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

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Comments

  • Registered Users Posts: 574 ✭✭✭Aontachtoir


    Another guaranteed judicial review, another three or so wasted years like the M28. Planning law in this country desperately needs a complete overhaul. "Due process" cannot mean giving individuals or environmental groups a free pass to delay much-needed infrastructure for years and years. The government should have a much freer hand to act.

    It seems like an impossible fight to get anything done in this country these days.


  • Registered Users Posts: 198 ✭✭Bazzer007


    I own land on the amber route and my farm will be halved if the motorway proceeds. For the last 12 year's it has been hanging over my head and the disruption it will cause. I have not complained and know the damn thing needs to be built for the greater good. I'll end up losing my house as well. Those on the navy route won't be bothered what route the road takes as long as it stays away from their neck of the woods. I'll just get on with it and live with the consequences, but I will be comforted by the fact the motorway will create jobs, improve people lives and most importantly save lives.




  • Another guaranteed judicial review, another three or so wasted years like the M28. Planning law in this country desperately needs a complete overhaul. "Due process" cannot mean giving individuals or environmental groups a free pass to delay much-needed infrastructure for years and years. The government should have a much freer hand to act.

    It seems like an impossible fight to get anything done in this country these days.

    The delays are caused by a shortage of staff in the judicial & planning systems

    Appeals can be lodged, heard and ruled on within a matter of weeks if the systems are resourced appropriately

    That you are so willing to eliminate rights due to resource issues is bonkers


  • Registered Users Posts: 442 ✭✭Limerick74


    Bazzer007 wrote: »
    I own land on the amber route and my farm will be halved if the motorway proceeds. For the last 12 year's it has been hanging over my head and the disruption it will cause. I have not complained and know the damn thing needs to be built for the greater good. I'll end up losing my house as well. Those on the navy route won't be bothered what route the road takes as long as it stays away from their neck of the woods. I'll just get on with it and live with the consequences, but I will be comforted by the fact the motorway will create jobs, improve people lives and most importantly save lives.

    All respect to you for your views and consideration of the overall national objectives. ðŸ‘


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,756 ✭✭✭ianobrien


    Another point about the online upgrade. Don't forget the Old Mallow Rd is there from Blackpool to Rathduff. If the do build it over the current N20 from Blarney to Rathduff, there is an alternative for those who can't travel on the motorway.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 310 ✭✭steeler j


    ianobrien wrote: »
    Another point about the online upgrade. Don't forget the Old Mallow Rd is there from Blackpool to Rathduff. If the do build it over the current N20 from Blarney to Rathduff, there is an alternative for those who can't travel on the motorway.

    I spend the evening looking at the maps and spotted that . Would it be able to handle the traffic if the motorway was closed?


  • Registered Users Posts: 574 ✭✭✭Aontachtoir


    The delays are caused by a shortage of staff in the judicial & planning systems

    Appeals can be lodged, heard and ruled on within a matter of weeks if the systems are resourced appropriately

    That you are so willing to eliminate rights due to resource issues is bonkers

    Nobody has an entitlement to prevent a much-needed road safety project from proceeding. I am surprised you would not view pouring resources into the planning and judicial systems to pore over vexatious objections and NIMBY complaints through appeal after appeal after appeal as a major waste of everyone's time and money.

    Put more resources into the system, sure, but also make it much harder to appeal a planning decision, massively raise the bar for a successful judicial review, and disincentivise vexatious objections. A multi-pronged approach is needed. This country has to be able to build important infrastructure.


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,796 ✭✭✭Isambard


    steeler j wrote: »
    I spend the evening looking at the maps and spotted that . Would it be able to handle the traffic if the motorway was closed?

    definitely not fit for purpose with the existing traffic never mind carrying the whole lot. Not an option imo.




  • Nobody has an entitlement to prevent a much-needed road safety project from proceeding. I am surprised you would not view pouring resources into the planning and judicial systems to pore over vexatious objections and NIMBY complaints through appeal after appeal after appeal as a major waste of everyone's time and money.

    Put more resources into the system, sure, but also make it much harder to appeal a planning decision, massively raise the bar for a successful judicial review, and disincentivise vexatious objections. A multi-pronged approach is needed. This country has to be able to build important infrastructure.

