All roads led to Dublin - still

westtip

I pulled out this article from the Ireland.com website from October 2003 today - thinking about the debate going on here about merits of certain motorways - written three years ago it still reads fresh although we have moved on since with many new roads opening. Much of what James Nix said in 2003 is still appropriate today, some I agree with some I don't but for those of us interested in this debate it is worth a re-read:


Irish Times October 15th 2003


All roads lead to Dublin, unfortunately

In the second of a series on Irish transport policy, James Nix argues for a fresh approach to our road network

Compared to two-lane roads, motorways are a joy. A camper-van can turn a two-lane road into a slow-moving queue. Provide two lanes in each direction and vehicles cruising on the inside lane can easily be overtaken.

Looking at the M1 or the M4 routes today, few would argue that a necklace of bypasses would have been a good solution. The Government's decision in 1999 to go for long stretches of motorway was correct. Having acknowledged that the Government got it right with the Belfast and Galway routes, there is a temptation to contend that new motorway from Dublin to Ashbourne, Cork, Limerick, Navan and Waterford is also correct. It isn't. Why not? The answer, in a word, is purpose.

As a nation we are seeking to redirect growth - to develop cities aside from Dublin. Motorway-building is the principle tool in this process. Some motorways focused on Dublin makes sense.

There comes a point when feeding all motorway into the M50 becomes counterproductive for Dublin and, at the same time, hinders the growth of other cities.

Encouraging Cork, Limerick, Galway and Waterford to rely on each other is central to regional growth. Good quality roads between them is the main way to achieve this. If, on the other hand, all motorway leads to Dublin, the consequences are stark. The capital will continue to serve needs that could be served by other regional cities.

Inter-regional reliance will remain a fantasy. Public representatives may as well shred the Spatial Plan and declare Ireland a city-state. Strong words, but the research couldn't be clearer. If building a fan of motorways from the capital aided regional growth, then Ballymena and Portadown should have become cites by now.

Welsh research shows that it is more important to link regional cities to each other rather than to the primate city. One study of the British motorway network found that its bias towards the area of England between Nottingham and Dover handicapped the development of the rest of Britain.

Germany deliberately decided not to focus its motorway network on Berlin. Portugal opted for a grid network to take some pressure off Lisbon. France, after years of radio-centric planning favouring Paris, is now trying to establish a synergy between Bordeaux, Toulouse and Marseilles; transport planning is the key instrument.

Back to Ireland. Separate motorways to Cork and Waterford cannot be defended. A motorway to Waterford should run via New Ross - to allow access to Rosslare - and be continued to Cork. Take the total amount of road needed for separate motorways and compare it with a single route - the build saving is staggering: 100km or €1 billion. This saving is four or five times the outlay to date on preliminary planning.

The key factor in today's supply chain is "delivery reliability", i.e. being able to say with certainty how long it takes to get to a given destination.

A Dublin-Waterford-Cork route achieves this: more goods will be routed through ports in the south-east, easing tailbacks at the Red Cow; people in Waterford will be encouraged to use Cork's new airport terminal, when complete; establishing a fully-fledged division of the High Court in Cork makes more sense, and so on.

Has Limerick been left out? No, delivery reliability has already been achieved between Portlaoise and Limerick. Limerick's problems stem from poor north-south connections (a point covered in this paper last Tuesday week).

And Meath? The NRA says that "road users travelling south [from Derry\] on the N2 will be encouraged, using a combination of advertising and signage, to use the link just north of Ardee to the M1, which is now complete from Dundalk to Dublin, as the more time efficient and safer route to Dublin, rather than using the traditional N2 route".

This strategy makes sense. Therefore, any plan to build two-by-two road from the N2 junction at the M50 north to Ashbourne is redundant. All that is required is a section of new road around Ashbourne so that the town's main street can be reserved for local traffic only.

