Good News for Ireland: New Runway in Dublin shelved

Húrin

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2008/1218/1229523051614.html

I am happy to report the best news of the recession yet. Due to the need to cut costs, Dublin Airport Authority is shelving its plans to build a new runway at that airport. It had hoped to more than double passenger numbers to 60 million per year, but the oul' credit crunch has thrown a spanner in.

So why is this a big deal? It's good because it gives us more time to ensure that when the economy picks up again, they will not have the chance to build it.

According to economist Matt Harley, the new runway will cost over €13 billion, when all costs are taken into account, most of it being paid by us. This is the kind of pollution project we don't need, especially in a recession.

It will more than double the carbon dioxide emissions from the airport and thus cause €8.4 billion in climate change damage (which is part of the above €13bn+ cost).

It will put 19 schools under 70 decibels of noise every day.

Furthermore, if the runway is ever built, jet fuel will be so expensive that it will hardly be used. I imagine a tribunal would be set up to find who wasted so much money on nothing.

Happy Christmas!

P.S. please use this thread to discuss the runway and airport related subjects, NOT whether climate change is real or not.

Liam Byrne

Well, considering that we have 2 or 3 underused runways elsewhere in the country, that's great news!

The world doesn't have to revolve around Dublin, despite Q102's laughable claim that it's "the world's greatest city".....

Victor

Húrin wrote: »

It will put 19 schools under 70 decibels of noise every day.

Assuming you are a member of UPROAR.

Surely your problem is when it goes over 70 decibels? Of course, this is slightly irrelevant as it is the internal, not external noise levels that count (35-45 dB being preferred for school work) and the DAA have said they'll mitigate noise effects.

Of course, the parallel runway has been in the county development plan since the 1970s, but people still built in the area.

Darragh29

It's probably to cut down on the number of people trying to get out of the country!

Moriarty

Ever wondered why property was cheaper around an airport, Hurin? That's right, noise pollution. NIMBYs one and all. Suck it up or move.

As Victor said, there's been longterm plans for a second runway, it hasn't come as any sort of a surprise. Hopefully DAA will be wise enough to get work underway on the runway while costs are still low in the construction sector over the next few years.

Manic Moran

So, Hurin, if I may inquire, what is the alternative plan?

The economy will presumably pick itself up again, and traffic loads out of Dublin will also presumably pick up again. There will be a demand for capacity which can only be met by air travel. It's not as if we can take a high-speed-train from Dublin to Paris like the British can from London.

Near as I can tell, the options are three in number.

1) Do nothing. Have an overstretched Dublin airport. This has reprecussions on anything from quality of service and traveller demand through to safety.

2) Build a second airport somewhere else. Baldonnel has been proposed as an alternative. Now, if people are complaining about the amount of money it will cost just to expand an additional runway to DUB, how much money do you think it will cost to expand to build an entire second international airport? Face it, Dublin is not the size of London, you don't need a Heathrow and a Gatwick. And you can't afford to spend gadzillions of Euro to do something which can be achieved far more cheaply by upgrading existing infrastructure.

3) Expand Dublin airport.

Unless I'm missing a fourth option, this seems to be a no-brainer.

NTM

SeanW

The OP is a hardline environmentalist. Economic hardship? Yeehaw! Cancelled road and/or airport projects? Lets Party!

Of course, this ignores the fact that Dublin Airport really needs this runway - Dublin has the lowest spec runway of any main runway in any capital city in Europe, and as a result, heavily laden freight planes headed for Dublin must partially unload at another Airport because it is so short (2.637km). Dublin also cannot handle the Airbus A380.
A much higher spec runway exists in Ireland - at Shannon. Shannon's runway was built to take just about anything the skies could throw at it - and the A380 is well within its capabilities.

And BTW that was not an oversight - government policy has historically been to screw Dublin for the regions (mostly Shannon) and aviation has been a major focus of this. The disparity in runway specifications for example was to attempt to force fully loaded freight planes to partially unload at Shannon, but most such planes from the East, do this in Manchester.
Very efficient.
So the "crunch" means that Dublin gets to continue playing the lame-duck of Europe in terms of aviation, and the OP couldn't be happier.

The OP also gets most of his data from norunway.com ... gee, you don't think they have an agenda, by any chance?

Schuhart

Liam Byrne wrote: »

Well, considering that we have 2 or 3 underused runways elsewhere in the country, that's great news!

