M20 - Cork to Limerick [preferred route chosen; in design - phase 3]

pajoguy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123476470#Comment_123476470

The update was penciled in for Q4 in 2024. Any reason for the 6 month delay? Probably understandable give the scale of the scheme.

The removal of this slip marked in yellow seemed to irk a few of the local politicians given the road is to be tolled and they claimed traffic will now exit at Patrickswell and go through the village. It will also feed the toll dodgers in through Croom.

Cookiemunster

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123477198#Comment_123477198

I'd expect that roundabout to go to construction as soon as the finances are available. Its planning permission would most likely have lapsed before the M20 is open.

riddlinrussell

Is it in the design docs that the road will be tolled? Haven't they moved away from that model to contracted payments a-la M17/18?

Or do the private operators see this road would actually be worth having a toll on so in it goes?

Surely in the modern era any toll on it would be ANPR on all entrances/exists instead of a physical barrier?

marno21

Construction of a roundabout at O'Rourkes Cross was part of the 2010 M20 plan anyway, as the R518 will be a feeder to the M20 and see more traffic. Traffic exiting the M20 South wanting to access Charleville would be making a right turn onto the old N20 so makes a roundabout necessary on safety grounds.

Cookiemunster

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123477207#Comment_123477207

There has been no decision made that there will be a toll on the road. We still don't have a final design and when we do it has to be signed off by the Minster and the Cabinet.

If it was to be tolled you have no idea where the toll would be placed (if there was indeed an actual toll booth), so I've no idea how you think toll dodgers would go through Croom.

Maybe wait until the final design is published before jumping to any conclusions.

pajoguy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123477307#Comment_123477307

Multi Point tolling has been recommended by the Project Team. I am aware it has to be signed off on by the Government Minister. I mentioned it as a background to the politicians giving out about it.

Hardly jumping to conclusions……

marno21

If it's to be tolled you could put the house on it being multi point barrier free tolling.

Much less incentive to skip one part of the motorway to save on a toll in such a scenario.

riddlinrussell

Yeah in that scenario 'dodging the toll' is called 'driving the old road'

Hibernicis

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123477400#Comment_123477400

Spot on. Multi Point barrier free tolling is exactly what the project team are recommending, based on the last (June 2024) update.

To encourage sustainable transport choices, support Ireland’s climate action plan, and to support the maintenance and renewal of the new transport infrastructure, the project team has recommended demand management measures. These measures include distance based barrier free tolling, whereby users pay on the basis of distance travelled on the new M20 motorway. Work is ongoing to determine appropriate toll charges for the various classes of vehicles, balancing a number of different factors, including the project objective to remove strategic traffic, especially heavy goods vehicles from the communities along the existing N20 to maximise safety and environmental benefits.

mydiscworld

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123477209#Comment_123477209

I see the safety need but the sheer volume passing that section each day before we get the M20 will mean it leads to traffic backing up. Drivers going to Limerick or Cork will have to yield to cars already on the roundabout, just in case they are taking a side road.

Hibernicis

The sooner that roundabout gets built the better. It's a very dangerous junction with a bad track record including fatalities and could yet give rise to a much larger scale catastrophic accident. 8 years have elapsed since the proposal to build two roundabouts in county Limerick, both of which were badly needed on safety grounds (see below). One, Beary’s Cross at the junction of the R513 and N24, was completed just over two years ago. (Six years for a roundabout wasn't earth-shattering either, but at least is got done). While this one has gone nowhere, largely because of a one objector repeatedly challenging it.

https://www.limerickleader.ie/news/home/242880/road-designs-to-improve-dangerous-limerick-junctions.html

riddlinrussell

Surely side road traffic will be balanced out by the fact that both main lanes will be 'blocking' cars on the side roads the majority of the time?

Baldilocks

We badly need to get away from tolling roads… 1 cent on the price of a litre of fuel would resolve this.

KrisW1001

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123478898#Comment_123478898

I'm all for that. Actually, make it 50c. Did I mention I drive an electric car?