    What is a nimby to one, can be someone defending their home to others, or someone protecting a vulnerable environment. I'm not stating what is or is not a "vexatious objection and NIMBY complaint", thats not my place.

    Your disdain for the right to appeal not withstanding, that you wish to extinguish such rights so easily because you want to see a road built faster is a terrifying prospect.

    Today its the M20, tomorrow its a 4 lane motorway through the center of the Phoenix Park or an incinerator beside the local primary school or a chemical waste processing plant on Fota Island or a 20 storey apartment block on the main street in Westport and so on

    Thankfully we do not need to worry about such nonsense as every citizen has a right to appeal planning decisions as Ireland ratified the Aarhaus Convention in 2012.
    The Aarhus Convention lays down a set of basic rules to promote citizen’s involvement in environmental matters and improve enforcement of environmental law; its provisions are broken down into three Pillars:
    • Access to information on the environment - this allows members of the public access to a wide range of information on the environment, including information on the state of the environment, associated policies and measures, and on the state of human health and safety, where this can be affected by the state of the environment.
    • Public participation – requires that parties to the Convention facilitate public participation in decisions about the environment; public authorities must have mechanisms in place to enable the public affected and environmental NGOs to comment on, for example, proposals for projects affecting the environment, or plans and programmes relating to the environment.
    • Access to justice – provides that the public have access to independent review procedures that are timely, equitable and not prohibitively expensive, to challenge decisions relating to the environment.

    You may not like that citizens of Ireland have such rights but they do and any attempt to remove these will lose in the courts, you know, those courts you dislike so much because they are so under-resourced that they have massive back-logs.


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,756 ✭✭✭ianobrien


    Apologies for going off topic but I imagine most people wouldn't have a problem with having the opportunity to appeal any decision. The problem is how long it takes. Look at how long the M28 was held up. The M28 would have been almost complete by now if the appeal process didn't take YEARS!


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  • Registered Users Posts: 2,756 ✭✭✭ianobrien


    Another guaranteed judicial review, another three or so wasted years like the M28. Planning law in this country desperately needs a complete overhaul. "Due process" cannot mean giving individuals or environmental groups a free pass to delay much-needed infrastructure for years and years. The government should have a much freer hand to act.

    It seems like an impossible fight to get anything done in this country these days.

    I remember reading somewhere that the AG is starting a full review of planning laws and courts to quicken the process. The review is to take 18 months or so.

    Yes the process to speed up planning is taking that long


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,811 ✭✭✭Chris_5339762


    steeler j wrote: »
    I spend the evening looking at the maps and spotted that . Would it be able to handle the traffic if the motorway was closed?


    Not a hope. Its an absolutely atrocious road, thats why the current dual carriageway section is there, even back in the 80s they felt that had to bypass it.


  • Registered Users Posts: 18,015 ✭✭✭✭Bass Reeves


    Not a hope. Its an absolutely atrocious road, thats why the current dual carriageway section is there, even back in the 80s they felt that had to bypass it.

    As well as that you have to low that this new road will have limited access. It's likely to have no junction from Mallow to Barney turnoff. If it was do e online with existing section from Ratduff to Blarney you would have a lot of traffic using that old road. You would need to upgrade it anyway

    I cannot see even part of the new road being on-line

    Slava Ukrainii



  • Registered Users Posts: 574 ✭✭✭Aontachtoir


    What is a nimby to one, can be someone defending their home to others, or someone protecting a vulnerable environment. I'm not stating what is or is not a "vexatious objection and NIMBY complaint", thats not my place.

    Appealing a fully necessary and justified upgrade like the M28 because you are worried your land value might decrease is NIMBYism. Appealing it because you oppose roads in general is vexatious. It seems naive or deceptive to suggest otherwise.
    Today its the M20, tomorrow its a 4 lane motorway through the center of the Phoenix Park or an incinerator beside the local primary school or a chemical waste processing plant on Fota Island or a 20 storey apartment block on the main street in Westport and so on

    Come on, you know this is absolute rubbish. A 4-lane motorway through Phoenix Park?
    Thankfully we do not need to worry about such nonsense as every citizen has a right to appeal planning decisions as Ireland ratified the Aarhaus Convention in 2012.