The world doesn't have to revolve around Dublin, despite Q102's laughable claim that it's "the world's greatest city".....

The decision to stunt Dublin's runway as part of the old Shannon stopover regime actually has the impact of cutting the whole country out of markets that Shannon just cannot compete in. The proof of the pudding is the eating - despite decades of preferential treatment, Shannon is still making losses and unable to make any meaningful contribution to national development. This contrasts with Cork with, despite several disadvantages with its location, actually manages to turn over a profit.

Shannon proves the error in your mindset. In the West, we built it but they didn't come. In the East, we didn't build it but people came anyway.

But, most of all, your (sadly not rare) hatred of Dublin retards national development. Because if you strangle Dublin, you make London your capital. But maybe that's what you want.

Incidently, delighted to see Shannon's connections to the mother country have been restored.

Húrin

Manic Moran wrote: »

The economy will presumably pick itself up again, and traffic loads out of Dublin will also presumably pick up again.

Yes, the economy will pick up, and perhaps even traffic at the airport will pick up for a short time. But not for long enough to justify this runway.

SeanW wrote: »

The OP is a hardline environmentalist. Economic hardship? Yeehaw! Cancelled road and/or airport projects? Lets Party!

I am not a hardline environmentalist. I am simply treating climate change with the seriousness it merits. This is in sharp contrast to the doublethink prevalent here in Europe, where the media and politicans say that climate change is so serious, biggest challenge ever, etc, but at the same time we must keep increasing CO2 emissions.

I also did not say that economic hardship was good. I said that this was a good effect of the recession. This surely implies that the recession on the whole is bad, which is indeed my opinion, but I can see that there is a silver lining in this cloud too.

So the "crunch" means that Dublin gets to continue playing the lame-duck of Europe in terms of aviation, and the OP couldn't be happier.

Yes, I am glad that we are not blindly rushing into building a new runway on the mere presumption that demand will exist for it, and that it will make more than it costs, and that it is compatible with the goals for reducing carbon dioxide emissions. Unlike Heathrow. Gordon Brown is even willing to commit political suicide to appease the aviation industry.

Reducing emissions will likely be a difficult process, and there are plenty more essential industries which need the emissions credits than aviation.

The OP also gets most of his data from norunway.com ... gee, you don't think they have an agenda, by any chance?

They do have an agenda, but so does DAA, and anyone else when they claim a new runway to be essential for the country's economy. UPROAR also have strong arguments and figures to back them up. Did you read the site or just judge by the name?

It is also interesting that they do not base their agenda on climate change, but for the most part on conventional economics and noise pollution.

djpbarry

Liam Byrne wrote: »

Well, considering that we have 2 or 3 underused runways elsewhere in the country, that's great news!

"Elsewhere in the country" is not much good to Dublin, is it?

Liam Byrne wrote: »

The world doesn't have to revolve around Dublin, despite Q102's laughable claim that it's "the world's greatest city".....

Whether you like to admit it or not, this country does, pretty much, revolve around Dublin, economically at least.

Manic Moran wrote: »

Have an overstretched Dublin airport. This has reprecussions on anything from quality of service and traveller demand through to safety.

Not to mention major inefficiency.

Victor

Liam Byrne wrote: »

Well, considering that we have 2 or 3 underused runways elsewhere in the country, that's great news! The world doesn't have to revolve around Dublin, despite Q102's laughable claim that it's "the world's greatest city".....

"The West" is at the far side of an island, across the water, across an island, across the water from the edge of a continent. Shannon is useful for aircraft with short maximum ranges (whether by design or cargoload) or as a mid-point on extreme journeys. The west doesn't need and will not get the level of development that the east has or will get. To do so is economically and environmentally unsustainable.

But, hey, the West are experts at that.

PeakOutput

Húrin wrote: »

Yes, the economy will pick up, and perhaps even traffic at the airport will pick up for a short time. But not for long enough to justify this runway.

so you really believe deep down in your soul that there will be no flying machines or driving machines once the oil runs out(which is not going to happen before 2060 at the earliest).....really??? you really believe that???

