M6 - Kilbeggan to Athlone

Irish and Proud

veryangryman wrote: »

Yes but these schemes are all dual carriageway.

...for the moment that is! Under new legislation (which supersedes long winded motorway orders), the N6 Kinnegead to Athlone HQDC is one of the routes for which a fast track motorway application has been submitted. The same goes for the N7 Borris to Limerick, N8 Cullahill to Fermoy, and N9 Kilcullen to Waterford. Other HQDC sections may follow.

veryangryman wrote: »

A simple one-lane bypass of Moate would have worked wonders for it. Quick and efficient. Witness the Loughrea bypass.

Agree - but on another note, the existing N6 will serve as a major access route for the eventual M6 and therefore, Moate should be by-passed like Enfield and Kinnegead was. I think the same would go for Kilbeggan. However, with this in mind, these simple by-passes should have been done well before the N6 HQDC came about.

Regards!

Irish and Proud

Deleted User wrote: »

And Enfield! yes I know half of it is N4, but it's still benefits Dublin - Galway traffic.

I heard a lot of complaints concerning the Enfield By-pass with motorists at the time saying it was easier and shorter to go through Enfield itself. However, I didn't hear too much about traffic snarl-ups in the aftermath either. The by-pass probably functioned as a traffic relief valve before the M4 came on stream. All in all, this by-pass might only be described as a limited success due to its u-shaped design with roundabouts.

Regards!

GerardKeating

veryangryman wrote: »

I think its retarded that the NRA do all of these roads from Dublin outward. E.g they organised the M4 all the way up to Kinnegad. Then the N6 to Tyrellspass. Then Kilbeggan. Now to Athlone.

Actualy make more sense this way. the sections closer to Dublin have more traffic.

GerardKeating

GerardKeating wrote: »

Actualy make more sense this way. the sections closer to Dublin have more traffic.

True, when you consider that the majority of the jobs are in Dublin and all roads leading to Dublin are principaly used by commuters firstly, then by goods & services and those needing to travel from Dublin to elsewhere (not commuting).

blast05

If full focus was put on the 2-3 mile section around Moate of the Athlone to Kinnegad motorway from day one, with an entry and exit point on to the motorway at either end of the 2-3 mile section as is the case now, then Moate would have been by-passed at least 6 months ago.

Probably not that quick, as the N6 overbridge was a major structure and this M6 section is the last to be laid. The remainder (i believe) is as good as finished, just needs the final layer of tarmac & lines etc.

Victor

Irish and Proud wrote: »

The N6 from Kinnegead to Athlone was proposed as one 58km (approx.) scheme for the EIS/CPO stage. I guess it was then seen as too big for a single contractor to take on, so the scheme was split exactly in two as it would be the most practical solution for build-ability purposes.

I think it was also convenient that it lead to Tullamore and it was an election year.

tubos

I really just can't wait until this road is opened! I'm like a kid waiting for Christmas Just open the road already!

veryangryman

Yes Gerard, but its not a good idea to encourage everything to go through Dublin. Theres only limited space there, and with the new push on operational efficiency of companies and the fact that it costs much less to setup/live outside Dublin than within, it could be a good idea to develop places in the midlands/west/northwest.

Fair enough, Dublin should get the bulk of priority for infrastructure, but it would be nice to develop other areas with bypasses/ida investment and even a small airport in the midlands. In time, they would pay for themselves with tax generation. Alternatives to Dublin should be made available -it would benefit everyone, including Dubs who would have the little bit more space on the M50, a little less time queueing for ATMs etc as a result

Come to think of it, the Sligo-Galway M17 plan is a major step in the right direction for these alternatives, so at least the govt are making progress

invincibleirish

veryangryman wrote: »

Yes Gerard, but its not a good idea to encourage everything to go through Dublin. Theres only limited space there, and with the new push on operational efficiency of companies and the fact that it costs much less to setup/live outside Dublin than within, it could be a good idea to develop places in the midlands/west/northwest.

Fair enough, Dublin should get the bulk of priority for infrastructure, but it would be nice to develop other areas with bypasses/ida investment and even a small airport in the midlands. In time, they would pay for themselves with tax generation. Alternatives to Dublin should be made available -it would benefit everyone, including Dubs who would have the little bit more space on the M50, a little less time queueing for ATMs etc as a result

Come to think of it, the Sligo-Galway M17 plan is a major step in the right direction for these alternatives, so at least the govt are making progress

Yes! more White Elephants for the regions, now!

veryangryman

"MORE" white elephants? PLEASE name me one existing in these regions? Yeah that airport at Knock is some white elephant - quite the opposite actually. The Letterkenny bypass anyone? Another one of your "white elephants"?

Seeing as you quoted no specific part of my post, you obviously think its all nonsense. The sun does not shine out of any nations capital - look at any successful nation like the US, UK, France. Many more examples. You do not need to go to these places capitals for a good standard of living, plentiful jobs, airports and decent roads.

Long story short, I think that the country would benefit from subscribing to my theory that theres plenty more to be had outside the Pale. The growing number of Dublin accents in midland counties like Offaly, Westmeath and Laois shows that im not the only one who thinks this.

And once again, White Elephant? Please do your research

invincibleirish

veryangryman wrote: »

"MORE" white elephants? PLEASE name me one existing in these regions? Yeah that airport at Knock is some white elephant - quite the opposite actually. The Letterkenny bypass anyone? Another one of your "white elephants"?

Seeing as you quoted no specific part of my post, you obviously think its all nonsense. The sun does not shine out of any nations capital - look at any successful nation like the US, UK, France. Many more examples. You do not need to go to these places capitals for a good standard of living, plentiful jobs, airports and decent roads.

Long story short, I think that the country would benefit from subscribing to my theory that theres plenty more to be had outside the Pale. The growing number of Dublin accents in midland counties like Offaly, Westmeath and Laois shows that im not the only one who thinks this.

And once again, White Elephant? Please do your research

Evidently we disagree on what the definition of what a white elephant is.

To me Airports in the middle of no where are white elephants.

what are you suggesting? seriously? that people in the midlands with Dub accents are truly happy to be there and would not wish to be much closer to Dublin? that their overpriced house in some dormitory town with a 2hr commute and zero public transport alternatives is the Celtic Tiger dream.

i'm all for developing critical mass outside of Dublin which have decent roads, amenities, public transport etc.

that means developing select regional centres (Think Cork not Tullamore) and focusing policies to develop that area.

blast05

what are you suggesting? seriously? that people in the midlands with Dub accents are truly happy to be there and would not wish to be much closer to Dublin? that their overpriced house in some dormitory town with a 2hr commute and zero public transport alternatives is the Celtic Tiger dream.

What about the tens if not hundreds of thousands of people living in Dublin that do not have Dublin accents and only live there out of economic necessity ?
Is there any country in the developed world that has as high a percentage of economic activity in its capital city and surrounding area as Ireland has ?

blast05

Deleted User wrote: »

Probably not that quick, as the N6 overbridge was a major structure and this M6 section is the last to be laid. The remainder (i believe) is as good as finished, just needs the final layer of tarmac & lines etc.

There were bridges close to Kilbeggan that were well on the way to being built before any work started on that major structure near Moate plus there was no reason why this section should have been the last to be laid

True, they could have started the Moate west bridge earlier.

veryangryman

invincibleirish wrote: »

Evidently we disagree on what the definition of what a white elephant is.

what are you suggesting? seriously? that people in the midlands with Dub accents are truly happy to be there and would not wish to be much closer to Dublin? that their overpriced house in some dormitory town with a 2hr commute and zero public transport alternatives is the Celtic Tiger dream.

A large percentage of these dubs living in such places have found employment in Athlone, Mullingar, Portlaoise etc etc without needing to return to their capital city. Mightnt be exactly a "dream", but this is Ireland, not Disneyland and im sure they make do. Many appreciate the added peace and quiet they get from the transition.

As for the commuters with "zero public transport alternatives", I must have been seeing mirages there today when i drove by the local bus/train station. Between Bue E, Irish Rail, Bus Nestor, Citylink and countless more, you do not NEED a car to commute to Dublin. As for getting round the towns, most now have local bus services. Not perfect ill agree, hence my argument for developing such areas.

And commuting times...it really takes 2 hours to get to Dublin from Mullingar? Even Athlone will soon be less than 90 mins once Moate gets bypassed.

Anyways, getting back to the thread title, hurry up and open the bypass already! :pac:

tubos

invincibleirish wrote: »

.

what are you suggesting? seriously? that people in the midlands with Dub accents are truly happy to be there and would not wish to be much closer to Dublin?

Well I am!

I don't commute to Dublin though, work locally and loving it, much better quality of life for myself and the new family.

I'm looking forward to the new road to Dublin being open so family can come and visit us with less hassle!!

ga2re2t

blast05 wrote: »

Is there any country in the developed world that has as high a percentage of economic activity in its capital city and surrounding area as Ireland has ?

Hmmm, yes! Most countries in fact. Pick up a Leaving Certificate geography book and learn about the "Core" regions of developed countries.
Ireland is small though so it only has one true core region - Dublin. Larger countries may have several core regions. But take France as an example: 10 million people live in the Paris Basin region (Ile-de-France), which is about 1/6 of France's population. As with Dublin in Ireland, in France all major infrastructure leads to Paris. That's how strong economies work I'm afraid.

veryangryman

Thats 1/6th in your French example.