    We seem to have adopted a very permissive reading of Aarhus, if other European nations are a comparator. So we either adopt a stricter interpretation of the treaty, or we repeal it as necessary. Slugs and quarry fauna cannot and must not be allowed to stand in the way of improving the lives of the people of this country, or saving lives on the roads.

    That said, if more vexatious reviews speed us along to the point where partial or full repeal of these laws becomes politically desirable, I wish the NIMBYs every success.
    ianobrien wrote: »
    I remember reading somewhere that the AG is starting a full review of planning laws and courts to quicken the process. The review is to take 18 months or so.

    Yes the process to speed up planning is taking that long

    It's a joke at this stage. The only good thing about the number of developments having their permission overturned by judicial review on environmental grounds is that it may finally spur the government to do something about it. Giving NIMBYs veto power over much-needed housing, infrastructure and the like should never have been done, but here we are.


  • Registered Users Posts: 13,684 ✭✭✭✭markodaly


    The delays are caused by a shortage of staff in the judicial & planning systems

    Appeals can be lodged, heard and ruled on within a matter of weeks if the systems are resourced appropriately

    That you are so willing to eliminate rights due to resource issues is bonkers

    Is it about rights though? How about the right to ride in a bike lane, or buy an affordable house, or not die due to a very dangerous road?

    We have seen over the past 10 years or so the court system is basically a proxy for the planning system. We see it time and time again, with various groups and people with some cash to try and stop developments be it infrastructures like roads or rail or metro, to bike lanes to housing, and so on.

    No one would care all that much if the system was more efficient and cases ruled upon in a matter of a few months, but it takes years and years for this stuff to get through all the courts, various appeals, and so on. Just look at the M28 saga.

    Also, the idea that these objections are just from a few poor ordinary folks doesn't stand up to scrutiny. Often there are wealthy business people or landowners funding these adventures through the Irish court system. They will put some ordinary person in front of the camera but behind the scenes, there will be a small set of very wealthy and privileged people pulling the strings.

    It is not grassroots, it's astro turf!


  • Registered Users Posts: 13,684 ✭✭✭✭markodaly


    Nobody has an entitlement to prevent a much-needed road safety project from proceeding. I am surprised you would not view pouring resources into the planning and judicial systems to pore over vexatious objections and NIMBY complaints through appeal after appeal after appeal as a major waste of everyone's time and money.

    Put more resources into the system, sure, but also make it much harder to appeal a planning decision, massively raise the bar for a successful judicial review, and disincentivise vexatious objections. A multi-pronged approach is needed. This country has to be able to build important infrastructure.

    The planning process is imo overly complex and messy. Often when someone is bringing a case to court, they are appealing it over some I not dotted or a t not crossed, that sort of thing. They will say some snail, or frog is on some protected species list therefore the EIS or something else is incomplete and therefore void, so that means the whole planning process would need to start again or some crap like that.

    Does anyone remember the whole saga about the M3 at the time? Do people even care today that that road exists? I doubt it.


  • Registered Users Posts: 6,648 ✭✭✭Pete_Cavan


    As well as that you have to low that this new road will have limited access. It's likely to have no junction from Mallow to Barney turnoff. If it was do e online with existing section from Ratduff to Blarney you would have a lot of traffic using that old road. You would need to upgrade it anyway

    I cannot see even part of the new road being on-line

    The new road is almost certain to be largely online between Blarney and close to Burnfoot. The existing N20 can't simply be left as is, whatever option is chosen. If a new motorway was built offline, the existing road still needs a major rebuild at significant cost. Building a new road entirely offline plus rebuilding the existing road would likely be a lot more expensive than rebuilding the existing N20 as dual carriageway plus upgrading and realigning existing alternative roads.


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,796 ✭✭✭Isambard


    the existing road from Blarney north to Rathduff is almost new and the section North of Rathduff to Burnfort is 2+1 built less than 20 years ago and extensively rebuilt about 3 years ago. An offline R road will be needed to replace all this if it is used for the M20 online.

    The suggestion there will be no junction between Mallow and Blarney is pure fiction


  • Registered Users Posts: 18,015 ✭✭✭✭Bass Reeves


    Isambard wrote: »
    the existing road from Blarney north to Rathduff is almost new and the section North of Rathduff to Burnfort is 2+1 built less than 20 years ago and extensively rebuilt about 3 years ago. An offline R road will be needed to replace all this if it is used for the M20 online.

