in line with EU heights. In 2000, the Government removed the maximum limit of 4.25m for heavy goods vehicles.
Mr Brennan said it was the Government's intention to ban these supertrucks for environmental and safety reasons after hearing that 13 EU states had maximum heights lower than that planned for Dublin.
The minister is set to bring in an independent expert to examine the report of the National Institute for Transport and Logistics (NITL), an independent agency set up by the Government, which found 18pc of the truck fleet, used by 10 key haulage operators at Dublin Port, is higher than 4.65m.
The new survey found that 157 trucks - 1.74pc of the total expected to use the tunnel - would fail to fit through the 4.65m height restriction of the tunnel.
"The number of vehicles affected is significant in absolute terms, but spread across the day and as a percentage of total truck movements remains small. Nevertheless, trends in vehicle design and fleet composition will inevitably produce an increase in the number of vehicles infringing a 4.65m height restriction."
Options presented by the report for dealing with the problem included an outright ban on supertrucks, restricting them by location or time, or giving special exemptions to them in the city centre when the tunnel opens.
It also predicts that the supertruck trend is growing internationally. In the UK where the government had a policy of high-clearance vehicles the number of larger trucks has led to fewer trucks on the roads, it said.
But the institute found the height of the Dublin tunnel is "in line with European norms where tunnel height ranges from 4.3m to 4.75m."
An Post said the trucks would operate on routes between mail centres in Dublin, Cork, Portlaoise and Athlone and not use the tunnel. They had two tiers, effectively fitting two trucks into one and this was the increasing trend in mail delivery.
The National Roads Authority (NRA) warned yesterday that safety would be compromised if changes to the Port Tunnel were made at this stage to squeeze in more height for trucks. The extra cost could run to €100,000 and the June 2005 opening date could be further delayed.
Michael Egan, NRA spokesman, said it was very concerned about suggestions that the floor of the tunnel be lowered or vehicles channelled through the highest part of the tunnel to accommodate the tall trucks.
In the event of a fire, crash or other emergency the changes would cause serious difficulties for drivers and passengers trying to escape via corridors linking the two separate tunnels carrying north and south-bound traffic.
Treacy Hogan
Environment Correspondent

Victor

Originally posted by Winters
The astonishing revelation that An Post has just taken delivery of 12

Ooops, my bad.

Originally posted by Winters
The An Post supertrucks, destined for its SDS parcel delivery service, are 4.75m

98FM reported this as 7.75m Duh!

Originally posted by Winters
Only recently, the Taoiseach told the Dail that he hoped nobody changed the current height restriction of the tunnel to cater for a few large trucks "which have bedevilled my own community for years".

So they can continue to go through his own community?

Originally posted by Winters
The extra cost could run to €100,000

Out of something like €600m?

Victor

http://home.eircom.net/content/irelandcom/breaking/1980755?view=Eircomnet

Access to draft report refused - Port Tunnel group
From:ireland.com
Tuesday, 18th November, 2003

The group lobbying for a change in the height of the Dublin Port Tunnel have been refused access to a draft report examining the issue despite the National Roads Authority and Dublin City Council being given copies.

The chairman of the Transport Umbrella Group (TUG), Mr Jerry Kiersey, today said the Department of Transport refused a copy of the Atkins Report draft for an economic impact study being conducted by Trinity College transport economist Dr Sean Barrett.
Mr Keirsey said he could not say for sure why access had been denied. "But it seems that those that have been opposed to this campaign for the last three years - those that made the original mistake in the height of the Port Tunnel - are continuing their campaign," Mr Kiersey said.

"Our view of the issue at this stage is that they're more concerned about being right rather than doing the right thing," he added.

A Department of Trasnsport spokesman said the draft was not made available because the Minister, Mr Brennan, felt it should only be seen by the those involved in the construction of the tunnel because of its technical nature.

TUG today issued its report which indicated that average economies of €6 million will be lost to the industry each year if the tunnel is not raised by the requisite nine inches to allow "supercube" lorries use it.

Supercubes are around 14 inches taller than conventional Heavy Goods Vehicles but have around 38 per cent greater capacity. They cannot fit through the Port Tunnel as currently planned and will instead use mainly city centre routes after disembarkation.