Yes, I am glad that we are not blindly rushing into building a new runway on the mere presumption that demand will exist for it,

the demand is already there thats the problem. we are losing money in our economy because we dont have a bigger capacity airport in dublin

Reducing emissions will likely be a difficult process, and there are plenty more essential industries which need the emissions credits than aviation.

you clearly have no idea how big the aviation industry is and how important it is

It is also interesting that they do not base their agenda on climate change, but for the most part on conventional economics and noise pollution.

uproar are a joke and as usual its the vocal minority making changes that affect the majority in a negative way... and yes i live near the airport

mikemac

Húrin wrote: »

They do have an agenda, but so does DAA, and anyone else when they claim a new runway to be essential for the country's economy. UPROAR also have strong arguments and figures to back them up. Did you read the site or just judge by the name?

It is also interesting that they do not base their agenda on climate change, but for the most part on conventional economics and noise pollution.

Uproar have less to do about safety and pollution and more to do with devaluing houses in the area. Though this is happening everywhere anyway
You live within a few km of an airport then property may well be cheaper and yes, there were different types of pollution, particularly noise. It was always likely the airport was going to expand, did you think about that before moving to the area? Or if you are from Portmarnock, it's likely the airport (or airfield) was there before your house

I haven't studied any cost benefit analyses reports but I hope it if this runway is ever needed for strategic and infrastructure reasons, the national interest will outweigh a bunch of NIMBYs.

Húrin

PeakOutput wrote: »

so you really believe deep down in your soul that there will be no flying machines or driving machines once the oil runs out(which is not going to happen before 2060 at the earliest).....really??? you really believe that???

No, this is called making **** up that I didn't say, or a "straw man" in polite circles.

It's not oil running out that I'm concerned about. It's cheap oil running out that will doom aviation to be a minority pursuit.

There are non-petrol alternatives for cars. There are no such alternative fuels or technologies for aircraft.

the demand is already there thats the problem. we are losing money in our economy because we dont have a bigger capacity airport in dublin

My point is that high demand is not going to be sustained for the several decades that DAA thinks it will.

you clearly have no idea how big the aviation industry is and how important it is

You clearly have no idea how unsustainable it is.

uproar are a joke and as usual its the vocal minority making changes that affect the majority in a negative way... and yes i live near the airport

UPROAR make most of their arguments based on economics that affect the whole country. If their charges are so flimsy I'm sure you can refute them directly.

btw, UPROAR do not have the power to make changes, DAA do.

mikemac wrote: »

Uproar have less to do about safety and pollution and more to do with devaluing houses in the area. Though this is happening everywhere anyway

You live within a few km of an airport then property may well be cheaper and yes, there were different types of pollution, particularly noise. It was always likely the airport was going to expand, did you think about that before moving to the area? Or if you are from Portmarnock, it's likely the airport (or airfield) was there before your house

I haven't studied any cost benefit analyses reports but I hope it if this runway is ever needed for strategic and infrastructure reasons, the national interest will outweigh a bunch of NIMBYs.

I'm not from Portmarnock. Some of their reasons do indeed appeal to NIMBYs, but that is not by any means the core of their case, which is national economics.

All of you have ignored the fact that airport expansion is incompatible with complying with our national obligations on greenhouse gas emissions.

PeakOutput

Húrin wrote: »

No, this is called making **** up that I didn't say, or a "straw man" in polite circles.

It's not oil running out that I'm concerned about. It's cheap oil running out that will doom aviation to be a minority pursuit.

this is never going to happen, we are not just going to let aviation dissapear accept for the few rich elite who can afford it after so long of depending on it. its simply not going to happen

There are non-petrol alternatives for cars. There are no such alternative fuels or technologies for aircraft.

if an electric motor can drive a car it can drive a propellor aviation will change, this change will just not involve its dissapearance or even close to it. more than likely the solutions will be cheaper and more efficient than how we do it now and therefore open up aviation to an even bigger market, never under estimate human ingenuity

My point is that high demand is not going to be sustained for the several decades that DAA thinks it will.