    The suggestion there will be no junction between Mallow and Blarney is pure fiction

    Mallow to the Blarney junction is about 20 km. Assuming a Mallow South junction the distance will be about 17 km. It highly unlikely there will be a junction in that distance

    Slava Ukrainii



  • Registered Users Posts: 1,424 ✭✭✭cjpm


    Mallow to the Blarney junction is about 20 km. Assuming a Mallow South junction the distance will be about 17 km. It highly unlikely there will be a junction in that distance

    No. That isn’t correct. In 2010 it was proposed that the Mallow south junction would be at Burnfort Cross, exactly where the M20 widening of the N20 moves offline to avoid Mallow town. It’s the perfect place as the existing N20 will handle the Mallow South traffic joining the M20.

    The rest of the Mallow traffic will join the M20 at Olivers Cross. At the junction of the Fermoy road and the Mitchelstown road. In fairness to the planners, a great idea.

    In 2010 there was also a junction proposed at Rathduff. For Grenagh and the Landfill in Bottlehill.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 1,424 ✭✭✭cjpm


    From Burnfort to Blarney the road pavement thickness is almost good enough to handle motorway levels of traffic. Substandard sections were upgraded about 7 years ago. It will need some relatively minor widening for sure.

    The parallel side roads that are proposed for local traffic will have tiny levels of traffic (due to the Rathduff and Mallow south junctions) and will be built accordingly. To local road standard.

    It’s a complete no brainer. An offline build between Burnfort and Blarney will cost an absolute bomb and will be held up in the courts for years. And we’ll be left with the current N20 lying practically idle.


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,796 ✭✭✭Isambard


    certainly south from Rathduff will be ideal for online M20 with junctions eliminated and some widening (and a new local road alongside). It's almost a new road. Rathduff will have to be bypassed I guess but then the 2+1 is wide enough to upgrade North to the Burnfort interchange, a local road already runs alongside here, but it would need a lot of upgrading, parts of it are the original Cork to Mallow road from the 17/1800s.


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,796 ✭✭✭Isambard


    cjpm wrote: »
    No. That isn’t correct. In 2010 it was proposed that the Mallow south junction would be at Burnfort Cross, exactly where the M20 widening of the N20 moves offline to avoid Mallow town. It’s the perfect place as the existing N20 will handle the Mallow South traffic joining the M20.

    The rest of the Mallow traffic will join the M20 at Olivers Cross. At the junction of the Fermoy road and the Mitchelstown road. In fairness to the planners, a great idea.

    In 2010 there was also a junction proposed at Rathduff. For Grenagh and the Landfill in Bottlehill.

    Yes, I'd expect Cork-bound traffic from my neck of the woods (N72 west of Mallow to use the N20 to Burnfort. It really should retain it's N status or at least a 100km/h speed limit (Cork at good at that so should be on the cards) I don't know where the next junction north of Olivers Cross will be, but if there is a Buttevant Junc, it may be better for our traffic to use that


  • Registered Users Posts: 6,648 ✭✭✭Pete_Cavan


    Isambard wrote: »
    Yes, I'd expect Cork-bound traffic from my neck of the woods (N72 west of Mallow to use the N20 to Burnfort. It really should retain it's N status or at least a 100km/h speed limit

    With the N72 to follow the new road north of Mallow, the N72 will likely continue south on what is currently N20, to meet the existing N72 at the roundabout. The N73 could then take over the N72 through the town and N20 south of that roundabout to the M20 Mallow South Junction. That would keep the current N20 around and through Mallow as National roads.


  • Registered Users Posts: 667 ✭✭✭BelfastVanMan


    Pete_Cavan wrote: »
    With the N72 to follow the new road north of Mallow, the N72 will likely continue south on what is currently N20, to meet the existing N72 at the roundabout. The N73 could then take over the N72 through the town and N20 south of that roundabout to the M20 Mallow South Junction. That would keep the current N20 around and through Mallow as National roads.

    I like this idea, seems to make sense in theory.


  • Registered Users Posts: 8,412 ✭✭✭Markcheese


    . Slugs and quarry fauna cannot and must not be allowed to stand in the way of improving the lives of the people of this country, or saving lives on the roads.