As a consequence, the TUG-commissioned report says, there will be more accidents, more pollution and more traffic congestion in the city, with supercube throughput at Dublin Port expected to rise by at least 5 per cent per year.

Mr Keirsey said changing the tunnel's height was relatively easy, but warned a decision was needed within a matter of weeks. "We're passing a point of no-return, obviously the longer you wait on a construction phase, the more it is going to cost to achieve that change."

TUG represents Irish Ferries, Stena Line, Dublin Chamber of Commerce, Irish Petroleum Industry Association, Chartered Institute of Transport and Logistics, Irish International Freight Association and the Irish Road Haulage Association.

Victor

NRA comment http://www.nra.ie/News/PressReleases/d947.HTML.html

Sarsfield

Clear, succinct and backed up with the relevant numbers.

And makes a mockery of the TUG report, and by extension, Sean Barrett.

I like it. :cool:

I await with interest Dr Barretts rebuttal.

Bee

Lets see...

I don't want a repeat of the Mad Cow roundabout by the NRA etc

The NRA give us roads without centre lane crash barriers, DCC gives us road and traffic mismanagement on a scale that defies belief as well as lethal junctions for cyclists to be crushed by lorries...

I hope these Luddites are told where to get off and the Dublin Port Tunnel is increased in height to facilitate economic growth and increase road safety for all users.

If it is increased in height of course the nice people in the NRA and DCC will do the honourable thing and resign........some hope!

Bee

Victor

Originally posted by Bee
If it is increased in height of course the nice people in the NRA and DCC will do the honourable thing and resign........some hope!

Bee, first off, less of the broken record. Second, go read the items on the front of the NRA website. Bigger trucks do not save lives.

Typedef

What a totally short-sighted government.

For the short term saving of not constructing the tunnel to accomodate super-trucks, the government is doing long-term damage to the economy, by keeping such trucks out of the tunnel and the city centre.

Clearly the goverment made a half-arsed job of the tunnel's comissioning and is now trying to cover it's tracks by introducing this 'legislation' under the guise of environmental protection.

Has the government any tangable proof that putting two 'ordinary' trucks on the road, to replace one super-truck has 'any' benefit to the environment?

If so, where is it, and is that source independant and credible?

Victor

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2091-904574,00.html

Tunnel shows what a deep hole we're in
The Sunday Times - Ireland
Noember 23, 2003
Comment: Liam Fay:

It's a pinch just as tight as George Redmond's handcuffs. According to a report published last week, a shortfall of 22.5cm (or 9ins) in the height of the Dublin port tunnel is likely to cost the Irish economy about €76m over the next 14 years.

That works out at almost €3.5m a centimetre, which is expensive real estate, even at Dublin prices.

The conviction on corruption charges of Redmond, the former Dublin city and county assistant manager, was undeniably welcome news. There was rich symbolism, too, in the sight of the once powerful official having to do what American cops call the perp-walk: the parade of a
manacled convict in front of the television cameras that is traditionally reserved for perpetrators of common crimes.

With the tribunals slowly spinning in circles, many of the politicians, developers and bagmen implicated in planning-sleaze controversies have long believed that no senior public figure would ever sniff the inside of a prison cell, no matter what emerged at Dublin castle about their shady dealings.

Redmond's conviction will send shivers of panic down some crooked spines. Now that one pillar of the Dublin planning rackets has been successfully brought down, others are more likely to crack. Before we get too carried away, however, it's important to remember that fraud and graft are not the only ills afflicting the Irish planning process. The system is like a rotting apple, going bad in several places at once. Even if corruption could be eradicated from its core — and that's an if the size of the millennium spire — the process would remain profoundly compromised, blighted by bureaucratic ineptitude and myopia, as well as political confusion. While there have been sporadic attempts at reform, the sheer number of agencies, quangos and vested interests still permitted to influence the outcome of even the most mundane planning decision ensures that the turmoil continues to be as deep as it is wide.

Almost every important infrastructural development seems to degenerate into a spaghetti junction of conflicting objectives and competing doctrines. Buck-passing and tracks-covering by officials appear to be the only engineering feats that can be relied upon for punctual delivery. It's no wonder the capital has a transport network that looks as though it was designed by monkeys. Monkeys on the take, at that.

