Motorway redesignation Phase #2 released

SeanW

marmurr1916 wrote: »

Cool!

You'll probably be able to add an extension to the M4 as far as Longford eventually.

I wouldn't bank on it - believe me I'd love to have even a Grade Separated Dual Carriageway out here, but at the public consulutation day in Longford recently, I found out they're thinking of doing it as a cheap crappy 2+2 "Type 2 Dual Carriageway." Apparently it's all down to existing and projected traffic volumes.

Now, I'd be happy with even a medium quality type 1 Dual, but with the collapsing public finances and a planned "bloodbath" budget coming up, I extremely pleasantly surprised if the scheme isn't cancelled and approved for some kind of decent DC.

Ah well, we can live in hope.

As for the extra 6-odd km of Motorway Kinnegad-Downs, ok it will be nice to have another short stretch to do 120km/h but other than I don't really see the point.

JayeL

I'm a little peeved at the plan for the N2.

I'm all for making it a motorway, but why only from the Cherryhound exit? Once you allow non-motorway traffic off at Coldwinters and on at the Dublin Airport Logistics Park (sounds romantic, doesn't it?), surely the only six-lane stretch on the N2 should be motorway?

If it isn't, then we'll have a strange situation where the limit on the widest part of the road will be 100kmh and once the road narrows after Cherryhound, it goes up to 120.

L1011

E92 wrote: »

Surprised to see no mention of either the N25(especially the Ballincollig bypass) or the 40 miles(64 km) bit of the N9 that they were unable to re-classify the last time. I believe that the Sligo Inner Relief Road is a Dual Carriageway, surprised to see no mention of that either.

The SIRR has about 6 at grade, signal controlled junctions. Theres about 15km of motorway grade road south of it, though.

Steviemak

BluntGuy wrote: »

Somebody on SABRE asked if they could see what the network will look like if all these go through.

Well, here's a quickly drawn map illustrating the changes if all the inter-urbans are completed, all other schemes planned are completed and the motorway redesignations go through...

Correct me if I've anything wrong...

When you look at that map it clearly illustrates the lack of investment to the North and West. If only the Northwest motorway could get off the ground to serve Donegal and Derry. To be most effective (population and area served) it should travel the M3 route and serve Cavan, spur to Sligo, Fermanagh, Donegal and on to Derry. Can't see it happening though.

Alun

BluntGuy wrote: »

Somebody on SABRE asked if they could see what the network will look like if all these go through.

Well, here's a quickly drawn map illustrating the changes if all the inter-urbans are completed, all other schemes planned are completed and the motorway redesignations go through...

Correct me if I've anything wrong...

Maybe it's just the scale of the map, but there's a section of N11 still between Bray and Rathnew (or is it earlier, I'm a bit hazy as to where the M designation will start now exactly?) that isn't immediately obvious from the map. At least the section around Bray / Kilmacanogue doesn't stand a bat in hell's chance of becoming Motorway in the foreseeable future, I reckon.

loyatemu

Alun wrote: »

Maybe it's just the scale of the map, but there's a section of N11 still between Bray and Rathnew (or is it earlier, I'm a bit hazy as to where the M designation will start now exactly?) that isn't immediately obvious from the map. At least the section around Bray / Kilmacanogue doesn't stand a bat in hell's chance of becoming Motorway in the foreseeable future, I reckon.

no - the section between the Bray bypass and Kilpedder is a mess of local accesses and duplicate junctions. It also has no alternative route.

The Newtown bypass and northern section of Ashford\Rathnew are easily Mway standard, but again no easy alternative route, so the M11 will only start at the Cullenmore junction and then continue to south of Gorey (assuming they build the missing section).

Good news IMO - the Arklow bypass in particular was originally built as a motorway but local political meddling led to it being opened as dual-carriageway. It is well capable of a 120km/h limit.

jd

loyatemu wrote: »

Good news IMO - the Arklow bypass in particular was originally built as a motorway but local political meddling led to it being opened as dual-carriageway. It is well capable of a 120km/h limit.

I presume there will be objections from local cycling clubs. They seem to use it for their Sunday cycles! :eek:

D'Peoples Voice

BluntGuy wrote: »

Somebody on SABRE asked if they could see what the network will look like if all these go through.

