M6 - Galway City Ring Road [planning decision pending]

brianc89

I don't know the route well enough, but given the level of work done to date including CPO notices etc, can the current route be maintained while significantly reducing the cost through fewer junctions or 2+2 instead of motorway?

Or are we back to drawing board again if a road is needed?

Seth Brundle

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120219265#Comment_120219265

I'd revert back to my point that they haven't preformed proper studies into traffic numbers because they haven't accounted for any displacement that would make use of proper PT or AT if it were available. How do I know this? Because they haven't any plans for PT or AT options. They could have planned and built proper PT & AT infrastructure several times since the project commenced but for whatever reason it was all about getting the road built - and only the road.

So if a new road is needed, who is it for? How many people will need it daily? Will it discourage people from using PT/AT and back into cars? How will the introduction of a new road affect existing traffic flows at interchanges? What impact on CO2 emissions will it have?

So far, there has been a headstrong approach with absolutely no willingness to look at any alternative options, even for the sake of reducing cost. As has been said loads of times, the current plan is to build a large road with no details on how or when they will improve PT or AT. And to top it off, they admit that it will make traffic worse! There is no way in hell that this project will represent value for money. I would also point out that, like others, I am not against road building in any way. But what is on offer here is not a solution for anyone.

ratracer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120219265#Comment_120219265

I don’t think it even got to the stage of CPO’s being issued though.

I feel very sorry for the 44 households and the businesses located along the route, who have been stuck in limbo for the last 10 years not knowing if they would have to move home, not being able to sell, not knowing whether to precede with home upgrades to energy efficiency etc as they are at the mercy of court decisions/ appeals etc throughout this sorry saga.

Pete_Cavan

There are two red herrings which have been pushed repeatedly by those promoting this road. These are 1. that this road is necessary to provide access to/from Connemara (usually accompanied by a sob story about Connemara) and 2. that is necessary to create another bridge over the Corrib (coupled with a vague reference to the existing N6 bridge getting bus lanes). Two noble and worthwhile objectives, but neither intrinsically linked to what has been designed.

While the road as designed may allow for both of those things, a motorway from Coolagh to Barna is not necessary for either. For example, both of those objectives could be achieved by branching off the N6 west of the N83, bridge over the river and swing north to connect to the N59 (maybe a quarter of what has been designed). That of course doesn't facilitate mass car commuting so isn't worth talking about.

Once you accept that the link between both those objectives and the road as designed is a fallacy, it then becomes clear that the purpose of the road as designed is to facilitate and increase car commuting. Those in favour bang the Connemara/third bridge drums because those things are more acceptable than "but I want to drive everywhere but don't want to sit in traffic". It's the equivalent of "what about aul'wans/disabled people" when removing car parking spaces is suggested. It's a socially acceptable thing to hang your own selfish desires on.

TnxM17

The updated National Development Plan has been posted in a seperate thread by @neiljung

https://www.gov.ie/en/publication/0969b-ministerial-brief-december-2022/

Of note to this thread is the following on page 77:

The NTA will shortly commence a review of the 2016 Galway Transport Strategy and the development of a new metropolitan area transport strategy for Galway, with an expected publication of a final strategy before the end of 2023.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120219723#Comment_120219723

Being realistic, I can't see that new strategy being published until late Q1 2024 if not later though I hope to be wrong about that

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120217831#Comment_120217831

Yep. There’s other things that need doing. But until it does arrive that would mean shutting things down- mitigating through extreme measures such as water based transport across a city. And there are those who focus on making sure it, its predecessors or its successors never arrive instead of focussing on the other parts. They feel the need to kill the crossings stone dead. It’s too valuable a traffic deterrent.

“There are two red herrings which have been pushed repeatedly by those promoting this road. These are 1. that this road is necessary to provide access to/from Connemara (usually accompanied by a sob story…”

You lost me at “sob story”. It’s like talking to a Brexiteer.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120217876#Comment_120217876

Can’t fault that.

brianc89

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120220928#Comment_120220928

I also don't appreciate this view. Someone else posted that only 3% of traffic is cross county (East Galway to Connemara say). I know people who simply don't, or very rarely, cross the county due to the congestion. It's only 3% cause it's not worth the stress.

On the other hand @[Deleted User] one could definitely argue that city planners are extremely reluctant to rollout PT / AT improvements for fear it'll reduce the support / requirement for the road.

Ah, the 3% chicken/egg problem returns. F*ck Connemara, they are staristically insignificant. Different century, different bunch of politicos, same Trevelyanist thinking. “We cannot waste funds on them, they do not matter enough to us.”

brianc89

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120220963#Comment_120220963

What about my second point? No sarcastic comment for that? 😂

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120220973#Comment_120220973

My apologies Brian, It wasn’t your mention of it I was referring to. It was-

“the movement of traffic going from one side of Galway to get to the other may look obvious it only accounts for 3% of traffic.”

If I *really* wanted to be sarcastic I would have said “The Movement told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command. ” But no. Not my way. No need to get into that crap.

This new boards layout has me posting multiple times to respond to different posters, and doing it on the phone means sometimes the Quote button does nothing. It was some previous antiroad (anti this road, as any mention of “antiroad” I make in context refers to here) poster that brought it in. Two of them rubbing out Connemara as a statistical anomaly to be ignored. Better I ignore them and remain civil.

Re: your second point, it’s certainly pertinent. It’s the whole either/or argument, and the kind of thing politicos love to do because they *hate* doing the hard work of doing all to certain degrees.