The naive notion that matters are improving is firmly refuted by the farce surrounding the Port Tunnel, the €625m project scheduled for completion in late 2005. A 2½-mile twin-tube tunnel, running from the M1 motorway at Santry to Dublin port at East Wall, this long-awaited underground motorway is central to government plans to ease Dublin's chronic traffic congestion. Its purpose is to divert the thousands of heavy goods vehicles (HGVs) bound to and from the country's premier port, which are currently compelled to travel through the city, along streets which were never built to accommodate them. There's just one problem. The tunnel will only cater for vehicles with a height of 4.65 metres (15ft 3in) or less. As most HGV lorries and trailers have an average height of 4.5 metres, the vast bulk of commercial traffic will be facilitated. However, recent years have seen the introduction to Ireland of super-size or so-called "supercube" trucks which, at 4.8 metres in height, are too tall for the tunnel.

This discrepancy has been public knowledge for some time. Yet the management responsible for the tunnel's construction — Dublin city council and the National Roads Authority (NRA) — have resolutely defended the rationale of the established plans, and resisted all calls for modification. Their central contention is that supercubes, which currently comprise only 2% of the trucks entering this country, ought to be treated as a peripheral anomaly, a miniscule tail that should not be permitted to wag the dog.

The project management's PR machine went into overdrive last week on publication of the aforementioned cost-analysis report by Dr Sean Barrett, a Trinity College transport economist, and commissioned by the Transport Umbrella Group, a haulage-industry lobbying alliance. Barrett found that the exclusion of supercube trucks from the tunnel would cost haulage firms €25.22m between 2005 and 2018 in longer journey times, and a further €51m in accident costs arising from extended transit on busy urban streets. The study also warned that the added congestion caused by forcing these trucks into the city will be the equivalent of introducing 1,000 extra cars into Dublin each day.

The response by the city council and the NRA was to question Barrett's maths. They queried the study's projected rate in the increased use of supercubes and rubbished the methodology of the accident-costs calculation. Worse than a war of words, the
row quickly descended into a war of numbers. The finer points of such technical disputations are lost on most people. Whether or not Barrett got his calculations wrong, what is clear is that a large infrastructural facility is currently being constructed with an identified shortcoming that could be rectified far more easily at this halfway stage than after the project's completion. As the Port Tunnel is intended to be used for at least a century, we should reasonably expect it to be capable of accommodating even the most new-fangled vehicle on the roads at the time of its
construction.

If planning is about anything it's about anticipating the future. Several of our newest regional motorways, for instance, are built to a specification that seems disproportionate given the contemporary volume of traffic. But they have been planned so they are geared towards coping with the volume of traffic predicted in 20 or 30 years. In a curious throwback to our protectionist past, however, some of those close to the Port Tunnel venture believe that the most desirable solution to the height controversy is a statutory ban prohibiting supercube trucks from entering the country. The council and the NRA are not the sole authors of this debacle. They are merely the bodies charged with building what is a central government project, funded under the National Development Plan.

The existing blueprint for the Dublin Port Tunnel is the result of no less than a decade of deliberation, debate and inquiry by the finest minds in Irish politics, academia and civic administration. It represents one of the proudest achievements of the Irish planning system in all its panoply and wisdom. There should be no surprise, therefore, that short-term considerations feature so much more prominently in the plan than long-term provisions. After the clean-up of the rickety old shop, when all the parasitical lowlife that lurk beneath its eaves have finally been dragged out into the daylight, what our planning process really needs is a date with the wrecking ball.

an_taoiseach

Anyone reading this thread could be forgiven for thinking that Dublin is the only port in the country.

An T

Victor

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,2765-1167752,00.html

July 04, 2004
Port tunnel changes may cost up to €60m
By Richard Oakley

RAISING the height of Dublin’s port tunnel to allow for supertrucks could cost the state as much as €60m.

While the purpose of the tunnel was to take heavy traffic away from Dublin city centre, it emerged during construction that its relatively low ceiling would not be able to accommodate some large trucks.

The government is now considering whether an extra 10 inches should be added to its height.

A report by the builders doing the work says the design changes will cost a minimum of €30m and a maximum of €60m. The report follows one by consultants last year, which was supposed to facilitate a decision on the height, but was referred to the contractors because Seamus Brennan, the transport minister, decided he wanted issues clarified.