    That said, if more vexatious reviews speed us along to the point where partial or full repeal of these laws becomes politically desirable, I wish the NIMBYs every success.
    .

    Neither slugs not quarry animals will delay a major development , but failing to account for them ( or to visibly include them in environmental impact studies ) will ...
    The objectors to the n28 couldn't give a fiddlers about the quarry , nor could those against the west Kerry green way give a thought for the Kerry slug ,
    Usually the objections gain traction because of somebody not doing their job properly - or just a legal interpretation of the current laws .

    Slava ukraini 🇺🇦





  • Appealing a fully necessary and justified upgrade like the M28 because you are worried your land value might decrease is NIMBYism. Appealing it because you oppose roads in general is vexatious. It seems naive or deceptive to suggest otherwise.



    Come on, you know this is absolute rubbish. A 4-lane motorway through Phoenix Park?



    We seem to have adopted a very permissive reading of Aarhus, if other European nations are a comparator. So we either adopt a stricter interpretation of the treaty, or we repeal it as necessary. Slugs and quarry fauna cannot and must not be allowed to stand in the way of improving the lives of the people of this country, or saving lives on the roads.

    That said, if more vexatious reviews speed us along to the point where partial or full repeal of these laws becomes politically desirable, I wish the NIMBYs every success.



    It's a joke at this stage. The only good thing about the number of developments having their permission overturned by judicial review on environmental grounds is that it may finally spur the government to do something about it. Giving NIMBYs veto power over much-needed housing, infrastructure and the like should never have been done, but here we are.

    You really are struggling with this aren't you.

    Its really very simple.

    1. Everyone has the right to appeal a planning decision.

    2. The appeals are deemed successful or failed by ABP or the courts as applicable.

    Thats it. Whether or not their reason for appealing is justified is decided by the applicable body. If its on a point of law not adhered to during the planning process, the appeals are typically successful. If its simply nimbyism, the appeals are typically unsuccessful.

    If your complaint is that its taking too long for these decisions, then your issue is with the resourcing of the courts/ABP.

    Personally I may or may not agree with the justification behind various appeals however I understand that everyone has the right to make such appeals and that we as a country are better off for having that access to justice.

    The alternative is projects being railroaded through, not adhering to environmental regulations, ignoring local concerns and objections not being listened to.


  • Registered Users Posts: 13,684 ✭✭✭✭markodaly


    You really are struggling with this aren't you.

    Its really very simple.

    1. Everyone has the right to appeal a planning decision.

    2. The appeals are deemed successful or failed by ABP or the courts as applicable.

    Thats it. Whether or not their reason for appealing is justified is decided by the applicable body. If its on a point of law not adhered to during the planning process, the appeals are typically successful. If its simply nimbyism, the appeals are typically unsuccessful.

    If your complaint is that its taking too long for these decisions, then your issue is with the resourcing of the courts/ABP.

    Personally I may or may not agree with the justification behind various appeals however I understand that everyone has the right to make such appeals and that we as a country are better off for having that access to justice.

    The alternative is projects being railroaded through, not adhering to environmental regulations, ignoring local concerns and objections not being listened to.

    Just on a point of order but why would someone from say Cavan have a right to appeal a planning decision in Cork?


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,424 ✭✭✭cjpm


    markodaly wrote: »
    Just on a point of order but why would someone from say Cavan have a right to appeal a planning decision in Cork?

    The biggest issue with all of this is the amount of time these things take….


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  • Registered Users Posts: 966 ✭✭✭riddlinrussell


    Markcheese wrote: »
    Neither slugs not quarry animals will delay a major development , but failing to account for them ( or to visibly include them in environmental impact studies ) will ...
    The objectors to the n28 couldn't give a fiddlers about the quarry , nor could those against the west Kerry green way give a thought for the Kerry slug ,
    Usually the objections gain traction because of somebody not doing their job properly - or just a legal interpretation of the current laws .

    I would argue Mr Peter Sweetman very much cares about the Kerry Slug, but he certainly cares more about the Government being held to their own legislation. As has been pointed out many times, if they keep being caught out by not doing the EIS properly its not really the objectors fault. Other objectors I'm sure have more selfish motives, but its one of those cases where if the government does their job properly, the case will fail at the first hurdle.


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