Well, here's a quickly drawn map illustrating the changes if all the inter-urbans are completed, all other schemes planned are completed and the motorway redesignations go through...

Correct me if I've anything wrong...

FFS, there'll be riots on the streets of Knock if this map is made public,
people in the underpopulated west of land will feel that the Northwest has seriously been deprived of proper infrastructure!!!
we'll have to commit to building the N5 longford & ballaghaderreen bypasses to pacify them!

Zoney

D'Peoples Voice wrote: »

FFS, there'll be riots on the streets of Knock if this map is made public,
people in the underpopulated west of land will feel that the Northwest has seriously been deprived of proper infrastructure!!!
we'll have to commit to building the N5 longford & ballaghaderreen bypasses to pacify them!

I believe a lot of the primary routes in the "gap" are now earmarked for dual carriageway rather than 2+1. Although said dual carriageway will be mostly at-grade, with no hard shoulder and a wire median barrier (hence the NRA calling it "2+2"). Pretty decent for the low traffic on those roads - and indeed not over the top either, as it is necessary to have safe and fast access to even the lower populated parts of the country.

On the 2+2 they should probably go for concrete barrier though - as the wire fence has high maintance costs (or more likely, it can even be *useless* for safety when it isn't maintained, e.g. re-tension/fix hours after a crash, check daily for damaged sections). Also at-grade junctions will be tricky - really some over/underbridges needed to avoid having junctions at all for minor roads, and then use roundabouts for the major ones (e.g. secondary or important R roads only).

spacetweek

Been thinking about the N3 redesignation as far as Clonee turnoff. I think on mature reflection this is probably better. It means that we could dedicate the rest of the road as far as the M50 to bus, etc. We should do an N4/N7 job on it and widen this Clonee-M50 part to 6 lanes with proper bus lanes (not the current crap) and cycle/walking paths. Stop getting buses to drop people off at the door to Blanch Centre, taking hours to get there, and use the N3 as the primary route. With the bus stops here on widened offramps, it would only be 200m to the entrance. Build a pedestrian bridge to allow access to the bus stop on the other side of the N3.

Furet wrote: »

So, I take it this means the M18 from Limerick to Galway is going ahead asap in its entirity?

Had always assumed that, but we'll have to see what Coweye comes up with in his budget, which is gonna be a tough one. To be honest, I'd always thought the Atlantic corridor would be finished after 2015, but it's a certainty now. I'm more worried about them slowing down the public transport bits , though.

BluntGuy wrote: »

Well, here's a quickly drawn map illustrating the changes if all the inter-urbans are completed, all other schemes planned are completed and the motorway redesignations go through...

Correct me if I've anything wrong...

Nice map, but you included a lot of non-motorway low standard bits, like N18 at Limerick, N11 south of Bray, etc.

Steviemak wrote: »

When you look at that map it clearly illustrates the lack of investment to the North and West. If only the Northwest motorway could get off the ground to serve Donegal and Derry.

I know! The lack of motorway north of the midlands jumps right off the screen.

Agreed with the N3 routing, but they've already decided to use the N2. And NI has messed it up by planning their section as dual, not motorway.

L1011

Its being planned to their concept of HQDC which is close enough to some of the bits of the N11 we're intending to make motorway, though. The UKs idea of 'motorway' is obsessive when its applied properly (and can be horrific when not - single carriageway roads that are 'motorways' exist).

Poster King

Aard wrote: »

Are the junction layouts on www.transport.ie definitive? If so, I can't believe that the M6/M18 interchange will be a roundabout with flyovers. Surely the land is available for a whirlpool, and if not then at least a cloverleaf...

I've read and heard a lot about this infamous M6/M18/M17 junction, but have not yet seen any plans/image of it. Can someone point me in the right direction please.
While I'm at it, can I express my incredulity at the planned route which goes no where near Galway City, what is the rationale for this?

spacetweek

Poster King wrote: »

I've read and heard a lot about this infamous M6/M18/M17 junction, but have not yet seen any plans/image of it. Can someone point me in the right direction please.
While I'm at it, can I express my incredulity at the planned route which goes no where near Galway City, what is the rationale for this?