The new document outlines two options, costing €30m and €60m respectively, which will allow for extra height. But it warns that both have safety implications. It also notes that the prices are conditional.

The €30m option would involve the contractors being allowed to carry out the necessary work without involving a full project team, which would usually act in a supervisory role on such work. This option would lead to a delay of less than a month, but obviously without supervisors — something the €60m option would include. The costlier option would cost up to €60m because it would involve the contractors doing the work overseen by an entire project team. It is thought this would lead to a completion delay of several months.

The contractors also say it would be possible to increase the clearance height of the tunnel by lowering the floor and making changes to the external fittings. However, this could cause difficulties in the event of an emergency.

It is understood that lowering the floor could leave a high footpath at the side of the tunnel, which would be difficult for cars to drive up onto if an emergency vehicle needed to get through the tunnel. The high footpath might also block the door of a car from opening if a person were trying to escape from a vehicle for some reason.

As currently planned, the tunnel will have a height of 4.65 metres, not enough to allow “supercube” trucks to use it. The National Roads Authority and Dublin city council point out that, when the tunnel was designed, such trucks were to be banned from Irish roads. They argue that no change is necessary as few Irish trucks are that big. Hauliers, however, claim that supercube trucks are vital to businesses in Ireland. They have said that these trucks are used on a widescale basis in both Ireland and Britain and that it does not make sense to build a tunnel that cannot accommodate them. The Transport Umbrella Group has warned that failing to raise the tunnel height would cost €76m over 15 years.

Brennan had previously asked consultants to advise him on whether or not the tunnel height could be raised and how much it would cost. Atkins, the consultancy firm, reported that the ceiling could be raised in a number of ways, costing from €20m to €100m and taking from one to five months.

Capt'n Midnight

A report by the builders doing the work says the design changes will cost a minimum of €30m and a maximum of €60m.

Don't they the constultants get 4% of the total inc. overruns ??

BrianD

Hauliers, however, claim that supercube trucks are vital to businesses in Ireland. They have said that these trucks are used on a widescale basis in both Ireland and Britain and that it does not make sense to build a tunnel that cannot accommodate them.

This simply isn't true. Only a handful of companies use these trailers for very specific businesses in Ireland and only for Ireland - UK transport. These trailers are banned on continental Europe where the max height in some countries is 4.0 metres. Banning these trailers would have zero economic impact as they are far from vital.

thejollyrodger

well if they are that important why didnt any of them make a submission when the height of the tunnel was being made ???

The government is now considering whether an extra 10 inches should be added to its height.

Did they ever hear of metric :rolleyes:

sliabh

Does anyone know when the minister is supposed to be making a decision on this? Or is he adopting the approach of "if I wait long enough the decision will resolve itself" that is so common here.

antoinolachtnai

Well, I would say he is holding off making a decision because he is trying to negotiate the price of the whole thing.

He is trying to get them to drop their price for the 'extra' before he gives the go-ahead. This is the rational thing to do.

It is interesting to see that it will cost EUR 30m to actually do the work, but EUR 30m to get all the committees in place to supervise it.

It's quite surprising that the contractor would suggest such a thing. Contractors don't normally go around pointing out how overpriced their overseers are when they are pricing extras. Reading between the lines of this report, it suggests that the contractor thinks that there is an awful lot of unnecessary bureaucracy in this project.

Victor

Originally posted by antoinolachtnai
Well, I would say he is holding off making a decision because he is trying to negotiate the price of the whole thing.

The minister has no place and quite possibly no right to negotiate in such a matter. How about we just delegate negotiating responsibility to Liam Lawlor?

Victor

http://www.thepost.ie/web/DocumentView/did-65655086-pageUrl--2FThe-Newspaper-2FSundays-Paper-2FNews.asp

Safety regulations beat costs in concerns over port tunnel
25/07/04 00:00
By Niamh Connolly

EU safety regulations on tunnels have replaced cost as the biggest concern about raising the height of Dublin Port tunnel, informed sources have told The Sunday Business Post.

A long-awaited decision on raising the tunnel's height to include so-called `supercube' trucks is due to be announced by the transport minister Seamus Brennan before August.

An estimate from the consortium Nishimatsu Mowlem Irishenco (NMI) has put the cost of raising the tunnel at between €30 million, if there are few delays, and up to €60 million, if there is a five-month delay.

