[Article] U-turn on the Luas as lines get connected

Victor

Call me a sceptic, but why does this sound like this replaces the St. Stephen's Green - Airport link and nothing lese will happen for years?

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,2765-1337383,00.html

The Sunday Times - Ireland
October 31, 2004
U-turn on the Luas as lines get connected
Stephen O’Brien

THE government is planning to join Dublin’s two Luas lines by running a new track from St Stephen’s Green to O’Connell Street.

Martin Cullen, the transport minister, will bring plans to cabinet before Christmas for a €70m spur to link the red and green Luas lines from Tallaght and Sandyford.

The move is an important shift in the government’s public transport priorities. The taoiseach said last week that a metro would not be built linking Dublin city centre to the airport before 2007.

Department of Transport officials are now finalising proposals for the 1km track, which would include at least two new Luas stops, at College Green and Westmoreland Street.

The line would go from the Luas terminus on the green, down Dawson Street, around College Green and over O’Connell Bridge via Westmoreland Street. The Sandyford line would then join the Tallaght line at Abbey Street.

In an interview with The Sunday Times, Cullen said: “This is something I think would make an important, realistic and positive contribution to the internal dynamics of the transport system within the city centre area.”

He told a Dublin Chamber of Commerce dinner last week that “joining up the Luas lines is the obvious start” to integrating transport in Dublin.

The current 24km of Luas cost about €800m — or €33m per km — but those costs were skewed by the fact that much of the 9km Sandyford line was built along the preserved route of the Harcourt Street rail line.

Had he survived the recent cabinet reshuffle, Seamus Brennan was committed to bringing a memo to cabinet proposing a €3.4 billion metro link from Dublin airport to Pearse station. The former transport minister had no plans for an overground link-up of the Luas lines and did not envisage the Sandyford line being linked to the rest of the rail network until the airport metro link was complete.

But Bertie Ahern told opposition parties last week that the programme for government commitment to built a metro link from the airport could not be met by 2007.

“The preliminary figures for the next phase of a metro are enormous,” he said. “Even if that project is cleared, it will take several years.”

Cullen has worked closely with the taoiseach and Brian Cowen, the finance minister, and has kept them briefed on his unfolding plans, though final decisions on the precise mix of Luas, metro and other options have not been taken.

One government official agreed the metro could drop to third place in the list of government’s rail priorities in Dublin, behind the Luas link and the €1.3 billion underground link from Connolly station to Spencer Dock, Pearse Street, St Stephen’s Green and Heuston, the so-called “interconnector”.

Instead of a €3.4 billion metro link to the airport, Irish Rail favours a Dart link estimated at €300-€440m, branching off the existing line between Howth junction and Portmarnock.

The company also proposes a rail spur from Clonsilla on the Maynooth commuter line to Clonee, which would provide a park and ride option for N3 car commuters.

One senior government source said: “It would be wrong to read into this that the metro is dead, but it is not coming down the tracks any time soon.

“One of the things that went wrong with the perception about the metro was that this was all about an airport link, and it’s not.

“The airport link is only a small bonus. The real thing is how you open up the whole of north Dublin in terms of land becoming available, housing development, a whole range of things.”

OfflerCrocGod

This link should have been there from the begining I just couldn't figure out why the hell the two lines were divided, it made no sense. €3.4 billion for the Metro link seems like wated money to me; it would end up costing a lot more then that - €5 billion anyone?

BrianD

I don't think it will replace the Airport rail link - there was no good reason for it to go to Stephens Green in the first place. It makes a lot of sense to join both lines as part of a city wide tram network. The airport link should be viewed as a separate project that will be integrated into the heavy rail/DART network.

A Dub in Glasgo

It is absolutely ludicrous that this small link was not built during the LUAS contracts! They really need to integrate things a bit better and provide a rail link to the Airport.

weehamster

Well, you can all thank the then minister for transport Mary O'Rourke for not joining the 2 line. She also made the choice not to go ahead with the Ballymun to Dundrum LUAS line which was originally planed to be built at the same time as the RED and GREEN lines. And if she didn't make that wonderful choice, that line woulnd be finished by now. :rolleyes:

narommy

weehamster wrote:

Well, you can all thank the then minister for transport Mary O'Rourke for not joining the 2 line. She also made the choice not to go ahead with the Ballymun to Dundrum LUAS line which was originally planed to be built at the same time as the RED and GREEN lines. And if she didn't make that wonderful choice, that line woulnd be finished by now. :rolleyes:

Yeah, She is a dope. Incredibly patronising too. I really don't know why anybody bothers with her. Getting a Senate seat was a joke.