Sh1te junction planned for here - can be seen in this map, click on the leftmost (southernmost) image.

As for the M18-M17 route not taking in Galway, they must have been aiming for a straight run north-south and traffic is supposed to use the M6 to complete the journey. That said, they could at least have deviated slightly to the west to take in Claregalway.

BluntGuy

spacetweek wrote: »

Sh1te junction planned for here - can be seen in this map, click on the leftmost (southernmost) image.

As for the M18-M17 route not taking in Galway, they must have been aiming for a straight run north-south and traffic is supposed to use the M6 to complete the journey. That said, they could at least have deviated slightly to the west to take in Claregalway.

Utter crappiness...

If the N7/N20 (or M7/M20 as the case may soon be), junction can get a free-flow (or partial free-flow now that I think about it), then this should as well, considering there is much more space available.

D.L.R.

Steviemak wrote: »

When you look at that map it clearly illustrates the lack of investment to the North and West. If only the Northwest motorway could get off the ground to serve Donegal and Derry. To be most effective (population and area served) it should travel the M3 route and serve Cavan, spur to Sligo, Fermanagh, Donegal and on to Derry. Can't see it happening though.

Agree on the need for a NW motorway, but disagree on your route choice. For me, the most effective route is:

(M1 Dublin-Dundalk)-N53-Castleblayney-N2-Monaghan-border-(A5)

OR

(M1/A1 Dublin-Newry)-A28 via Armagh-(A5)

both much shorter than an M3 extension, and serving much larger population corridors.

Zoney

BluntGuy wrote: »

Utter crappiness...

If the N7/N20 (or M7/M20 as the case may soon be), junction can get a free-flow (or partial free-flow now that I think about it), then this should as well, considering there is much more space available.

The N7/N20 junction is only going to be freeflow by virtue of omitting city-bound traffic flows. All the traffic from Cork, Kerry, West Limerick will no longer be able to access the city via Childers Road (such as that is) and will have to use the ring road and then paltry junctions at the N69 Dock Road and N24 Tipp Road. These two junctions are already traffic jams at peak times - the former is currently a roundabout connecting to a R link road to Raheen - this will form one half of the dumbell junction for the ring road (guesses as to how magnificently that will work?). The N24 is a diamond junction that was plagued by unsafe right turn movements, and now has traffic calming strewn along the bridge (to little effect) and traffic lights to stop traffic backing up onto the ring road (instead having it back up on the main Tipperary road).

Steviemak

DLR I agree to some extent.

However, the only Dublin orientated population centre on that route not served by my proposal is Monaghan. Alot of Omagh Armagh traffic heads to Belfast. It can be argued that Monaghan is 30mins from the M1 on a high standard single carriage way.

My route although longer will serve - Cavan, Virginia, Sligo, (Enniskillen),Ballyshannon, Donegal Town, Stranolar, Letterkenny and Derry. It removes the onus on NI to build the majority of the road which is the reason there is no motorway today. I believe if the route to Derry Letterkenny was all in the Republic it would currently be under construction.

My route will never happen but it would save us building two roads in the future.

BluntGuy

Zoney wrote: »

The N7/N20 junction is only going to be freeflow by virtue of omitting city-bound traffic flows. All the traffic from Cork, Kerry, West Limerick will no longer be able to access the city via Childers Road (such as that is) and will have to use the ring road and then paltry junctions at the N69 Dock Road and N24 Tipp Road. These two junctions are already traffic jams at peak times - the former is currently a roundabout connecting to a R link road to Raheen - this will form one half of the dumbell junction for the ring road (guesses as to how magnificently that will work?). The N24 is a diamond junction that was plagued by unsafe right turn movements, and now has traffic calming strewn along the bridge (to little effect) and traffic lights to stop traffic backing up onto the ring road (instead having it back up on the main Tipperary road).

Yes...

But as we all know, terrible junction designs and locations are facets of PPP schemes. The only reason for them, as far as I can see, is to make the old road as inaccessible as possible so as to annoy people into using the toll road. Devious... :mad:

D.L.R.

Steviemak wrote: »

DLR I agree to some extent.