That's the problem with fuel taxes: these days not everyone pays them, and there's no way in hell you could put a tax on electricity just because a tiny amount of it goes into cars, and a tiny number of them use a motorway.

As the percentage of private vehicles running on fossil fuels declines, governments will need something else to fill that funding gap. Road User Pricing is coming, like it or not… I know TII were looking at a pilot of this on M50 some years ago, so that toll fees would apply to everyone on the road, depending on how much of it they used, not just those crossing the gantry.

Things have gone quiet on M50 since, but the idea is very attractive for getting funding on new projects, and unlike single point tolling, there's no risk of traffic flooding bypassed towns to "dodge" a toll.

phog

In Switzerland you need to pay an annual fee if you want to use their motorway network.

It could work here instead of tool booths but we really don't have a means to police it so it could turn out like our non compliance with paying the TV Licence

KrisW1001

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123479500#Comment_123479500

Easily policed if you put ANPR cameras at the on and off ramps. Of course, once you do that, you don't need the sticker, and you can decide a fee based on distance travelled (like Spain, Italy and France do). That's probably one of the ideas proposed for N20's distance-based tolling.

phog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123479669#Comment_123479669

Italy & France use toll booths, Switzerland doesn't use the booths, users of their motorway network must have the vignette. I think that's electronic at this stage rather than a physical sticker. I still think Irish drivers will avoid it unless forced to be compliant and our Gardai don't have the resources to police it, just look at how many don't pay their NCT, Insurance, Motor Tax, etc

KrisW1001

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123480086#Comment_123480086

Yes, they use booths, but unlike here, the booths are at entrances (take a ticket) and exits (pay), so you are charged by the kilometre for using the road. How they collect the money isn't what defines the type of tolling.

Vignettes are also used in Czech Republic, Slovakia and Austria, by the way. The vignettes have an RFID security feature against forgery, but enforcement is actually via registration plate lookup (you have to give your plate details when buying, and you can't transfer from car to car).

I used to do this stuff (specifically, software for tolling data collection and analysis) for a living, so if you'll forgive a long post, here's an overview.

Basically, there are four broad classes of road tolling:

"Free" : paid by tax revenues.

Time : vignettes and other time limited passes. Pay once, unlimited use.

Point: Pay as you go, charged for crossing a line. Toll-bridges, turnpikes, tunnel charges and most Congestion zone charges are in this category. This is the only class of tolling in use in Ireland.

Distance : Pay as you go, charged by distance travelled. Irish people are probably most familiar with France's Autoroutes, but Spain and Italy do the same. Freight drivers in Germany also pay this kind of toll, and not just on motorways, but it's calculated by vehicle tracking. A variety of this without direct payment is called Road User Pricing (RUP) or Road User Charging (RUC) , depending on which side of the Atlantic you're on: we say "Charging". RUC is the New Hotness in the world of tolling. How you measure the distance doesn't really matter; the defining factor is that the price depends on how far you've driven.

Up to now, we've only used point tolling, but TII is l very interested in distance tolls (RUC) on M50, and it's definitely slated for introduction on M20. It's actually the fairest system - for instance, most M50 toll-payers would see their fees go down under RUC, because right now they're paying for all the cars that never cross the tolling point.

I don't think vignettes would work here, not because of fraud, but because they'd cause a massive shift of traffic off the motorway network, and back through villages and towns.

Compliance rates on Motor Tax have actually improved dramatically over the last few years, as has NCT evasion. Tying the various car records together has shut down a lot of the avenues for fraud. You now also need a driver licence number for insurance renewal, which will shut down a lot of fraud there too.

phog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123480196#Comment_123480196

I've driven there do understand how they work. My point is booths slow everything down while a year charge allows you use motorways without the messing of barriers/booths etc

Cookiemunster

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123480500#Comment_123480500

As shown by the M50, you don't need booths. You can have ANPR cameras at the junctions and you can pay via a toll tag or an app.