I remember Garett FitzGerald giving his tuppence on the link up too. Saying that it was impossible for it to go around the bend at Nassau Street. He's an economist so why did anybody listen to him???

Back on topic. They should build the Luas link and the inter connector.

Does anybody know the journey times for the proposed Metro V's Dart Spur, Airport to Connolly ?

antoinolachtnai

I don't know, but we did some estimates on the list before here.

As I recall, we came up with:

travel time by DART spur: 30 minutes or so. (20 minute to Howth Junction, ten minutes further to the airport)

CORRECTION: The time would be more like 26 or 28 minutes. Time to Howth Junction is 14 minutes, not 20, and I think I have underestimated the length of the spur)

travel time by Metro (assuming N1 alignment, not going by the N2 junction as proposed in the original RPA plan): 20 minutes or so.

The real issue, though, is wait times. The average wait for a Metro could be 5 minutes or less, depending on demand. (6 trains per hour)

The average wait for a DART would be more like 15 minutes (2 trains per hour).

The other issue to consider is the location of the DART or metro station. This would probably be at least 5 minutes walk from the arrivals area. It could be further.

So the journey time from the arrivals hall to the city centre would be 30 minutes by metro and 50 (CORRECTION: 43) minutes by DART.

What stumps me about this plan is why you would go to all this expense to provide these services, when buses will be able to travel from just outside the arrivals hall through the Port Tunnel to the city centre in less than 25 minutes.

With 6 buses per hour, that would mean the average journey time, kerb-to-kerb, would be 30 minutes.

BrianD

The link was left out because the government at the time did not have the backbone to face up to the various lobby groups in the city centre. at the time. There is no issue with bends etc. In fact some of the earlier RPA illustrations showed trams in situ on College Green. Hopefully the link could be the start of a northside route - perhaps to Ballymun via DCU. ACtually, I wouldn't view the linking of the 2 lines as a U turn as there was no statement to the effect that they would not be linked.

I believe that the airport link should come off the Sligo line with a simultaneous upgrade of signalling at Connolly. This would open up a brand new line within the city.

narommy

BrianD wrote:

The link was left out because the government at the time did not have the backbone to face up to the various lobby groups in the city centre. at the time. There is no issue with bends etc. In fact some of the earlier RPA illustrations showed trams in situ on College Green.

I know :mad:
Backbone is sadly lacking

Villain

I could be reciting myth here but was there not something about the lines been different sizes or something?

MrPudding

irish1 wrote:

I could be reciting myth here but was there not something about the lines been different sizes or something?

:rolleyes:

narommy

irish1 wrote:

I could be reciting myth here but was there not something about the lines been different sizes or something?

NO Difference. :rolleyes:

All the trams can runs on both lines. period.

There is a difference in the distance between the tracks on the different lines but that just means that a metro 'could' run on the Sandyford line.

Anyways I don't think that the lines would meet that way. It'd be more of a conectin stop job.

I wonder if Connex is exerting presure on the Gov to link the lines

Villain

Jesus, don't all roll your eyes once, I did say I could be reciting Myth, and obviously I was. God Monday morning really does bring out the worst in some people.

MrPudding

irish1 wrote:

Jesus, don't all roll your eyes once, I did say I could be reciting Myth, and obviously I was. God Monday morning really does bring out the worst in some people.

Vey sorry but this "myth" has been done to death here. Quite recently again infact. It gets tedious.

MrP

Keyzer

Its a bloody disgrace the way this transport problem has been allowed to go on for so long. Having a 2 tram lines that aren't connected defies logic. Chimpanzee's could have come up with a better solution.

So the metro is out the window or shelved for another 3-5 years? I seriously doubt it will ever be built.

The most sensbible thing to do is work with what we have already, that being extend the dart to the airport. Who cares about wait times, its the convenience which is the major factor. I was recently in Amsterdam, got the train from Schipol into city centre but had to wait for 10 mins, I didn't care because I could relax and take it handy instead of worrying and lugging cases around looking for a taxi etc.

If it happened in any other country, these contsant cock ups with everything, there would be a civil war. How these muppets get control and waste money/time on stupid projects which do nothing to help the traffic problems in Dublin.

Where does the logic come into building a tram system but only having it on one side of the city? I live in Finglas and the traffic is a nightmare going into the city in the morning.

It just defies logic, i feel like crying....

And if you think the luas was a big job or complicated check this out - www.bigdig.com

narommy

irish1 wrote:

God Monday morning really does bring out the worst in some people.

Yip

antoinolachtnai

Well, Schipol Airport has a train frequency which is double or more what the likely Dublin Airport frequency would be. Your waiting time for a train in Dublin Airport could be up to 30 minutes. 15 minutes is just the average.