Proposed motorway to Navan (and onto Kells) is a similar case. A newly-printed map of Ireland shows that the Drogheda bypass runs considerably west of the town. An east-west motorway from Navan to the Drogheda bypass would be about 60 per cent shorter than the €680 million route from Navan to Clonee. Drogheda port would be better linked with Navan and its Meath hinterland.

Isn't it smarter to direct traffic close to Dublin Airport and Dublin Port rather onto the Blanchardstown roundabout?

The Government should be praised for its decision in late 1999 to go for motorway. The problem - in essence - is that the author(s) of the roads plan appeared to feel that all new motorway should run in the same corridor as pre-existing national route. A wholesale adherence to this strategy is indefensible.

The road-builders of ancient Rome took an entirely fresh approach; their network, the Viae, departed radically from what existed before. Centuries later, the same can be said of the German, US and Portuguese highway networks. Likewise, Britain's M40 has no "junior" trunk route.

To uncritically follow an age-old network is to say that the technology of movement never advances. We know this to be wrong - the gap between today's vehicles and medieval travel is enormous. Departing from our inherited network makes sense because it saves billions.

JoeyJJ

Very good read, well researched...

lostinsuperfunk

The Cork-Waterford-Dublin motorway is an interesting idea. Both Cork and Waterford get a motorway connection to Dublin and you get a Waterford-Cork motorway into the bargain. It would also help journeys between the three major ports on the south coast (Cork, Waterford and Rosslare).
However he's wrong about the M40 in the UK. Between London and Oxford it runs roughly parallel to the old A40. And as it terminates in London anyway it hardly constitutes a radically different approach to road planning.

jjbrien

It is true the the goverment has always had tunnell vision in this regaurd. All th e currennt motoroways lead to Dublin. If you want to take a train from Galway to Sligo you have to go to Dublin change at Heauston take a bus to conolly and then take anonter train to Sligo. But thats the way Irelands transport policy has always been since the 60's.

murphaph

James Nix wrote:

[West] Germany deliberately decided not to focus its motorway network on Berlin

Unsurprisingly really, given that Berlin was surrounded by a foreign state, the GDR. Anyway, I'd agree with parts of what Nix writes and disagree with others. The Dublin-Waterford-Cork motorway would appear to have made sense alright. We are going to have a LOT of motorway standard road in the republic for the size of the country and its population. The point he raised about linking the main regional towns/cities will be addressed at least in part by the ARC, which will provide motorway quality links between Tuam-Galway-Limerick-Mallow (with a clear possibility to continue to Cork) and provide upgraded links north and south of the motorway quality roads.

Schuhart

Encouraging Cork, Limerick, Galway and Waterford to rely on each other is central to regional growth.

I think various people have said the same thing in different ways. The problem is setting out a plan based around the regional cities. For starters, Sligo will complain about their exclusion. They'll be joined by Donegal, Mayo, Longford and ultimately every town across the country, each expecting to the same treatment. Everyone wants their little bit of road, and bringing some kind of national coherence to that has eluded us for generations.

The question is less a technical one about what the ideal regional development strategy is. Its how to get some sense out of the political system.

westtip

Schuhart wrote:

I think various people have said the same thing in different ways. The problem is setting out a plan based around the regional cities. For starters, Sligo will complain about their exclusion. They'll be joined by Donegal, Mayo, Longford and ultimately every town across the country, each expecting to the same treatment. Everyone wants their little bit of road, and bringing some kind of national coherence to that has eluded us for generations.

The question is less a technical one about what the ideal regional development strategy is. Its how to get some sense out of the political system.

I think at the time the two articles were published the writer, Jame Nix, proposed with cross border co-operation, a west east cross border route from Sligo to Dundalk as the northern cross country route, connecting the NW and BMW to the axial east coast route. So Sligo, for example, wouldn't be excluded. Longford would interconnect to the motorways system being close to the mid country east west route, the south would have a west - east loop from Cork to Waterford to Enniscorthy connecting with the N11 north south axial route. A north south axial route running from Letterkenny to Cork (happening under T 21 with the upgrade of the N15/17/18/20 route) would connect each end of the cross country routes. Effectively it would have laid a grid of two boxes on the country, with a spur from sligo to letterkenny of guarenteed motorway/HQDC, with good quality connector roads to the grid, perhaps using 2+1 or the standard national roads we have now (for example a feeder road from Navan to the Drogheda bypass/M1 section there), I think the idea was that every major town wouldn't be more than 25/30 miles from the grid. It wouldn't have solved all our problems and wouldn't have pleased everyone, but IMO, it would have offered a better road infrastructural system for true regional development, and would actually have meant less miles of motorway being laid down.

Transport21 Fan

Comparing Berlin and the situation in Ireland concerning initial motorway development is apples and oranges. Berlin was the cultural and poltical capital of several unified Germany states which all had their own major cities and infrastructure within them. The autobahn system was a reflection of this polycentric greater Germany which arose after the World War One.

Ireland and Dublin would be more comparable to Bavaria, where Munich has the same socio-economic relationship within that region as Dublin does within Ireland.

There is nothing abnormal about Dublin being the capital of Ireland and having an influence to reflect this.

And we all know how sucessful this over population of rural Ireland was in the past! I mean, it's not like rural Ireland has a history of mass emigration, social breakdown an mass starvation or anything like that... It's only Dublin which never worked...right?

I am totally against this Dev-inspired, anti-Dublin psychology (and this is what this is at its root) social engineering we have in this country and using our civil services, rail and road networks to somehow artifically deconstruct our capital city.

I am amazed at how many people in Dublin put up with it at times. When Charlie McCreevy stood up in the Dail and went on about the "Dublin Mindset" to gushing appluse in the Dail chamber, while famer Bertie sitting there beside him nodding in agreement. Could you imagine if a Dublin minister stood up in the Dail and started going on about "rural mindset" during a discussion about the Rossport 5 denying the whole coutry natual gas as if it was bad for Irish society as a whole - there would be murder.

Decentalisation by government has failed in every single country it has been tried. People should be allowed to live and work were their want to live and if that's in Dublin or Bangor Erris then good luck to them. There are natural, cultural, social and economic syngeries which make this happen. Using motorways, western rail corridors, rural airports and civil service departments cannot force this to happen.

The reason why all roads and railway lines lead to Dublin, is because this is normal and perfectly acceptable and managed correctly is perfectly sustainable. Certainly a hell of a lot more sustainable than everybody scattered all over the place with no critical mass.

One day I would love to see Dublin with a population of 3 million with most of them living inside the M50, with Limerick, Cork and Galway get to populations of 500,000 each all with their own metro/light rail systems and a super motorways and high-speed rail network connecting them all - while our coutryside remains just that. But seeing the minister in Cashel opening a new biotech company today gives me little hope we are ever going to wise up in this country.

The James Nix article although well meaning is just playing into the hands of the Tom Parlon's and Charlie McCreevy's and their hatred of Dublin and its citiizens and the 80 year old war on Dublin/Urban Life by the rural elite of this nation.

People is Dublin can't have gambling at casios, but farmers betting on two greyhounds tearing a live hare to pieces in a rain soaked field is a noble and sacred traditon which must be cherish by the nation and funded by the taxpayers...

The Dublin Mindset has served this country and all its citizens very well. Maybe it's time to start realising that Dublin is an asset to Ireland and not a burden.

Flukey

Dublin needs better transport services Transport21fan, but we have to service all the country's need. I am a Dubliner by the way. The almost exclusive radial structure to our motorways and rail lines is not good enough. Keep them all, yes, but get other routes going too. As Jjbrien pointed out, to go by rail from Sligo to Galway means going to Dublin first. There are lots of examples of getting from A to B by having to go to C first. That makes no sense. Why should you have to go halfway around the country to get to somewhere that was not that far from where you started from? We've had long debates on the merits and demerits of the Western Rail Corridor in particular, and other projects, but they would address that kind of thing. A Sligo to Dundalk route was mentioned. Another good idea. We need to connect Dublin to the regions, but we also need to properly connect the regions to each other.

spacetweek

Transport21 Fan wrote:

Comparing Berlin and the situation in Ireland concerning initial motorway development is apples and oranges. Berlin was the cultural and poltical capital of several unified Germany states which all had their own major cities and infrastructure within them. The autobahn system was a reflection of this polycentric greater Germany which arose after the World War One.
<snip>
The Dublin Mindset has served this country and all its citizens very well. Maybe it's time to start realising that Dublin is an asset to Ireland and not a burden.

Well said T21. I have to listen to this Dublin-bashing all the time in work from country heads who moved to Dublin because their bog-holes in Mayo had no jobs.

Hear hear!

Schuhart

Transport21 Fan wrote:

Berlin was the cultural and poltical capital of several unified Germany states which all had their own major cities and infrastructure within them.

This kind of point needs to be made in response to any comparison of Ireland with its 4 million (or 5.5 million if we take the island) to countries of 100 million. We are a small county, and that brings advantages as well as disadvantages. But we lose the disadvantages if we blindly adopt practices from abroad without looking at their relevance in a small country context.

Transport21 Fan wrote:

The James Nix article although well meaning is just playing into the hands of the Tom Parlon's and Charlie McCreevy's and their hatred of Dublin and its citiizens and the 80 year old war on Dublin/Urban Life by the rural elite of this nation.

On reflection, the idea also seems to embody a touch of the mentality that used to oppose bypasses in towns. Remember that little rhyme:

They say that Naas is a terrible place
Balbriggan is just as bad
But of all the towns that I've been through
Oh f*** me, Kinnegad.

Nix's idea seems to have at its core the notion that an amount of people travelling between Cork and Dublin will be so flah'd out by the time they get to Waterford that they'll stop and do their business there. That's the kind of mentality that gave us the Shannon stopover, and look what a thundering success it was (for Manchester airport.)

Maybe we should just build whatever transport infrastructure is justified by expected usage. Its the only thing we really haven't tried yet.

Transport21 Fan wrote:

The Dublin Mindset has served this country and all its citizens very well. Maybe it's time to start realising that Dublin is an asset to Ireland and not a burden.

Indeed. I think we also have to change the mindset that tries to suggest that its sinful for Dublin to have the kind of ordinary developments that would be taken for granted in any other developed city of its size, for fear that this might [horror]encourage people to live in Dublin[/horror].

Slice

Transport21 Fan

I am totally against this Dev-inspired, anti-Dublin psychology

How does the plan Nix propose disadvantage Dublin? Looks like something that benefits both Dublin and the country as a whole while at the same time saving money on motorway construction.

westtip

Slice wrote:

Transport21 Fan

How does the plan Nix propose disadvantage Dublin? Looks like something that benefits both Dublin and the country as a whole while at the same time saving money on motorway construction.

I agree, I was pretty baffled that the plan was seen as "a dev inspired scheme to knock Dublin" or the reaction that it was inherently anti Dublin. The rationale seemed to be you could get a better motorway structure for the whole country - including Dublin, with a grid style scheme, the M50 would be part of the grid, instead of being used as a mega interchange. Less actual miles of motorway would need to be built and the interconnector roads to the grid system could have been planned at the same time.

drivers from Cork going on the southern swing via Waterford would have to go a bit longer (I estimate about 25/30 miles) to get to Dublin but it would be on free flow motorway, of circa 150 miles whch is just over 2 hours at motorway cruising speeds, and the motorway wouldn't terminate at the M50 red cow, it would be a seamless motorway drive from Cork to Dundalk (notwithstanding the toll bridge delays), with the M11 simply continuing as it does now onto the M50, and the M50 onto the M1 free flow. Yes the traffic would be heavier around Dublin but that is to be expected

jank

Does anybody know the story with the Atlantic corridor?
Any time table yet for it or are they building bits of it here and there and then just build the rest when they feel like it?

I know in a few years that Tuam to Mallow will have DC or am I wrong to think that.

westtip

jank wrote:

Does anybody know the story with the Atlantic corridor?
Any time table yet for it or are they building bits of it here and there and then just build the rest when they feel like it?

I know in a few years that Tuam to Mallow will have DC or am I wrong to think that.

The NRA website details the national road schemes take a look at these links:

http://www.nra.ie/News/DownloadableDocumentation/file,2065,en.pdf

http://www.nra.ie/RoadSchemeActivity/SchemeActivity-2006/

http://www.nra.ie/RoadSchemeActivity/MajorRoadSchemesinPlanning/#d.en.543

It is a matter of a bit now a bit later etc. to be expected, sure won't it be a great country when its finished....The Atlantic Corridor was a bit of a PR myth put into T21, most of what they said about the ATC had already been planned as part of the NDP, they just rebranded it and tried to claim it was something new, so they could present a glossy brochure to the public and pay a few more PR consultants a few quid, it was just something they said they would do ages ago and hadn't finished yet. Still Martin Cullen is the king of PR - he paid enough for advice in that area over the years in DOE

Lennoxschips

that article is spot on, i've been saying for years that we should be getting more bang for our motorway bucks, instead of building motorways from every town in ireland to dublin

it's too late now unfortunately, the cork-dublin motorway is well underway, on a route serving serving regional megatropolises like urlingford, durrow, cashel, caher and fermoy

Schuhart

Lennoxschips wrote:

it's too late now unfortunately, the cork-dublin motorway is well underway, on a route serving serving regional megatropolises like urlingford, durrow, cashel, caher and fermoy

To be honest, I think this is the key point. There's no point at this stage with suggesting a grand strategy, however intellectually satisfying, that does not address what is actually being put in place. To be honest, I genuinely have that Shannon stopover feeling about this idea of diverting motorways with any object other than carrying the most bums on seats at the fastest speed. But, in any case, its immaterial.

What would be interesting in some clever suggestion of low cost methods of getting more value from the structure being put in place. Otherwise we're turning the discussion of transportation into some kind of philosophical dialogue where we envisage an ideal Ireland of which the material one that we live in is a poor reflection.

westtip

Schuhart wrote:

To be honest, I think this is the key point. There's no point at this stage with suggesting a grand strategy, however intellectually satisfying, that does not address what is actually being put in place. To be honest, I genuinely have that Shannon stopover feeling about this idea of diverting motorways with any object other than carrying the most bums on seats at the fastest speed. But, in any case, its immaterial..

I agree with you - but the article by Nix stuck in my mind when I read it back in 2003, whcih is why I looked it up again and posted it for discussion. I am sure the transport planners and engineers making recommendations to the senior civil servants writing the NDP would have had some kind of input on the shape of the motorway system. Unfortunately the flabby white boys in power are not transport planners. The ideas are not rocket science. Re the shannon stopover syndrome, I don't see the analagy with this one - the southern loop motorway idea Cork-Waterford-Enniscorthy then the M11/M50/M1 North, wouldn't make it compulsory for drivers to "stop-over" at Waterford, it would have added about 25 miles to the total journey to Dublin but would have meant less motorway needed to be built (no radial route to Cork nor Waterford), and therefore would have cost less, It would have also meant the motorway system would have been better utilised in terms of total car usage - one of the the things about building full motorways in ireland is despite the huge growth in the number of cars, we are building massive over capacity on our regional motorway system. If you look at this route - money is being spent on upgrading the N24 and N25 - both east/west routes across the south of the country - there was no need for these upgrades (or at least they could have been incorporated into the motoway structure) if the motorway to Cork had been put on this route, so money would have been saved there - These routes are getting the National Roads upgrade treatment see http://www.nra.ie/RoadSchemeActivity/MajorRoadSchemesinPlanning/ - the standard wide single lane roads with hard shoulder, they are still key strategic routes from the south eastern ports, as an island all of our ports should be strategically linked by motorway or HQDC - so why isn't this happening - because so much is being spent on the radial system from Dublin.

Schuhart wrote:

What would be interesting in some clever suggestion of low cost methods of getting more value from the structure being put in place. Otherwise we're turning the discussion of transportation into some kind of philosophical dialogue where we envisage an ideal Ireland of which the material one that we live in is a poor reflection.

Better interconnector roads and regional roads so drivers and commercial delivery vehicles and buses can get to the motorway system easily, safely and quickly and eventually the building of a grid system. Will it be Low cost ...err those two words together don't sound too convincing in ireland, and one other thing remove the toll barriers on the M50 and free up the flow of traffic on the M50 interchange (which is what the M50 has now become)

westtip

Transport21 Fan wrote:

There is nothing abnormal about Dublin being the capital of Ireland and having an influence to reflect this..

I don't think anyone is arguing with that view.

Transport21 Fan wrote:

And we all know how sucessful this over population of rural Ireland was in the past! I mean, it's not like rural Ireland has a history of mass emigration, social breakdown an mass starvation or anything like that... It's only Dublin which never worked...right? .

A bit of a simplistic view. There was plenty of poverty and deprivation in Dublin at the time when the country had its fair share of the same.

Transport21 Fan wrote:

I am totally against this Dev-inspired, anti-Dublin psychology (and this is what this is at its root) social engineering we have in this country and using our civil services, rail and road networks to somehow artifically deconstruct our capital city. .

Give me a break, the grid plan simply proposes better use of resources and actually a system which may have served Dublin and the whole country better, but required less motorway to be built (ie it would have been cheaper and highly effective)

Transport21 Fan wrote:

Decentalisation by government has failed in every single country it has been tried. People should be allowed to live and work were their want to live and if that's in Dublin or Bangor Erris then good luck to them. There are natural, cultural, social and economic syngeries which make this happen. Using motorways, western rail corridors, rural airports and civil service departments cannot force this to happen..

Can't see what this alternative motorway plan has to do with decentralisation? I don't think the plan was seen by the writer as a way of social control, but await to be enlightened. Decentralisation by the way can work if controlled properly, a good example would be the DVLH centre in Swansea, where all driving licences in the UK are processed. This level of decentralisation of functonal civil service units can work very well. However I agree I am not sure the secretiarat and executive centre of an organisation like the civil service can ever be decentralised successfully, but again I don't see what that has to do with this road plan.

Transport21 Fan wrote:

The reason why all roads and railway lines lead to Dublin, is because this is normal and perfectly acceptable and managed correctly is perfectly sustainable. Certainly a hell of a lot more sustainable than everybody scattered all over the place with no critical mass...

So trucks coming into Rosslare wanting to travel to Cork on HQDC/Motorway have to go via Dublin?? I don't think the grid motorway system is designed to scatter everyone all over the place, it is simply designed to move traffic around the country more efficiently and make supply chain planning a lot more efficient.

Transport21 Fan wrote:

One day I would love to see Dublin with a population of 3 million with most of them living inside the M50, with Limerick, Cork and Galway get to populations of 500,000 each all with their own metro/light rail systems and a super motorways and high-speed rail network connecting them all - while our coutryside remains just that. But seeing the minister in Cashel opening a new biotech company today gives me little hope we are ever going to wise up in this country....

It won't happen because people can no longer afford housing within the M50, which is a great pity, but I agree with your sentiments re critical mass in our cities.

Transport21 Fan wrote:

The James Nix article although well meaning is just playing into the hands of the Tom Parlon's and Charlie McCreevy's and their hatred of Dublin and its citiizens and the 80 year old war on Dublin/Urban Life by the rural elite of this nation.....