KrisW1001

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123480500#Comment_123480500

That wasn't my point, and I've also driven in each of the countries I named, except Slovakia. (you can get "one day" vignettes for travelling through on a longer journey).

The point I was making is that the decision isn't "booths" or "no booths"; it's between one of the four classes of road charging that I listed. Once your decide the model, then you can choose a way of implementing it. With current technology, all of the classes of tolling I listed can be implemented without barriers or booths.

I listed those classes in order of increasing "fairness", based on who pays for the road versus who benefits from it. Vignettes are fairer than funding from general taxation (where non-drivers subsidise motorists), but they still result in light users subsidising heavy users. Similarly, point tolls result in those whose trips cross the tollgate subsidising those whose journeys don't do so.

But really, I think a vignette/flat-fee system is not suitable for Ireland because of how our motorways interact with the rest of the network: many motoways serve as the only bypass for a town centre (because they were originally not intended to be motorways). This is generally not the case on the continent, where your choice is between a motorway or using a (usually single carriageway) bypass/relief road. I would be concerned that once you bring in an annual charge to use the motorway network, only the minority of drivers will pay it, and you'll shove all the occasional travellers back into the towns, defeating the purpose of building those bypasses in the first place.

phog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123480512#Comment_123480512

I'm aware of that but we currently have a network with toll booths.

I think we should move away from booths and charging for passing certain points on motorways. We should either charge by distance or a yearly charge to use the motorway network

Cookiemunster

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123480609#Comment_123480609

We're talking about the future M20, not what's already there.

phog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123480753#Comment_123480753

You might be but my OP on this was mentioning Ireland doing something like Switzerland for use of the Motorway Network.

KrisW1001

Distance-based tolling had been proposed for M20.

Whether that happens or not is a political decision. The road will probably be built with all of the infrastructure necessary to implement a camera-based system, because that's needed for journey-time predictions anyway. After that, it's up to whatever government we have in future to decide whether to charge or not.

I'm generally in favour of RUC on motorways (we've already got tolls on nearly all of them as it is), and generally against it elsewhere.

rounders

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123477207#Comment_123477207

Not sure unfortunately. They've just said "unforeseen circumstances". I'm not sure if all the planned consultation events went ahead or did they pause too. Hopefully the next update will shed some light on the delay.

Red Silurian

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123480820#Comment_123480820

I would say instead of tolling the road they should put speed cameras the length of it, average ones would be best, and share the fines with the private road operator in lieu of toll income.

In any case I remain skeptical that the road will ever be built

KrisW1001

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123486107#Comment_123486107

That idea creates a moral hazard. If the government relies on fines from speeding motorists to fund road maintenance, then they will be financially disincentivised to take any measures that would dramatically reduce speeding. This is in direct contradiction with their duty to provide a safe road network. Also, the fines themselves will reduce speeding.

At first glance, this idea might look like the current situation where tobacco taxation goes towards health funding, but it's different in one very important way: smoking increases the demand for healthcare, so a fall in smoking rates will translate into a lower cost of healthcare. If high tax discourages people from smoking, then it's a net gain overall.

But: If you funded maintenance out of speed fines, and those fines discouraged drivers from speeding, your maintenance fund shrinks, but the demand for road maintenance stays the same.

Red Silurian

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123486367#Comment_123486367

Well the speed cameras will be there so the govt wouldn't be financially incentivised to take them away if they are a money maker and they will reduce speeding.

On the average speed zone at Birdhill there were over 5,500 motorists caught speeding in 9 months and that's despite a compliance rate of over 96%. Now think about how much more traffic a motorway between Limerick and Cork would have

https://www.limerickleader.ie/news/home/1025646/close-to-700k-in-speeding-fines-on-m7-in-eight-months.html

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/47-drivers-a-day-caught-speeding-on-the-m7-since-average-speed-cameras-went-live/41810609.html

hans aus dtschl

The tolls are not really about revenue generation (or at least shouldn't be!) they should be about encouraging and discouraging specific driver behaviour. You don't want to fill up intercity motorway capacity with short distance journeys if you can help it.