Ours is almost 1/3rd

Victor

On topic please.

veryangryman

Ugh. Talk about killing a conversation with these rules.

Mods - your second only to bouncers in people i despise

Staying on topic, i hear theres doubts of it even finishing in July.

[on_topic]
Driving in this morning, I see that a huge gantry had been erected in Athlone (eastbound) and that the top surface is being laid, at the bridge west of Moate there appears to be a large amount of work still to do. If there are any further delays, they will be here.
[/on_topic]
Better infrastructure will mean (hopefully) better distribution of jobs.

Pittabang

Travelling along the bypass at Tober over the new bridge I was able to see that a lot of the westbound carriage way was now almost completed. The carraigeway markings wer getting done the centre broken line was completed and the hard shoulder and inside line had been marked out but not yet paintes. The top layer of tarmac on the eastbound lane wasnot yet completed but holy god thats a good sign- surely thats a good sign for a close completion date?

nordydan

Pittabang wrote: »

Travelling along the bypass at Tober over the new bridge I was able to see that a lot of the westbound carriage way was now almost completed. The carraigeway markings wer getting done the centre broken line was completed and the hard shoulder and inside line had been marked out but not yet paintes. The top layer of tarmac on the eastbound lane wasnot yet completed but holy god thats a good sign- surely thats a good sign for a close completion date?

Came back down this road on saturday, the signs going up on the old N6 (new R road) definitely say M6 but are covered in mud

blast05

Re the entry, exit off the motorway about 1.5 miles west of Moate - Westmeath Co Co are not going to be thanking the NRA for this before too long. The new ~200m roadway off the existing N6 into this junction is fine but once you go under the bridge and striaght through the 2nd roundabout, you can go continue on a 1 track roadway for about 2-3 miles arriving at Mount Temple national school. All of Mount Temple, Glasson, Tang and a whole pile of other parishes will start using this road to get on to the motorway when heading for Dublin and it plainly was not deisgned for such traffic volumes.

I'm certain that this junction is an afterthought as it was NOT on the plans when construction commenced! but useful for those living to the west of Moate wishing to use the M6.

Even with the bypass, I still believe that Moate high streeet will be busy!

Victor

blast05 wrote: »

Re the entry, exit off the motorway about 1.5 miles west of Moate - Westmeath Co Co are not going to be thanking the NRA for this before too long. The new ~200m roadway off the existing N6 into this junction is fine but once you go under the bridge and striaght through the 2nd roundabout, you can go continue on a 1 track roadway for about 2-3 miles arriving at Mount Temple national school. All of Mount Temple, Glasson, Tang and a whole pile of other parishes will start using this road to get on to the motorway when heading for Dublin and it plainly was not deisgned for such traffic volumes.

The road was designed by the Westmeath NRDO - part of the council.

veryangryman

Deleted User wrote: »

I'm certain that this junction is an afterthought as it was NOT on the plans when construction commenced! but useful for those living to the west of Moate wishing to use the M6.

Even with the bypass, I still believe that Moate high streeet will be busy!

How? There is very little in Moate other than a reasonable population of Athlone/Dublin commuters.

The sad thing is that once this road is built, we will have probably 20 years use out of it till world oil runs out and we have to get the old horse drawn carts out again

Oh what fun well have....

veryangryman

veryangryman wrote: »

How? There is very little in Moate other than a reasonable population of Athlone/Dublin commuters.



Oh what fun well have....

You'll be surprised just how many cars join & leave the N6 as it passes through Moate, if it wasn't for having to stop several times to let cars join or turn right there would be no holdups there.

veryangryman

I assume you refer to the N80 Clara/Tullamore/ etc road

Sure wont that link onto the Motorway, thus taking the bulk of those devilish right-turners off of the Main Streets

Ok a few other minor roads here and there, but i honestly cant see the town ever having gridlock problems again

The N80 was taken care of a few months ago and now has no effect on the traffic in the town.

I agree that Moate will not be grid locked, but it will be busy enough at certain times of the day. Because Moate is a one street town, almost 100% of the local traffic uses the main street for part of the journey.

blast05

Was out on the bike this evening. Structure 3 (bridge for the road connecting Mount Temple to the N6 at the Castledaly cross half way between Athlone and Moate) is now 100% complete. That means every bridge structure is now 100% complete.
About 25 machines working in the vicinity of structure 2 today (opposite the landfill site close to Athlone so definitely no intention of opening the section that would do as a Moate by-pass ahead of the rest. However, no sign of any work ongoing anywhere between 7-8pm this evening which is disappointing

According to the local rag (Westmeath Independent) the road will open late August/ early September, slipping a bit again

veryangryman

Oh well, at least we wont have to look at Moate during Winter time again...

With a bit of luck it may just be a case of making it look bleaker than it really is, after all they were over confident about opening it in April last autumn.

Hopefully if that's the case late July early August is my guess.

spacetweek

veryangryman wrote: »

How? There is very little in Moate other than a reasonable population of Athlone/Dublin commuters.

The sad thing is that once this road is built, we will have probably 20 years use out of it till world oil runs out and we have to get the old horse drawn carts out again

Oh what fun well have....

Yeah, and we all switch to biofuel, and there's just as much traffic as before.

Stop thinking that the end of oil means the end of driving.

Chris_533976

Theres tonnes of oil out there anyway (oil sands). All that has to happen is that oil prices have to go high enough for it to be economically worthwhile for oil sands to be extracted. Thats off topic tho.

I think this scheme got a bit boned because of bad weather

Pittabang

well its only 11 weeks until the end of July so it's totally possible to put up with the jams until then. I noticed whilst on the new bridge west of moate that they already have top layer tarmac with road markins visible to the east as you go over the bridge. Looking west is still a way from being completed.
TOP TIP keep your eyes on the road at all time

veryangryman

Pittabang wrote: »

well its only 11 weeks until the end of July so it's totally possible to put up with the jams until then. I noticed whilst on the new bridge west of moate that they already have top layer tarmac with road markins visible to the east as you go over the bridge. Looking west is still a way from being completed.
TOP TIP keep your eyes on the road at all time

Im sure he means the current road, not the new one folks...

Pittabang

LOL - Yes the current road

Drove through Kilbeggan this morning the road surface is atrocious, it's breaking up all over the place.

I think it may make sense to open the section that passes Kilbeggan ASAP on the grounds of safety, the road is so bad there is a very high risk of there being an accident because of it.

From what I can see the Kilbeggan - Moate section is almost complete.

veryangryman

And you know for a fact that the road wont be replaced anytime soon either. Once passed over to the councils by the NRA, it will be left to rot.

Pittabang

I'm sorry to tell you that once the motorway is completed the state of the roads through Kilbeggan and Moate will be of no concern of mine

Same here, just concerned about safety to all road users NOW!!

blast05

Was driving over the bridge that brings you from the main N6 road Dublin side of Moate to Tubber (this is the next bridge east of where we thougt the Moate bypass would open early) ..... looking east of here everything looks 100% done for about 1km further east (that was as far as i could see) - it wasn't a few weeks ago when i last passed here.
Also, final layer of tarmac being put on the section close to the first bridge at the end of the Athlone dual bypass on Thursday/Friday when i was passing.
Am going to go for a cycle on the whole section one of the evenings during the week

Pittabang

Hey,
I saw the same thing yesterday from a couple of bridges. There is a lot of road painting completed and signage erected. There really cant be too much longet before the whole road is completed. What is needed is an on site recon by bike- looking forward to the report back

Pittabang

slightly beside the point. But what is the best way to get from the McDonalds at the edge of Athlone to the Garda Station in the town on Fridays at about 4PM - 4.30PM. Will the traffic through the town be bad ?
Google Maps tells me to go straight along the old Dublin Road but I can't help thinking that taking the ring road around to the exit for the Roscommon Road (N61) might have less volume???

Should I go straight at the Mc D along the Dublin Road (4.8K)or Around the ring ? (9.4KM) the traffic is my unknown here

thanks

Pittabang

Pittabang wrote: »

slightly beside the point. But what is the best way to get from the McDonalds at the edge of Athlone to the Garda Station in the town on Fridays at about 4PM - 4.30PM. Will the traffic through the town be bad ?
Google Maps tells me to go straight along the old Dublin Road but I can't help thinking that taking the ring road around to the exit for the Roscommon Road (N61) might have less volume???

Should I go straight at the Mc D along the Dublin Road (4.8K)or Around the ring ? (9.4KM) the traffic is my unknown here

thanks

Better off going around the bypass to the Roscommon rd, then right at "bright ideas" then left, takes you past the Gards station.

darkman2

Pittabang wrote: »

Hey,
I saw the same thing yesterday from a couple of bridges. There is a lot of road painting completed and signage erected. There really cant be too much longet before the whole road is completed. What is needed is an on site recon by bike- looking forward to the report back

Blue signage or Green signage? Broken hard shoulder or solid hard shoulder? If its green it wont open as motorway.

Blue signs, I didn't notice the lines when I last drove past.