A phenomenal amount could be done to make the bus experience to and from the airport. The costs would be tiny, compared to the cost of running train tracks.

It's not that the train is a bad idea. Obviously, it would be good to have a train service or a metro to the airport. The problem is that there is a shortage of cash. We have to ration the money out so as to get maximum value-for-money. I'm just saying that something less glamorous than trains might represent the best value for money.

Even if we had the cash sitting here in a giant briefcase and we decided to start work tomorrow, it would still be at least 2009 before we'd have any trains running.

So what I'm saying is that a greatly improved bus service is something you could have up and running within months, and at a far lower cost, while still bringing many of the benefits. (In the case of the Airport, where the port tunnel will be available, it brings all the benefits, except the perceived level of comfort.) So why not do that for starters?

(Personally, my preferred way to get to the airport is the Aircoach. I often drive to the airport to meet people though, because it is much better value - EUR 1.50 for petrol, say, plus EUR 2 (average) for parking, as opposed to EUR 19-26 (1 or 2 singles + 1 returns) on the Aircoach.)

narommy

I really think that the idea of runing busses thru the Port Tunnel has real merits.

Hopefully somebord will have the gumption to do it. Probably Aircoach?

enterprise

Im going to say one thing!

PRAISE THE LORD - A TRANSPORT MINISTER HAS ACTUALLY COME UP WITH A GOOD IDEA!

It beggers belief. Of course it should have be done 1st day! I look forward to the day where I can get on a tram at Milltown and get off at Connolly to go to work or Heuston to travel down the country.

Re: the Iarnrod Eireann Dublin Rail Plan.

The entire DART network would be recast to facilitate a line to the airport so I reckon you could have trains every 10 mins at peak and 15 or 20 mins off peak. Also it could be an express service to the city.

Also: I look forward when I can get a train to the airport!

Thank God the metro is dead.

sliabh

There has been a bit of mention of why the Luas was not run to O'Connell street here a few times so I thought I'd add my 2 cents on this.

To the best of my understanding (and I am open to correction here) what happened at the time was:
It was understood that the need was for two new rail lines on the city. One from Tallaght, and a second along the old Harcourt street alignment which would ultimately go to the airport. Mary O'Rourke dithered for a few years on over or underground through the city centre for the Harcourt line. Essentially the arguments boiled down to cost (of tunnelling) vs convenience (FF did not want to have to listen to city centre businesses whinging about digging up the streets. And there were outragous scare stories at the time about the city grinding to a hault because of tram construction).

So eventually a comprimise was made. The Green line luas would be constructed along the old Harcourt line and then would continue on a new route to St Stephans green pending the ultimate decision on the city centre route. The line would be tram initially but was designed to be upgraded to a heavier rail standard in the future. (Hence the wider seperation between the tracks. I am not going to mention the "g" word so people don't start off down that dead end again).

Ultimately the Sandford/Harcourt line was intended to be continued to the airport/swords. The link to O'Connell street was left to then. The decision was made in principle that this link would be underground and this would be the "metro". As it was going to be underground it didn't make sense to build an overground link from St Stephens green to O'Connell street right now when this would be obsoleted in 5-10 years and removed. So instead an on street tram run was built. In the knowledge that a much shorter length of line would be eventually become redundant.

O'Rourke then left office leaving the decision to approve and build the second phase of this line to her successor.

What has happened since is that the RPA came up with a draft estimate for the cost (>€5bn) which made the project politically and financially unacceptable. Following advice from the man who built the Spanish Metro this was reduced to a more realistic €2.4Bn (using simpler routing, station designs, and 24 hour tunnelling). However no one trusts the RPA estimates (they admit themselves that they lack estimation skills), and when you come up with two massively different estimates you lack political credibility. So the department of Finance and his Bertiness have refused funding to the minister of Transport.

That's pretty much the history of why the Grren line did not go to O'Connell street. The new minister is aware of this. And I'd say he doesn't see things changing too soon. So knowing that he has about 2 years in the job he can't really sign off, or fight for a major multi €Bn project. Instead he reckons €70m (his estimate this morning) for a simple link to O'Connell street will:
a) be something that he can actually get approved
b) be put forward as an example of how he worked to help Dublin's problems
So he gets a success he can trumpet come election time and defends his position at the cabinet table. Brennan in someways bit off more than he could chew in pushing for what he couldn't deliver and see what happened to him.

So where does this leave all the rest of us, the travelling public? Well in pretty much the same place as we were before. With politicians that continue to make short term incremental changes that are politically safe rather than bite the bullet to go for the sort of major work that is needed (whether it's interconnector or metro or some other scheme).

enterprise

Sliabh,

Your right in your run down of the LUAS timeline, thats why the two lines wern't connected.