You clearly have no idea how unsustainable it is.

oil prices will fluctuate gradually going up but prices will adjust and this necessary industry to the world economy will flourish there is simply to much at stake to even have the option of letting it dissappear on the table its just not going to happen and to think otherwise is lunacy to be honest

UPROAR make most of their arguments based on economics that affect the whole country. If their charges are so flimsy I'm sure you can refute them directly.

their main arguments all link to local pollution and local land value decrease this has always been the groups reason for existence

is there a group in shannon or cork protesting the creation of a new run way?

is there a group in carlow / kinnegad lobbying for a new airport to be built there instead which is were uproar suggest we build an airport instead of a new runway?

no theres not, there is a vocal local minority trying to make changes that suit them on a local level. dont get me wrong this local politics is the bane of the irish economy so they arent the only ones doing it but it dosnt make it any less ridicolous on a national level.

btw, UPROAR do not have the power to make changes, DAA do.

be thankfull for small graces

Húrin

PeakOutput wrote: »

this is never going to happen, we are not just going to let aviation disappear accept for the few rich elite who can afford it after so long of depending on it. its simply not going to happen

It happened before, thus it can happen again. Abusing the word 'simply' will not prove your point. I don't see how the economy is dependent on aviation either. The biggest benefit appears to be foreign tourists coming in and spending, though we lose as much potential tourist revenue by the numbers of Irish people flying off elsewhere for holidays.

I did not mention aviation disappearing either. I simply said that it should not be allowed to grow any further. How much aviation we can have will depend on how much emissions cuts can be made in other sectors of the economy which are more important.

if an electric motor can drive a car it can drive a propellor aviation will change

It surely will. But an aircraft combustion engine needs much more power than a car engine. It would do no good to have a plane running on alternative fuel or batteries, if not only the tanks but also the fuselage had to be filled with fuel/batteries to make a journey.

The volumes of people that currently fly could not be carried by propellor driven planes. That's why we have jet aircraft in the first place.

Alternative methods of jet propulsion are, at best on the drawing board and won't be realised for decades. We don't have that much time left to reduce emissions, or to wait for the cheap oil to keep on flowing. source

These things will happen. Ireland would be better off being prepared for them than being caught by surprise after wasting billions on useless infrastructure.

never under estimate human ingenuity

But don't put an almost religious faith in technology either.

oil prices will fluctuate gradually going up but prices will adjust and this necessary industry to the world economy will flourish there is simply to much at stake to even have the option of letting it dissappear on the table its just not going to happen and to think otherwise is lunacy to be honest

This certainly doesn't justify building a new runway.

their main arguments all link to local pollution and local land value decrease this has always been the groups reason for existence

Not really, on their runway page there's little about house prices. It's more about national economics, county planning and adverse health effects.

is there a group in shannon or cork protesting the creation of a new run way?

Are these airports planning to build new runways?

is there a group in carlow / kinnegad lobbying for a new airport to be built there instead which is were uproar suggest we build an airport instead of a new runway?

I expect not, and that is where I would sharply disagree with Harley. Such an airport would be a very stupid thing to build.

be thankfull for small graces

Like the recession's effect on DAA finances. :pac:

evercloserunion

Liam Byrne wrote: »

Well, considering that we have 2 or 3 underused runways elsewhere in the country, that's great news!

The world doesn't have to revolve around Dublin, despite Q102's laughable claim that it's "the world's greatest city".....

It doesn't have too, but it does. Expansion follows demand, not the whims of a few bitter culshies.

SeanW

Húrin wrote: »

I don't see how the economy is dependent on aviation either.

Methinks Húrin should look at Ireland's position on a world map ... Aviation is the only way we can send and retrieve goods, mail etc in a timely fashion, water transport has for the most part WORLDWIDE been sidelined to bulk and/or time insensitive freight shipments.
Ditto for passengers, very few passengers put to sea these days except short haul passengers and people with cars. Again, you want to sail to America or Japan? Forget it.
The world is much more globalised now than ever before, and Ireland depends on aviation. Deal with it.

I did not mention aviation disappearing either. I simply said that it should not be allowed to grow any further.

You obviously don't know much about Ireland's historical aviation policy which was to screw Dublin and give it a mutilated, underresourced infrastructure and handicap it with ridiculous bans and regulations at the behest of the professional victims in the West and particularly the Shannon whingers brigade.
It got so bad that the U.S. Civil Aeronautics Board threatened to kick Aer Lingus out of New York JFK altogether, unless some U.S. airlines were allowed to fly into Dublin, in 1971, hence the birth of the "Shannon Stopover" before this, service between Dublin and the U.S. of any kind was completely forbidden.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shannon_Airport#Shannon_Stopover

What the DAA had proposed, is a correction. Much like the other things that Dublin City needs, like the Interconnector railway tunnel, Metro North, extra Luases, certain road improvements, and a fine tuning of the bus network, are all corrections to combat the neglect that Dublin city has faced in past decades.

It surely will. But an aircraft combustion engine needs much more power than a car engine. It would do no good to have a plane running on alternative fuel or batteries, if not only the tanks but also the fuselage had to be filled with fuel/batteries to make a journey.

Boeing is investing heavily in algae-biofuel solutions for its aircraft, and there is a plan for a hydrogen fuelled aircraft on a drawing board somewhere. It would take up half a planes fuselage though.

In addition, cuts in Ireland's CO2 production could be achieved in other ways - we need to invest more in public transport, have proper development and building codes, use better technologies etc. And what about replacing fossil-fuel fired power stations with Nuclear Power? After all, since you propose damaging Irelands economy with this continue-with-the-status-quo stuff, surely in exchange some Green orthodoxy itself should be up for challenge.
I mean, if global climate change is this dire grave emergency that we're supposed to believe it is, and we're supposed to accept a million Carbon Taxes and bans on everything from patio heaters to traditional light bulbs (which actually have an important use in places like attics and staircase cupboards etc), why are the Green Parties of the world not re-evaluating their anti-Nuclear orthodoxy?

jmayo

SeanW wrote: »

...
Of course, this ignores the fact that Dublin Airport really needs this runway - Dublin has the lowest spec runway of any main runway in any capital city in Europe, and as a result, heavily laden freight planes headed for Dublin must partially unload at another Airport because it is so short (2.637km). Dublin also cannot handle the Airbus A380.
A much higher spec runway exists in Ireland - at Shannon. Shannon's runway was built to take just about anything the skies could throw at it - and the A380 is well within its capabilities.

And BTW that was not an oversight - government policy has historically been to screw Dublin for the regions (mostly Shannon) and aviation has been a major focus of this....

So I guess that was why the Shannon LHR link was removed ?
Stop having a go at anything outside Dublin just because some nimbys are having a go at expanding the runways in Dublin.
Dublin airport is also a joke becuase there is no proper public transport infrastructure linking it to the city or the country.
BTW ditto with Shannnon but that will probably never affect you.

Victor wrote: »

"The West" is at the far side of an island, across the water, across an island, across the water from the edge of a continent. Shannon is useful for aircraft with short maximum ranges (whether by design or cargoload) or as a mid-point on extreme journeys. The west doesn't need and will not get the level of development that the east has or will get. To do so is economically and environmentally unsustainable.

But, hey, the West are experts at that.

Yeah, but you will be damm glad of the gas from "the West", if it ever materialises, keeping your ass warm.
The fact that most development in Ireland is centered around the Dublin metro area is also screwing up the country.
As mod of Acc & Prop forum you will have noticed that lots of people have had to move out almost as far as the Shannon in order to work in the great capital.
This has created numerous satelite towns and villages littering the midlands that are bereft of social infrastructure and are future problems.
Stop having a go at the west because you have nimbys in Dublin.

evercloserunion wrote: »

It doesn't have too, but it does. Expansion follows demand, not the whims of a few bitter culshies.

It is "culchies".
If you are going to use labels to try and insult people at least learn how to spell them.
As above stop having a go at the west because you have nimbys in Dublin.

Now I guess I should return to try and pull one over my eastern brethern and get my new runway built in the backyard
No nimbys down here....

dodgyme

SeanW wrote: »

And BTW that was not an oversight - government policy has historically been to screw Dublin for the regions (mostly Shannon) and aviation has been a major focus of this.

Now that is simply not true and very simplistic argument. Dublin needs proper infrastructure but for example if the luas lines are built and dont join up you can hardly blame it on gov policy being bias towards the west. It just bad planning. No other city outside Dublin has a Luas line for example and wont and probably shouldnt. That means funds are going to the area with greatest need i.e. Dublin, however that shouldnt mean everywhere else gets nothing. Planning has been the greatest problem in this country and the focus then turns into a dub v culchie BS argument. I am sick to the teeth of two types of people. People in the west whinging that they get nothing and Dubs p*ssing and moaning if anywhere else gets anything, the "what do ye need that down here" attitude. If it were a disease it a be called "Smallcountryitsis"

SeanW

jmayo wrote: »

So I guess that was why the Shannon LHR link was removed

... by a private company with a commercial mandate. Which, for whatever reason, necessitated EI getting the hell out of there at that time.
If this were 1970, the government would probably react by banning all Dublin-Heathrow air travel in an attempt to "fix" the "problem."