The two figures are based on the level of safety guarantees incorporated into the contract.

Brennan visited the tunnel's construction works at Whitehall in north Dublin last week and spoke to members of Dublin City Council, as well as engineers from NMI.

Informed sources said that EU safety regulations are now the main issue in decisions about raising the tunnel to the 4.9-metre height sought by hauliers and exporters. This follows a recent fire in an Austrian tunnel.

Safety concerns were subsequently raised at EU level that have implications for modifying the parameters of the road and footpath within the tunnel.

``Not raising the tunnel will create far more safety issues than raising it,'' said Jerry Kiersey, of the Transport Umbrella Group, which comprises several representative bodies and lobby groups.

``On a wet Friday night if you have a cavalcade of trucks around the M50, they may not see the sign warning of a low tunnel ahead because they have travelled safely on the motorways of Ireland. Imagine the chaos that will en- sue?''

He said Heavy Goods Vehicles (HGV) would end up `rat-running' through other roads if the tunnel's height is not raised.

Kiersey warned that the proposed ban on high trucks could not be implemented as it would lead to a spate of compensation cases by haulage firms.

antoinolachtnai

There is only one vendor. There is basically only one choice, to make the change or not. The Minister is the person who will decide whether the change will go ahead, and one of the criteria he will use in making that decision is price. That means that he is effectively the driver of negotiations from the government's side, whether he is at the negotiating table or not. (Of course if the whole thing comes down to a safety issue, it won't be a decision over price.)

John R

This is all so much bull.
There is no new safety problem, in fact truckers trying to squeeze oversize trucks through small gaps is a constant problem all over the country, particularly for Irish Rail who have many low overbridges. In the case of the port tunnel it is easily solved by fitting warning traps and oversize barriers on the approaches to the tunnel. Rat running is easily solved by putting traps on roads linked to the DCC traffic system, then the offending truckers can easily be caught by the Guards.

As for compensation, the hauliers have had years of warning over this which was plenty of time to sell the offending vehicles. It is like the rest of us demanding compensation when our old cars fail the NCT for emissions regulations because there was no such thing when we bought the cars.

Basically these jokers are saying that they cannot be expected to operate their vehicles in a safe manner and if they are unable to drive them through the tunnel then they will just break the law anyway so we should just waste another €60m for their benefit.

sceptre

Originally posted by Victor quoting from the SB Post
``Not raising the tunnel will create far more safety issues than raising it,'' said Jerry Kiersey, of the Transport Umbrella Group, which comprises several representative bodies and lobby groups.

Jerry represents the trucking companies. Jerry owns a trucking company. So in fairness, ignoring for a moment whether what he's saying is correct or not (especially given that the argument he offers seems to centre around not being able to see signs on a dark Friday evening) one can hardly expect him to say anything else.

Apart from the trucking companies, anyone know who else is represented by the TUG?

John R

Originally posted by sceptre
Jerry represents the trucking companies. Jerry owns a trucking company. So in fairness, ignoring for a moment whether what he's saying is correct or not (especially given that the argument he offers seems to centre around not being able to see signs on a dark Friday evening) one can hardly expect him to say anything else.

Apart from the trucking companies, anyone know who else is represented by the TUG?

Is it so bloody dificult for journalists to point out that the person they are quoting "raising safety concerns" is in fact the employer of the potential safety threats and law breakers?

It is like a burglar issuing safety advice to householders to keep their doors unlocked so as the doors will not be smashed when a burglar comes theiving and to stay in bed because disturbing the could cause the burglar to injure the householder. Oh and if you don't follow his advice the burglars will sue you for loss of theiving revenue.

Hecate

Hmm whats that noise? Wasn't this same debate all over the press about a year ago?

Physically the tunnel has somthing close to 5 metres actual clearance, but as a *safety measure* it will be restricted to 4.65M to protect against loose loads etc.. Road tunnels throughout the continent have an average height of 4.3m to 4.75m so the height of the port tunnel is more than reasonable.

Arghh..why are they even considering this cráp??!, just because a few malcontents make some noise they waste further time and money conducting a survey that tells them it will cost 60million to allow that 2% of supercube lorries to use the tunnel. They'd be better off spending that money on better extraction systems for the tunnel; safety, fire safety in particular, should be the No.1 concern not some star destroyer sized dutch lorries carrying tulips...