But in all honesty could anyone ever see them converting the Green line to a metro standard? - it would have ment months of disruption as completly new stations would have had to be built to enable a metro type train to run on the line.

Also where would the tunnel come out in Ranelagh - I can't see any available space to have a tunnel portal let alone the disruption casued by the changeover to a "metro".

I congratulate Mr. Cullen on some forward planning - his rating is improving as far as im concerned. Maybe not "pro-car" afterall?

BrianD

I think Sliabh has summarised the history of the gap very well!

It beggers belief. Of course it should have be done 1st day! I look forward to the day where I can get on a tram at Milltown and get off at Connolly to go to work or Heuston to travel down the country.

You will probably have to alight from the green line in O'connolly Station and change to a Red line trame.

Be interesting to see if there was ever any design work on a junction in O'Connell St.

jank

good news indeed but it seems to me that the goverment is making up a transport policy as they go along with no vision for the future!

What about the north of the city? no luas or rail planned here, which is why i would be in favour of a rail link be it metro/luas or whatever. Swords should also be connected up as a huge % of people here work in dublin and use cars

Some good news but much more work to do. However I think they want to wait until the port tunnel is finished before they look at a north city luas/metro link
(maybe there hoping that one tunnel will solve all of the citys transport problems )

enterprise

I don't mind changing at all if required.

What I propose should happen is:

Alternate Green line trams run from Sandyford to Connolly / Heuston vice versa via a triangular junction at O'Connell Street / Abbey Street Jct (you could fit it in).

Withdraw the Connolly / Heuston "shorts" and used the paths vacated by this to provide the Green line service. This has two benefits.

A: Keeps the 3000 & 4000 tram fleets apart and available to work their own line with internal branding etc.

B: Opens up Heuston / Red Cow etc to the long distance Commuters who work in the St. Stephens Green / Harcourt Street areas.

BrianD

It may require a power upgrade of the Red line as the 40 m trams will consume more power.

enterprise

Im sure there is enough power in the system to cope with a 4000 series tram. All platforms on the red line are already capable of taking 4000 series trams.

thejollyrodger

well if they are going to link up the two lines then they must be saying No to the metro forever. Like they can hardly run both Metro and LUAS on the same line?. Personally I think Dublin really needs a metro.

What happens if they change their mind in 5 years (with the MASSIVE increase in Dublin Airport via 2nd terminal + 2nd runway )and decide to have a dedicated MEtro ? It wont work with the new upgrade.

This has mickey mouse planning written all over it.

enterprise

No actually its sensible planning!

The metro was only intended to go from airport to city centre (St. Stephens Green).

The IE proposal is much better with bigger benefits.

weehamster

thejollyrodger wrote:

well if they are going to link up the two lines then they must be saying No to the metro forever. Like they can hardly run both Metro and LUAS on the same line?. Personally I think Dublin really needs a metro.

What happens if they change their mind in 5 years (with the MASSIVE increase in Dublin Airport via 2nd terminal + 2nd runway )and decide to have a dedicated MEtro ? It wont work with the new upgrade.

This has mickey mouse planning written all over it.

The metro is a 'heavy rail' line (like the DART) meaning it can carry far more passengers than a tram could which is a 'light rail'.
The Metro would have stops spread further apart than a tram would. So this mean in the future that lets say you get off the metro at Stephens green and you want to get to Westmoreland street area, then you can take the LUAS.

It is very uneconomical to have a metro station at the same number of intervals as a tram system. This is how, good rail systems operate all over the world.

As for the 2nd Airport Terminal, this can be linked by underground travelators (Japan uses theses everywhere as they are cheap and effective, offering speeds up to 3 times faster than walking pace) to a underground DART station at the existing Airport (if they built the DART Airport spur)

Metros will be built, but only when we can justify the cost (ie biger population). DART extension and LUAS lines are cheaper, therfore more of them can be built.

Zaph0d

antoinolachtnai wrote:

A phenomenal amount could be done to make the bus experience to and from the airport. The costs would be tiny, compared to the cost of running train tracks.

What do you have in mind to make the airport buses better? You've mentioned using the port tunnel which makes sense. On the existing route, there is already a motorway for half the distance and the remainder is QBC.

Stimpyone

Zaph0d wrote:

What do you have in mind to make the airport buses better? You've mentioned using the port tunnel which makes sense. On the existing route, there is already a motorway for half the distance and the remainder is QBC.

On the N32 the Air Dart used to have it own 24hr QBC as it is the only bus ( to my knowledge ) that uses it. They've scaled it down to just peak times now :rolleyes: