R624 - Cobh/Fota road dualling [early planning]

Chris_533976

Surprised I didn't post this sooner, but anyway.

Current access to Cobh (13,000 AADT) is via the Fota Road and an old bridge, which directly hits a t-junction immediately onto the island. Its a bit of a bottleneck at the moment, especially during the rush hour and isn't quite wide enough for two lorries to happily pass without problems.

Heres the Yahoo maps page of the area -

http://maps.yahoo.com/#mvt=m&lat=51.892085&lon=-8.276252&mag=5

The Fota road itself has a 60kmh speed limit now and is quite twisty with poor line-of-site and frequently has tractors and slow rubbish holding it up.

So Cork Co Council has proposed a 2+2 dual carriageway (w/ roundabouts) access scheme for Cobh. It'll be a part online, part offline build with a large new girder bridge for access to the island, leaving the old bridge intact. It'll go from where that map has the word "Fota" and will lead to where the map says "Marino".

The Public Consultation for the preferred route occurred late last year, heres the details -





Thought a few people here might be interested. Wont be built for a couple of years yet (they're heading into Preliminary Design now), but it is needed quite badly for the island.

invincibleirish

Fabulous stuff,kudos to Cork Co.Co. any idea of how much it'll cost, also surely it will be only be the first part of an eventual plan to improve the road going into Cobh further on as until you reach Rushbrooke its very unsuited for the traffic it has?

murphaph

Nice scheme there. Looks like some shoreline land reclamation on the mainland if that map is anyway accurate?

How many kms altogther? looks long enough there. If Cork (with its excellent CASP) wasn't subsidising counties with no comprehension of planning it could afford a lot more infrastructure like this.

Chris_533976

Mainline will be about 4km, but thats just a rough measurement on a map. The bridge will be quite expensive tho as its a 2+2 bridge of about (guess) 250m.

deRanged

That looks fantastic - the sooner the better.

murphaph

Stick it up for discussion on SABRE chris.

Chris_533976

To the crosspost mobile

murphaph

Lol, does it backfire like the original?!:D

Chris_533976

Fortunately its not a troll thread, because those do backfire when crossposted resulting in a healthy weilding of the banstick

invincibleirish

murphaph wrote: »

Nice scheme there. Looks like some shoreline land reclamation on the mainland if that map is anyway accurate?

How many kms altogther? looks long enough there. If Cork (with its excellent CASP) wasn't subsidising counties with no comprehension of planning it could afford a lot more infrastructure like this.

Before we totally wet ourselves with Cork Councils CASP lets remember they still built on old lines out of the city towards Ballincollig/Bandon, if only those alignments had been preserved!

murphaph

invincibleirish wrote: »

Before we totally wet ourselves with Cork Councils CASP lets remember they still built on old lines out of the city towards Ballincollig/Bandon, if only those alignments had been preserved!

Indeed. Every authority is guilty of such behaviour but Cork has possibly go the best grip on reality of any in the country. The City and County Councils actually work together! Compare and contrast to Waterford/Kilkenny, Limerick/Limerick/Clare and of course Dublin/Fingal/South Dublin/Dun Laoghaire Rathdown.

Niall1234

Ideally it would be lovely to have a spur off the proposed Ringaskiddy Dual Carriageway and have a nice suspension bridge over Cork Harbour into Cobh.

But hey, this is Ireland, we don't do impressive construction projects. (Would look well though )


Back to reality. How come they won't be doing 2+2 all the way to the junction with the N25. 2+2 back to single lanes always cause traffic to backup.

Chris_533976

I asked that question, the people at the meeting said that it was outside the scope of the study and that it would probobly be easy to do anyway (fat chance).

I dont think it'll be a huge issue as there arent major tailbacks at the moment, and its a fairly short (~1km) section.

Padraig Mor

A nice scheme but the R624 from IFI towards Cobh will need SERIOUS refurbishment and widening. God knows what they'll do on the section of road alongside Carrigaloe train station as I can't see how they could widen it - maybe if they removed all the cars parked illegally outside the houses there it might help!

marno21

10 years later...