Stop having a go at anything outside Dublin just because some nimbys are having a go at expanding the runways in Dublin.

The O.P isn't a NIMBY, he's a hardcore environmentalist and, on the subject of roads and airports, is a BANANA (Build Absolutley Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone).

Dublin airport is also a joke becuase there is no proper public transport infrastructure linking it to the city or the country.

True. One of the many problems that requires correction.

BTW ditto with Shannnon but that will probably never affect you.

Actually I had to use Shannon a few times (mostly when I was growing up). It involved half a days travel over boreens to get to ... a Tier 1 International Airport out in the middle of nowhere.

This has created numerous satelite towns and villages littering the midlands that are bereft of social infrastructure and are future problems.

Agreed, my local area of Longford has, to a small extent become Dublin's bedroom - that was caused by failures on a number of fronts. Firstly, there was no effort to have a sensible property market - no decent building codes to make things like apartments pleasant, desirable places to live, and no effort to have sane property prices anywhere for any type of accomodation anywhere. That's why at the end of the property bubble (major part of the problem) you had people paying €750,000 for a 3 bed semi-D in Gorey.
If we had a government that didn't prostitute itself in front of developers at every turn, we might have seen more coherent urban planning that would have seen off much of this nonsense.

The second failure was the lack of a REAL plan to develop the regions, i.e. something other than pointless token gestures like de-centralisation (which should really be called dis-organisation for its practical effect on the public services) and various "screw Dublin" plans, all of which I believe have done more harm than good.

Stop having a go at the west because you have nimbys in Dublin.

I'm not having a go at the West, if you have something that makes sense, I'm all for it. Got a traffic problem? Fix it. I don't care if it's Newlands Cross or Culchimahon, if something is needed and makes sense, like an urban bypass, a railway or an Airport, I'm all for it.
What I object to is tomfoolery and gob****ery like what the professional victims in the West get up to, which when taken seriously usually does more harm than good.

jmayo

SeanW wrote: »

... by a private company with a commercial mandate. Which, for whatever reason, necessitated EI getting the hell out of there at that time.
If this were 1970, the government would probably react by banning all Dublin-Heathrow air travel in an attempt to "fix" the "problem."

The O.P isn't a NIMBY, he's a hardcore environmentalist and, on the subject of roads and airports, is a BANANA (Build Absolutley Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone).

Actually I had to use Shannon a few times (mostly when I was growing up). It involved half a days travel over boreens to get to ... a Tier 1 International Airport out in the middle of nowhere.

Agreed, my local area of Longford has, to a small extent become Dublin's bedroom - that was caused by failures on a number of fronts. Firstly, there was no effort to have a sensible property market - no decent building codes to make things like apartments pleasant, desirable places to live, and no effort to have sane property prices anywhere for any type of accomodation anywhere. That's why at the end of the property bubble (major part of the problem) you had people paying €750,000 for a 3 bed semi-D in Gorey.
If we had a government that didn't prostitute itself in front of developers, we might have seen more coherent urban planning that would have seen off much of this nonsense.

The second failure was the lack of a REAL plan to develop the regions, i.e. something other than pointless token gestures like de-centralisation (which should really be called dis-organisation for its practical effect on the public services) and various "screw Dublin" plans, all of which I believe have done more harm than good.

I'm not having a go at the West, if you have something that makes sense, I'm all for it. Got a traffic problem? Fix it. I don't care if it's Newlands Cross or Culchimahon, if something is needed and makes sense, like an urban bypass, a railway or an Airport, I'm all for it.
What I object to is tomfoolery and gob****ery like what the professional victims in the West get up to, which when taken seriously usually does more harm than good.

You see we do agree on lots of things, even nintyer99 and his education principles I see
There is no semblance of planning in this state. Build a road today in the full knowledge that it is already not suitable and will have to be reworked within few years e.g M50.
Allow small towns and villages to be overrun by badly built housing estates but do not improve the local schools, community centres etc.
No raillinks and poor bus service to boot.
I just do not condone turning this into a bash the west thread.
Shannon airport fulfilled a major purpose with stopovers for long haulflights at one period and they even based an industrial zone there which at least gave some focus for employment and development outside of the east coast.
Why they never put in rail links to Limerick and even Galway is beyond me.
At least it would have been a way of interlinking major airport to two growing urban areas but that might have been forward thinking I guess.