However, the only Dublin orientated population centre on that route not served by my proposal is Monaghan. Alot of Omagh Armagh traffic heads to Belfast. It can be argued that Monaghan is 30mins from the M1 on a high standard single carriage way.

My route although longer will serve - Cavan, Virginia, Sligo, (Enniskillen),Ballyshannon, Donegal Town, Stranolar, Letterkenny and Derry. It removes the onus on NI to build the majority of the road which is the reason there is no motorway today. I believe if the route to Derry Letterkenny was all in the Republic it would currently be under construction.

My route will never happen but it would save us building two roads in the future.

Its too extravagent IMO. The only part of the NW which could argue the case for full motorway to Dublin is Derry. The rest is small potatoes. Your idea is very indirect regards Derry, just to connect a few small towns of 5,000 population and Enniskillen (15,000).

Therefore the best route is the most direct one, whether its built mainly in NI or the Rep. The M1 as far as Dundalk or Newry is generally headed toward Derry anyway so another large road is wasteful. Sligo will eventually have a dualled N4 all the way to Dublin. Cavan and Enniskillen are just too isolated. Omagh and Armagh on the other hand are large towns right on the Dublin-Derry axis.

Chris_533976

Sponge Bob wrote: »

The M17 is not on the list as well as the N6 Galway Outer Bypass .

M17 doesnt need to be redesignated as a Motorway Order was published for it and it will be built as motorway from day 1 (whenever/if ever that is). It wont be built as HQDC so wont need to be reclassified.

I guess the Galway Outer Bypass will be reclassified if built, but I'd say as little attention to that as possible until its being built is the best. Lets not give the people/departments objecting to it another reason to keep complaining. I reckon thats what the NRA will do too.

Steviemak

D.L.R. wrote: »

Its too extravagent IMO. The only part of the NW which could argue the case for full motorway to Dublin is Derry. The rest is small potatoes. Your idea is very indirect regards Derry, just to connect a few small towns of 5,000 population and Enniskillen (15,000).

Therefore the best route is the most direct one, whether its built mainly in NI or the Rep. The M1 as far as Dundalk or Newry is generally headed toward Derry anyway so another large road is wasteful. Sligo will eventually have a dualled N4 all the way to Dublin. Cavan and Enniskillen are just too isolated. Omagh and Armagh on the other hand are large towns right on the Dublin-Derry axis.

Armagh is 20 miles from the M1. I travel through Omagh on a Monday morning regularly and the huge majority of cars head to Belfast when they hit Ballygawley. Letterkenny is way more vital to the Republic than Derry. Derry is not even considered important enough by NI to build a Motorway between it and its main economic hub Belfast.

The north will not be building a motorway between the border and Derry in many a long year if ever. Neither will our government. When push comes to shove irish taxpayers will not allow them to build a motorway in one of the richest economies in the world, the UK, to serve Derry.

Skyhater

JayeL wrote: »

I'm a little peeved at the plan for the N2.

I'm all for making it a motorway, but why only from the Cherryhound exit? Once you allow non-motorway traffic off at Coldwinters and on at the Dublin Airport Logistics Park (sounds romantic, doesn't it?), surely the only six-lane stretch on the N2 should be motorway?

If it isn't, then we'll have a strange situation where the limit on the widest part of the road will be 100kmh and once the road narrows after Cherryhound, it goes up to 120.

The simple reason for this is to allow "non-motorway traffic" (Learners Drivers, etc) access from the R135 (Old N2) to Finglas and beyond.

D.L.R. wrote: »

Agree on the need for a NW motorway, but disagree on your route choice. For me, the most effective route is:

(M1 Dublin-Dundalk)-N53-Castleblayney-N2-Monaghan-border-(A5)

OR

(M1/A1 Dublin-Newry)-A28 via Armagh-(A5)

both much shorter than an M3 extension, and serving much larger population corridors.

I'd add a third option here..... M1 > N33 (To Ardee) > N2 (to the Border).
This is the current preferred rout to the NW, and is the obvious choice for any future DC upgrade. This would link in perfectly with the A5 upgrade in the North.