Cork County Council made this one of their many priorities when looking for funding as part of the 2016-2022 Capital Plan Review.

In light of the fact that €4.5bn has been allocated for RLR projects, based on appraisal and subsequent prioritisation, I would expect to finally see movement on this scheme in the next few years.

Chris_5339762

It should do. Whilst I do think dual carriageway access is way OTT, the lack of pedestrian and cycle facilities along the fota road (read: none at all) and the fact that Belvelly Bridge is the only bridge onto Cobh island and can be fun at rush hour, justifies a scheme.

I only hope they'll start the process again and extend the scheme to the N25 junction, because Slatty Bridge, connecting Fota Island (which itself connects to Cobh via Belvelly) to the N25 was built in the 1770s and is falling down. Its also the only bridge without a diversion via Carrigtwohill.

Aontachtoir

Short article in the Evening Echo today about Cork County Council's ongoing attempts to have the Carrigtwohill-Cobh R624 upgraded to a national road and dualled. Anyone who's travelled this road will know how badly an upgrade like this is needed, especially around the Belvelly bridge. Lots of farmland on the Great Island though so maybe a dual carriageway could be run directly across from Belvelly to Cobh, rather than hugging the shore of the Lee as the current road does.
https://www.eveningecho.ie/corknews/County-Council-continues-bid-to-upgrade-Fota-Road-8a5828e6-2c8a-47a0-b6ec-d89b5ba3678c-ds

veryangryman

Aontachtoir wrote: »

Short article in the Evening Echo today about Cork County Council's ongoing attempts to have the Carrigtwohill-Cobh R624 upgraded to a national road and dualled. Anyone who's travelled this road will know how badly an upgrade like this is needed, especially around the Belvelly bridge. Lots of farmland on the Great Island though so maybe a dual carriageway could be run directly across from Belvelly to Cobh, rather than hugging the shore of the Lee as the current road does.
https://www.eveningecho.ie/corknews/County-Council-continues-bid-to-upgrade-Fota-Road-8a5828e6-2c8a-47a0-b6ec-d89b5ba3678c-ds

National.... i dont get his logic. Who uses that road other than those going to a small suburban town. Jesus i hope they dont mess up the existing decent system by allowing this.

If traffic numbers allow then by all means dual like done with some R roads l.

Aontachtoir

veryangryman wrote: »

National.... i dont get his logic. Who uses that road other than those going to a small suburban town. Jesus i hope they dont mess up the existing decent system by allowing this. 
If traffic numbers allow then by all means dual like done with some R roads l.

Cobh is a bit more than just a random small suburban town. It's the largest town on the Great Island, and quite a popular tourist destination too (cruise ships, tourist sights etc). As the article also notes, there is significant housing expansion planned for the island too. The current road access to Cork through Fota is hardly "decent" - it's a narrow, twisty road which definitely needs improvement.

I presume the goal of getting it turned into an N-road is so that TII pay for upgrading it, not the Council. All the more reason in my opinion that TII should be expanded and given responsibility for the R-roads too.

marno21

Dun Laoighre has a comparative national route although it's more of a collection of signposts than a defined route

Cobh has brutal road access and badly needs an additional bridge even for to cater for emergencies in the event of an issue with the existing ****heap of a bridge.

Cobh has exceptional rail access to be fair with 3 stations and regular services.

I agree regional roads under TII would be a good idea as it would consolidate improvements and make them consistent instead of the current scattergun approach. No point putting them under TII though if they are going to be starved of funding.

There badly needs to be an upgrade programme advanced for regional roads, especially for removing single lane bridges, dangerous corners and bad junctions. This finally seems to be happening for national secondaries.

Chris_5339762

marno21 wrote: »

Cobh has brutal road access and badly needs an additional bridge even for to cater for emergencies in the event of an issue with the existing ****heap of a bridge

The bridge is whats needed here really, even the upgrade proposed in 2006 did not dual everything, it went from the entrance to Fota hotel (not the wildlife park) onto the island, but left about a mile of single carriageway over the equally crap Slatty Water Bridge to the N25.


This project is needed, but I'd say second bridges are needed at both crossings really rather than anything else. The existing Belvelly Bridge is lovely but the fact that its the only road access to such a large town is a problem.

Heartbreak Hank

marno21 wrote: »

I agree regional roads under TII would be a good idea as it would consolidate improvements and make them consistent instead of the current scattergun approach. No point putting them under TII though if they are going to be starved of funding.

There badly needs to be an upgrade programme advanced for regional roads, especially for removing single lane bridges, dangerous corners and bad junctions. This finally seems to be happening for national secondaries.

Is there a reason that this doesn't happen? Is it councils want to hold onto the responsibility or TII don't want to take it on?

veryangryman

Heartbreak Hank wrote: »

Is there a reason that this doesn't happen? Is it councils want to hold onto the responsibility or TII don't want to take it on?

I'd imagine that neither want to spend the money. I stand by my point that it's not a National route, more a commuter/touristy route. Dual it yes, but if the Coco pops (the county council people) do a Galway and get ridiculous with assigning national; routes (think the N83, N67 extentions) just to save themselves a buck, i think i might just give up on life.

AugustusMinimus

I’m struggling to think of another town the size of Conn which isn’t served by a National Route. At least one not attached to a larger urban area.

veryangryman

Portarlington. In fairness anything South Cork and theres nowhere else to go without driving into the sea!
Galway has about 50 miles west, Dublin hundreds north and south, Limerick in every direction etc so they need Natiional routes.

marno21

veryangryman wrote: »

Portarlington. In fairness anything South Cork and theres nowhere else to go without driving into the sea!
Galway has about 50 miles west, Dublin hundreds north and south, Limerick in every direction etc so they need Natiional routes.

Cobh is about 50% bigger than Portarlington.

The only places bigger in Ireland without national road access are Malahide, and would be Carrigaline only the N28 to Rinagskiddy skirts the town. Tramore, Rush, Skerries, Portmarnock, Trim also big towns without access.

marno21

https://www.echolive.ie/corknews/Funding-application-for-the-overhaul-of-Cobhs-main-road-35bda603-7a43-463c-9acb-3727107c6f1b-ds

This article is very light on actual detail but it looks like something may be happening on this route at last.

Aontachtoir

marno21 wrote: »

https://www.echolive.ie/corknews/Funding-application-for-the-overhaul-of-Cobhs-main-road-35bda603-7a43-463c-9acb-3727107c6f1b-ds

This article is very light on actual detail but it looks like something may be happening on this route at last.

Would really love a bit more detail on what exactly the Council have in mind to "rehabilitate" this road. Are there old maps from pre-crash attempts to do so? Can we assume dualling to Cobh?

marno21

Aontachtoir wrote: »

Would really love a bit more detail on what exactly the Council have in mind to "rehabilitate" this road. Are there old maps from pre-crash attempts to do so? Can we assume dualling to Cobh?

Take another look at Post #1 of this thread.

Aontachtoir

marno21 wrote: »

Take another look at Post #1 of this thread.

Thank you.

It's a nice snapshot of the route on Fota (and where the new bridge might be). There's a lot more to the route though. If they're really going to dual it all the way to the N25 they'll have to replace or widen the existing bridge just next to the resort entrance, and at the other end there's no room to dual the existing R624 after it passes under the railway to run alongside the Lee (unless Carrigaloe in its entirety is CPO'd and flattened). Unless they decide not to upgrade that part, it will be interesting to see how they plan on getting the dual carriageway all the way to Cobh.

Either way, delighted to see some movement on improving this very subpar stretch of road. Well done Cork County Council - I'll miss them after the city boundary expands.

AugustusMinimus

Very badly needed. In addition, the 60kph limit between the N25 and Belvelly is beyond a joke.

I presume nothing can really be done between Belvelly and Cobh?