Never knew there were BANANAs
The only place apparently suitable for development according to them then is the Red Centre in Australia.
There are no people, no water really to pollute and sweet shag all else.
All new airports should be built 500 km west of Alice Springs :rolleyes:

Manic Moran

Dublin airport is also a joke becuase there is no proper public transport infrastructure linking it to the city or the country.

In fairness, though I do like rail, I've never had any great problems using either the 747 bus into town or those blue airlink buses, depending on which comes first. It's not as if people coming into DUB are shafted if they don't have someone to pick them up.

NTM

Fratton Fred

How is stopping the development of the main airport on an island a good thing?

Dublin is not competing with Limerick, it is competing with Warsaw and budapest. if flying into dublin becomes an even bigger pain in the arse, it just adds more weight to the arguement not to locate your business here.

dresden8

Fratton Fred wrote: »

Dublin is not competing with Limerick, it is competing with Warsaw and budapest. if flying into dublin becomes an even bigger pain in the arse, it just adds more weight to the arguement not to locate your business here.

Carbon savings on the double, Woo-hoo! Come Mister tallyman tally me banana carbon number!!!

And yes that is sarcasm, I've been badly misunderstood on this forum recently so I'll spell it out.

Húrin

SeanW wrote: »

Methinks Húrin should look at Ireland's position on a world map ... Aviation is the only way we can send and retrieve goods, mail etc in a timely fashion, water transport has for the most part WORLDWIDE been sidelined to bulk and/or time insensitive freight shipments.

Yes I agree that aviation is important for applications like international postage. Relatively few goods are so perishable that they need to be airlifted.
Shipping is not at all sidelined. Almost all foreign products that are in the shops are shipped in. Every shipyard in the world has a full order book (or did; I can imagine the recent crunch has cancelled a few orders).

I have said repeatedly before. I am not a hardline ideologue calling for the airport to be shut down and horse drawn carts to be the order of the day. You are setting up a parody of my argument in which I call for the end of aviation. It's called lying.

Ditto for passengers, very few passengers put to sea these days except short haul passengers and people with cars. Again, you want to sail to America or Japan? Forget it.

I think the greater good of the economy should not be subservient to increasing leisure flights. Rather, the other way round is how it should be.

The world is much more globalised now than ever before, and Ireland depends on aviation.

It's not about "now" - it's about the future. The economy is globalised now, but it may not be so globalised in the future. I don't expect the government to think beyond its five year term; do you too freely admit to such short term thinking?

You obviously don't know much about Ireland's historical aviation policy which was to screw Dublin and give it a mutilated, underresourced infrastructure and handicap it with ridiculous bans and regulations at the behest of the professional victims in the West and particularly the Shannon whingers brigade.

What the DAA had proposed, is a correction.

Dublin has the largest airport in the country by far.

...all corrections to combat the neglect that Dublin city has faced in past decades.

If Dublin has been neglected why has it been the focus of most new infrastructure such as the M1, M50, both Luas lines? If it has been neglected, why is Ireland more centred on it than ever before?

Boeing is investing heavily in algae-biofuel solutions for its aircraft, and there is a plan for a hydrogen fuelled aircraft on a drawing board somewhere. It would take up half a planes fuselage though.

Good for them. However, the current fleet are designed to be in the air decades from now.

As I said, the alternatives to kerosene are far from realisation.

Thus, there is not the time to allow aviation to grow before Ireland must reduce its carbon dioxide emissions.

In addition, cuts in Ireland's CO2 production could be achieved in other ways - we need to invest more in public transport, have proper development and building codes, use better technologies etc. And what about replacing fossil-fuel fired power stations with Nuclear Power?

Sure, why not? Probably a good idea. However, achieving the 90% cuts that we need to make in our emissions in the next couple of decades will not be easy. The most important sectors of the economy need the emissions credits to keep functioning through this transition. Believe it or not, there are more important sectors of the economy than aviation.

Let's be honest, claims that the capping of airport expansion will destroy Ireland's economy is just DAA scaremongering.

why are the Green Parties of the world not re-evaluating their anti-Nuclear orthodoxy?

I expect some of them are. But I'm not here to talk about nuclear power. The Green party in this country are the kind of ineffective idiots that plead with us to piously reduce our "carbon footprints" as Ireland's emissions keep growing and growing....