Zoney

Here is a map I did up including these reclassifications (incl. the delayed N9 one). It includes motorways under construction or due to start - but not the planned ones (e.g. M17) because quite frankly even if some of those happen eventually, I don't think they'll be built that soon.



Note: I'm not sure whether some of the N10 might be placed under motorway restrictions - due to it connecting straight onto the M9 (possibly with a trumpet interchange?). Also I have not included the existing N10 - it is possible the eastern part of Kilkenny Ring Road and southern section of N10 would remain primary route - as the latter will also connect to the M9.

egan007

That map nicely demonstrates how the Government ignore the west and north west.

Zoney

egan007:

Well, there are plans for the west/northwest (I should do up another map including them) - M17, M20, 100s and 100s km of simple dual carriageway ("2+2") - e.g. N2/A5, rest of the N4, N17, much of N15, some of N21, all of N24, completely new N26.

One can hardly argue these could have been done ahead of the Dublin links, or indeed at the same time. I will however point out yet again the failure of the government to finish those links by 2006. If they had been, then by 2010 we might well have had M17 and M20 for starters, and a finished M18.

However, there's nothing can be done now - not least with a substantial minority of people (42%?) having voted Fianna Fáil first preference in the last general election.

spacetweek

The issue of the N10/M10 was brought to my attention by this post on Sabre - the bloke correctly points out that the N10 Link Road will freeflow with a trumpet (visible on page 3 of this. I've looked at the whole link road and it doesn't seem to have any frontage access until you get to a roundabout right before Kilkenny. So it's hard to know where the motorway restrictions will start and end. (Full list of drawings.)

Overall, it's good to see them rushing these changes through and getting the maximum value out of dual carriageways. It's a total of 202 km, though around 70k of that isn't built yet. We'll end up with a German-style road network, primarily composed of motorways linked by single carriageway, unlike the messier UK one where most of the trunk routes and a lot of link roads are dual, with a smaller number of very wide, very busy motorways.

By my calculations, we'll have 951 km of motorway by the end of 2010 - quite an achievement, considering we had 104 at the start of the decade.

1huge1

egan007 wrote: »

That map nicely demonstrates how the Government ignore the west and north west.

And how the only motorway not going to dublin is the one from Limerick to Galway.

Stark

It makes sense to serve Ireland's major cities first, before going to the trouble of building motorways serving tiny population centres in the middle of nowhere for the sake of making the map look more symmetric.

Zoney

Cork, Limerick and Galway, even Sligo, are not tiny population centres in the middle of nowhere - in Irish terms anyway, which is what counts. They will have to be better connected if they are to be developed as economic anchors for large chunks of the country. The *only* sensible option is to better invest in the regions in order that they contribute more to the national economy - without investment you simply end up having swathes of country to keep running that less and less people are going to live in - and yet at the same time have to ramp up spending in Dublin. It is already quite inefficient to have a quarter of the population clustered around Dublin. The current situation is no good for Dublin nevermind the regions.

In the absence of Greater Dublin seceding from Ireland, what's good for the regions is good for Dublin.

BluntGuy

spacetweek wrote: »

The issue of the N10/M10 was brought to my attention by this post on Sabre - the bloke correctly points out that the N10 Link Road will freeflow with a trumpet (visible on page 3 of this. I've looked at the whole link road and it doesn't seem to have any frontage access until you get to a roundabout right before Kilkenny. So it's hard to know where the motorway restrictions will start and end. (Full list of drawings.)

Overall, it's good to see them rushing these changes through and getting the maximum value out of dual carriageways. It's a total of 202 km, though around 70k of that isn't built yet. We'll end up with a German-style road network, primarily composed of motorways linked by single carriageway, unlike the messier UK one where most of the trunk routes and a lot of link roads are dual, with a smaller number of very wide, very busy motorways.

By my calculations, we'll have 951 km of motorway by the end of 2010 - quite an achievement, considering we had 104 at the start of the decade.

Well, I'm the 'bloke' who made that. and according to my calculations we'll have 1108 km of motorway in Ireland by 2015. Not sure about the 2010.

I totally agree with what you said about the road network. A wide network of D2M motorway-standard roads, rather than a relatively small number of D3M (which need consistent upgrading) will do so much more for us in the long-term.