Mmmm... can't really see your rationale here. We all need Dublin to succeed just as we do Cork, Limerick and dare I say it, Belfast (remember that other city on our island)

Transport21 Fan wrote:

People is Dublin can't have gambling at casios, but farmers betting on two greyhounds tearing a live hare to pieces in a rain soaked field is a noble and sacred traditon which must be cherish by the nation and funded by the taxpayers...

The Dublin Mindset has served this country and all its citizens very well. Maybe it's time to start realising that Dublin is an asset to Ireland and not a burden.

Can't comment on the gambling situation vs hare coursing and don't actually see what it has to do with a motorway grid system. As to the Dublin Mindset, do you mean the D4 mindset, the Hill 16 mindset, the Tallaght mindset, the Howth mindset. Does such a thing as the Dublin Mindset exist? Dublin is of course an asset to the country just as the country is an asset to Dublin, but I really don't see where your arguments against what Nix proposed come from, what he argued for was better use of national resources. The article is not inherently anti-Dublin, it was however against waste of capital resources and simply proposed an alternative.

Schuhart

westtip wrote:

it would have added about 25 miles to the total journey to Dublin but would have meant less motorway needed to be built (no radial route to Cork nor Waterford),

If it adds 25-30 miles to a route of about 150 miles that sounds like it adds about 25 minutes to the journey time. From what I can gather, the opportunity cost of travel time is taken to be of the order of €8 per hour (less for social traffic, and far, far more for travel during work time.) So that means you add a social cost of about €4 to every Dublin-Cork journey, simply to put Waterford on the same route. That’s what I mean by the proposal having a Shannon stopover feel to it – you create a cost for a lot of people who don’t want to be next nor near Shannon/Waterford which might outweigh any possible local benefit.

I think we have a bit of a history of this sort of thing in planning transport infrastructure, where we try to introduce a social or, more correctly, a political agenda to the process. Which is what I mean when I say lets just try building the infrastructure that’s needed where its needed, because that has not really been tried yet.

If there’s a need, for the sake of argument, to improve the route from Waterford to Cork then let’s improve it – with a road that caters for the expected level of traffic between those two locations, rather than leaving a permanent flaw in the Dublin – Cork road. In this context, can I say I have no problem in principle with people who say the whole Dublin Cork road does not need to be of motorway standard.

It would look to me that a social cost of €4 per Cork-Dublin journey would mount up pretty quickly. Apart from an emotional appeal to that part of the Irish mind that resists seeing the country centred on Dublin, I’m not sure there’s that much to be said for Nix’s idea.

mike65

A motorway down the east coast as far as Enniscorthy which then cut across to Waterford and down the south coast to Cork always was the logical route, clearly it was never going to happen as the burgurs of Kilkenny/
Carlow, Kildare, Laios and Tipp would do thier nuts and scream blue murder.

As for journey distance Cork-Dublin direct is 159 miles via Waterford/Enniscorthy its 184.7

Mike.

Schuhart

I think the same point remains. 25 miles is about 40 km. According to this post

the NRA is aiming for an average speed of 97km/h on the new motorways

40% of an hour is 24 minutes. Taking the ballpark opportunity cost of time at €8, that’s about €3.20 per journey. That sounds like no small cost.

Put it another way, if a particular development took 24 minutes off journey time it would be regarded as a substantial benefit.

mike65

Tis all academic now!

Mike.

nordydan

To be honest I think the government may have their priorities right for the current NDP plan. Develop the interurban route to the capital, then join the other cities. Once these schemes are complete, the next planned schemes are those like the Cork to Donegal N20/18/17/15 (I can think of at least 12 schemes for this alone), N24, New ross bypass, tullamore bypass, N22, no of kerry schemes, n2 schemes, castlebar-westport and N11 completion. If they were doing these first, there would be uproar. It'll take a while to upgarde the entire country like!

I feel however some schemes have been missed (at a national level), such as Monaghan/N12 to Athlone and the N52/N51 schemes mentioned elsewhere.