Big_Mac

SeanW wrote: »

... by a private company with a commercial mandate. Which, for whatever reason, necessitated EI getting the hell out of there at that time.
If this were 1970, the government would probably react by banning all Dublin-Heathrow air travel in an attempt to "fix" the "problem."

Aer Lingus needed the Landing slots in LHR to run their new link from belfast, and thats why the dropped Shannon. Turns out its not that profitable for them

Serves them right

SeanW

Húrin wrote: »

Shipping is not at all sidelined. Almost all foreign products that are in the shops are shipped in. Every shipyard in the world has a full order book (or did; I can imagine the recent crunch has cancelled a few orders).

Yes, for bulk, time insensitive, or low value shipments, shipping is the only sensible way. Got a coal mine in Australia and want to bring the coal to Ireland? It doesn't make sense to fly it over. Ditto for oil, bulk chemicals, steel and other commodities, even some foodstuffs (the formula for Bailey's Irish Cream was determined in part by the need to keep the cream and the alcohol mixed for 1 year including 6 months on the high seas).

But if you've just bought a bunch of high end graphics cards or other computer chips in China and want to ship them to Ireland, they'll be obsolete by the time they get here and you'll have lost 1/2 of your money.

It's not about "now" - it's about the future. The economy is globalised now, but it may not be so globalised in the future. I don't expect the government to think beyond its five year term; do you too freely admit to such short term thinking?

I'd like to see some hard evidence that the "it may not be so globalised in the future" before we decide to abandon a potentially vital piece of infrastructure.

Dublin has the largest airport in the country by far.

Perhaps by terminal space and passenger numbers, but Dublin is very much the poor relation in terms of runway specification, vis-a-vis Shannon (and that was deliberate) and vis-a-vis main airport-runways of capital cities all over Europe.

If Dublin has been neglected why has it been the focus of most new infrastructure such as the M1, M50, both Luas lines?

Because it needs it! All of it and a lot more, to correct historical abuse and neglect.
Fact 1: A deliberate decision was taken to hamstring Dublin's aviation infrastructure at every turn, this continued more or less until the breakup of Aer Rianta and the Open Skies agreement. Read the history of the Shannon Stopover, and remember that Dublin's existing runway is shorter than Shannons and the shortest of any main runway of any main airport of any capital city in Europe. All of this was done deliberately at the behest of the professional victims in the Shannon region.
Fact 2: In the 1980s the government of the day took a document called the DRRTS - Dublin Railway Rapid Transport Study, to the EC to procure development funding. That plan outlined a 3 line DART network, including the existing Dublin Suburban (which was converted into what we now call the DART), a connection from Heuston to the Connolly-Pearse main line, a spur to Tallaght etc.
The E.C. wrote out a cheque to pay for it, the government pocketed the money. CIE ended up having to borrow 100% of the cost of the 1 DART line that was built - on an existing twin track alignment!
Prior to that there were even plans to curtail or abandon the Dublin Suburban altogether!
Fact 3: The M50 was built originally as a Dublin Bypass, but was built under specification in most every respect, primarily the junctions (non-freeflow) and with not enough lanes, both of which became problems partly because:
Fact 4: Corruption. In the late 80s and early 90s, Dublin was allowed to grow wild with developer-led planning, and a lot of brown envelopes passed to FF councillors by said developers. That's why we had most of those Tribunals (though I could have guessed most of what they revealed).

All of this abuse and malinvestment requires an insane amount of corrections, these have begun (Luas, M50 works etc), more are underway and must continue into the future with things such as the DART Interconnector, Metro North and other projects though the focus should IMO now switch to public transport initiatives. That doesn't mean we should abandon certain projects just because we don't like their carbon footprint.

If it has been neglected, why is Ireland more centred on it than ever before?

Because large cities tend to the economic engines of the regions they're in - there probably wouldn't be much going on in Bavaria if Munich weren't there for example, and even though I personally spend very little time in Dublin I can clearly see that it's Ireland's economic engine, also Cork to a lesser extent.

If we do other projects while allowing the neglect and abuse of Dublin City to continue, it would be like putting a tailfin on your car while the steering wheel is ceasing up or the engine is falling out.

Let's be honest, claims that the capping of airport expansion will destroy Ireland's economy is just DAA scaremongering.

FrattonFred wrote:

Dublin is not competing with Limerick, it is competing with Warsaw and budapest. if flying into dublin becomes an even bigger pain in the arse, it just adds more weight to the arguement not to locate your business here.

QFT!