On your first, I’ve made the point before but I would posit that the congestion itself would be viewed as a positive thing by the more militant Green-cause activists. A deterrent against increased activity across the city, and a suppressant of one-off housing demand in Connemara, and population demand in general.

And, to be clear, I am not of the opinion that any of the posters here are so militant as to want to preserve the congestion as an anti-car deterrent. None of you want that. None of us want that.

timmyntc

If you care so much for connemara through-traffic, then you should be pushing for greater PT within city limits, which will take traffic off of city roads allowing through-traffic an easier run.

Larbre34

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120240558#Comment_120240558

So you're in favour of extraneous traffic in City Centres?

Thats a position I've never heard anyone take before.

what_traffic

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120220963#Comment_120220963

Why the focus on the 1/10 who are coming from South (3-4% ) and North (5-6%) Connemara who want to "bypass" the City. What about the 9/10 who want to go into the City? Sort that out first I would say as a Connemara person. Spend the funds on that.

Anybody travelling in the Coast Road and Clifden Road this week will tell you there are very little car traffic .... oh its Mid-Term. Take a lot of peak car traffic on the Clifden Road by just building a large Secondary School in Moycullen.

timmyntc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120240566#Comment_120240566

Crossing the N6 is not "in city centres", and yes given the circumstances traffic that bypasses the city is fine. The intra-city commuters make up the majority of all car traffic - if you were to remove all bypass traffic immediately it would make no difference to congestion.

The problem is those who could be using PT but instead drive - they live in areas where PT can be provided and can be viable (knocknacarra, barna, doughiska, oranmore, athenry, baile chláir, etc) All those places can be served with PT and city PT can be improved and most people going to school, work, or shopping in city can be facilitated.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120242696#Comment_120242696

Look, you’re not getting Car-to-PT voluntarily. Ever. Not in the volumes you would need to meet targets. You know this. So you need to force it. But of course no one’s ever going to vote to take cars away, they’re like Yanks with guns. So you make sure the physical environment can’t put them on.

it’s all about making the choice not a choice. And the congestion, the road scarcity, they are tools to squeeze people out of the hated cars.

”Don’t care where they go, just they’re not in cars. F*ck ‘em.”

you’ll fig leaf about PT and active travel and “no such thing as bad weather just bad clothing” yada yada but this is all about f*cking over the hated car.

now I’m no fan of cars myself & I’ll take the measures presented. But we need to go the tax, licencing & scrappage route. A tax on cars hurts cars. A lack of road hurts all. A lack of road caps the population. Car or no car.

TnxM17

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120243047#Comment_120243047

It’s interesting that in your posts supporting the GCRR you are putting out shall we say ‘interesting’ theories rather than what actual benefits might accrue from building the road in its current plan.

I don’t hate cars, in fact I quite like my own. And I currently need it for work as it takes me over the west & northwest of the country. However, I shouldn't need it for getting around town. I am meeting someone in town soon, to walk is about 29 mins, to drive is 6, cycle 7. The bus will only take me part way. The TII bikes are in the city, so no use. And the Brite bikes are not out until IIRC next month. When those are the choices people will go with the most convenient are cheapest

It’s what’s on the slab. And has been for the past thirty years. Details change but the essentials stay the same. You can BS all you want about your theories, but we already have indications that the thirty years of antiroad holdup are having an effect on population numbers & growth in Galway & Connemara.

https://connachttribune.ie/galway-city-is-failing-to-meet-key-population-growth-targets/

https://www.advertiser.ie/galway/article/105736/hid-globals-move-to-city-shows-connemara-not-a-priority-for-government

timmyntc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120243662#Comment_120243662

That move into the city is because of the difficulty in acquiring staff - many people do not drive, and the public transport options for getting out there were awful. The work is not high paid, but because of the location was only open to people who owned a car.

Moving to the city opens those job prospects to people living in the city, younger people, people without cars, etc. The ring road would have done nothing to stop this move.

So “no one wants to live in connemara- and that’s how it has to stay. Because they get two mountain passes and two city-deep bridges or a f*cking boat, and let them be happy about it, the ungrateful sh*ts”

i get it on the green end. “Connemara is full of the kind of natural wild beauty we need to replicate all over the country when the humans get it that their place is in the city, stop building one offs out there and start the rewilding of filthy, filthy meat grazing land. It’s the backarse of nowhere and it has to stay that way.”

Pete_Cavan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120244196#Comment_120244196

Nobody said like the hyperbolic nonsense you seem to be attributing to others. They are your words, even if you put them in quotation marks.

You seem to love a bit of self-loathing.

Is that lad able to read my posts? I can’t read him, I have him on ignore I think from the Galway county hamsterwheel thread. I’d love to know why that too became a “National Anti-car Movement News” thread as well, but hey-ho…

hans aus dtschl

SeaSlacker, you'll notice that I haven't commented or replied to you one way or the other on here or anywhere else, but would you mind giving it a rest? It's getting boring at this stage.

Seth Brundle

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120247371#Comment_120247371

I think he might be referring to me because I previously told him to grow up or something or else it was because I told him to shut up with this paranoia about some kind of well funded national anti-roads movement.

hans aus dtschl

I don't even mind that that's their point of view: people can believe in conspiracy theories all they want, it's just that sifting through the same post over and over again is boring.

There's been loads of good discussion in this thread with lots of people arguing for and against the Galway ring road, it's just taken a weird turn in the last two or three pages.

Green Peter

With all this hot air maybe balloons would be an option.

*edit: post had detail lost by phone. Will return & give detail*

Sam Russell

Mod: This thread is heading down a rabbit hole.

I will close it for now for review.