Kaner

I live in the States near the I-80 freeway, which runs from New York to San Francisco. The underpass closest to my house is 14' 9", which quite a bit less than the tunnel height of 4.65m (15' 4").

It seems that supercube trailers are not used in either mainland Europe or the US.

I have noticed that a lot of the trailers in the US are 53', rather than 40'. Is 40' stilll the max length in Ireland?

antoinolachtnai

I don't know anything about the permitted container length, but it is certainly the case that a higher truck is more environmentally sound, because it reduces the number of journeys made without taking up more road space.

sliabh

antoinolachtnai wrote:

I don't know anything about the permitted container length, but it is certainly the case that a higher truck is more environmentally sound, because it reduces the number of journeys made without taking up more road space.

Are you sure about that? A higher profile will have greater drag. So more power (and pollution) will be required to move it. It also will have greater weight which means increased wear on roads.

BrianD

That is not necessarily true. The overall weight of the truck is limited by law (38 tonnes I think) so no matter the shape or size of the load the weight can't go above the legal limit. Super cubes are really only good for bulky but light items.

The height of the tunnel is really a red herring. No matter what the size of a truck it is not environmentaly friendly to bring them into urban centres. The tunnel in conjunction with the HGV management plan will put 98% of trucks through the tunnel and the other 2% via an alternative route to the M50.

Even as the truckers lobby state that many trucks make deliveries within the M50, I would hazard a guess that research would show that most of these would be going to industrial estates that are accessable via the M50. Oh and I forgot the huge number of trucks who go to the fruit and veg markets in Smithfield! In anycase, supercubes are impractical for urban deliveries because of loading and parking. High property prices mean smaller store rooms requiring smaller more frequent deliveries.

One question I haven't heard debated in whether fuel trucks will be allowed in the tunnel. One of largest truck movements in the city is tankers transferring aviation fuel from Dublin Port to the Airport. All if it moves by road through marino, drumcondra, whitehall and onto the M1. There is talk about a pipeline but I would speculate that there will be much local opposition.

antoinolachtnai

There will be more drag, but only in proportion to the increase in height, or maybe a little less. So there is no increase in drag per unit of goods carried. However, the unladen weight of the truck is roughly the same. So the total weight being transported per unit of goods is lower.

Additionally, the use of road space is less.

I can't see why a supercube is any less practical than a regular height lorry. Presumably it has the same footprint and manouverability.

A lot of companies with big stores and fast turnover seem to think that supercubes are perfectly practical.

BrianD

antoinolachtnai wrote:

There will be more drag, but only in proportion to the increase in height, or maybe a little less. So there is no increase in drag per unit of goods carried. However, the unladen weight of the truck is roughly the same. So the total weight being transported per unit of goods is lower.

Additionally, the use of road space is less.

I can't see why a supercube is any less practical than a regular height lorry. Presumably it has the same footprint and manouverability.

A lot of companies with big stores and fast turnover seem to think that supercubes are perfectly practical.

I don't quite follow what you are trying to say about the supercube trailers in your posting. The only real difference between a loaded supercube truck and a standard trailer is the height. The laden weight and length of a supercube can't be any different to a standard trailer.

The only companies that appear to use supercubes in Ireland seem to be Tescos (white and unmarked) and An Post/SDS. Supercubes are ideal for long motorway journeys from a depot to a large supermarket. You won't find them replenishing the Spar in Camden St.!

antoinolachtnai

Exactly, what I mean is that the amount of truck (i.e., unladen weight) required per unit of goods is smaller, if the unladen weight stays the same, but the number of units of goods is greater.

So you can carry say 38 tonnes with a 5 tonne truck, rather than only carrying say 30 tonnes with a 4.8 tonne truck.

Obviously, it only makes sense if you have pretty big stores and healthy turnover of goods.

How high are those trucks that Argos and Marks and Spencer use?

D'Peoples Voice

Does anyone know the expected height of the new Tunnel under the Shannon Estuary in Limerick city?
Is it to be a similar height to the Lee Tunnel in Cork?

Ste.phen

Wow, fair play, that's an old thread to be digging up