Should Ireland and Britain build a bridge/underground

My name is Mud · 02-02-2009 5:00pm

Malta is a European country that is also an island

mowgli-mcnob · 02-02-2009 5:02pm

Good idea but who would you trust to build it?! If Irish people were involved the tunnel wouldn't meet in the middle! and would be too small to fit trucks or would leak!! And of course, it would go over budget!

Professey Chin · 02-02-2009 5:20pm

xOxSinéadxOx wrote: »

yeah but britain could do it!

But then theyre takin our jerbs:(

robinph · 02-02-2009 6:05pm

When was England an island?

Lump · 02-02-2009 6:11pm

There are already plans to do this......

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/south_west/4121001.stm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Sea#Proposed_tunnel_projects

I also remember reading in the Irish Times about it, along with plans to build a massive sea wall/ring road across dublin bay to avoid flooding and complete a ring road around Dublin.

Lump · 02-02-2009 6:14pm

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2007/0825/1187332533418.html

I don't have a log in but there's some of the article.

Fratton Fred · 02-02-2009 6:33pm

Riddle101 wrote: »

Cyprus is not a country, i'm talking about countries that are islands

in that case, neither is Ireland. Problem solved.

af_thefragile · 02-02-2009 6:39pm

^Oh and cyprus is a country!

Lump wrote: »

There are already plans to do this......

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/south_west/4121001.stm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Sea#Proposed_tunnel_projects

I also remember reading in the Irish Times about it, along with plans to build a massive sea wall/ring road across dublin bay to avoid flooding and complete a ring road around Dublin.

It'ld cost €20 billion!
No way anyone's gonna bother. I think the catapult and mattresses idea has more of a chance!

Alun · 02-02-2009 6:46pm

robinph wrote: »

When was England an island?

As a Brit myself, it always amuses me that Irish people get all uptight about the Brits not knowing that Ireland isn't part of the UK, yet often refer to that big island over the Irish sea as England, or talk about such mythical concepts as "English reg" cars, "English customs", or the "English army".

SheroN · 02-02-2009 6:48pm

Malta.

Cool Mo D · 02-02-2009 6:55pm

Technically, Cyprus is in Asia, not Europe, even though it is in the EU.

Irish Halo · 02-02-2009 7:08pm

MYOB wrote: »

Our train tracks are a different width to the UK and the rest of Europe; so any train tunnel would have to be operated Le Shuttle like with people changing trains - no Eurostar for onward journeys.

I think this is the biggest stumbling block really, I never understood why Ireland has a different gauge to Britain, I mean when the tracks etc were being set the two countries were part of the union so you'd think ... oh wait was that the problem? The need for forethought? OK never mind.

bikki · 02-02-2009 7:23pm

U seen the balls they made of the port tunnel. So britian would build there half on time and on budget, 6 years later we would finish our half and be bankrupt

Richard · 02-02-2009 7:30pm

bikki wrote: »

U seen the balls they made of the port tunnel. So britian would build there half on time and on budget, 6 years later we would finish our half and be bankrupt

It's interesting that a lot of people here see the British as being organised and efficient, yet many British wouldn't agree with you and instead look to the Germans or Japanese as examples of efficiency.

ART6 · 02-02-2009 7:31pm

Teleportation will be discovered in the next 50 years, and then roads, railways, tunnels, bridges, planes etc will become irrelevant. "Beam me up Scotty." Welcome to the truly green society.

Professey Chin · 02-02-2009 7:33pm

ART6 wrote: »

Teleportation will be discovered in the next 50 years, and then roads, railways, tunnels, bridges, planes etc will become irrelevant. "Beam me up Scotty." Welcome to the truly green society.

Unless these teleporters work on fossil fuels

Richard · 02-02-2009 7:39pm

af_thefragile wrote: »

^Oh and cyprus is a country!

Correct. The Republic of Cyprus covers the whole island, although the northern part is occupied by Turkey (I know there are differing views on this but only one country recognises that Northern Cyprus is not occupied and that's Turkey). The Greek part is ethnically Greek and speaks Greek but is not part of Greece. They joined the EU only in recent years and swapped the Cypriot Pound for the Euro even more recently.

And I'd doubt you'd get a tunnel out to it.

As for the different railway gauge in Ireland - the Irish gauge used to be wider but they decided to make it halfway between this old gauge and the main British gauge for some reason.

Cool Mo D · 02-02-2009 7:43pm

And even though the Port Tunnel was leaky and took forever to build, it did come in on budget, which is more than can be said for the channel tunnel.

Lump · 02-02-2009 7:57pm

And wasn't it designed by a Brit? So the fact that it's too small can be blamed on them

BlitzKrieg · 02-02-2009 8:01pm

if iceland joins the EU can we build a tunnel to them aswell?

galwayrush · 02-02-2009 8:22pm

We can't even manage a by-pass in Claregalway , Co Galway.:rolleyes:

bikki · 02-02-2009 8:35pm

Cool Mo D wrote: »

And even though the Port Tunnel was leaky and took forever to build, it did come in on budget, which is more than can be said for the channel tunnel.

The tender price for construction of the tunnel was €457 million. The final project cost was brought to €752 million

javaboy · 02-02-2009 8:39pm

bikki wrote: »

The tender price for construction of the tunnel was €457 million. The final project cost was brought to €752 million

Yes but it took way longer than it was supposed to so you have to allow for inflation.

bikki · 02-02-2009 8:45pm

Sure i worked fitting out the controll building, i was getting paid for weekends i didnt even work on.

The Glass windows coving the Controll room cost 18k each.

They broke 1 of them 3 times while i was there.

I built big fancy curved ceilings in there and my company charged a fortune for them.

galwayrush · 02-02-2009 9:20pm

If a tunnell ever happened, i'll bet our half will cost more , take longer and end up being too low.;)

Cool Mo D · 02-02-2009 9:34pm

bikki wrote: »

The tender price for construction of the tunnel was €457 million. The final project cost was brought to €752 million

Yes, €450 million was the original construction estimate, which didn't include land acquisition, legal costs or financing. €750 million was the original estimate of how much the whole package would cost.

02-02-2009 9:40pm

banshee_bones wrote: »

where would you locate it?

under da sea
darling it's better down where it's wetter - take it from me!

02-02-2009 10:05pm

Why think so small? Why not a tunnel to New York? Or an escalator to the moon?

Riddle101 · 02-02-2009 10:44pm

Deleted User wrote: »

Why think so small? Why not a tunnel to New York? Or an escalator to the moon?

A tunnel to New York? Do you really want to give America an excuse to call us the 51st State, it's bad enough most Americans think we're part of Great Britain.

An esculator to the moon? Why would you want to go to the moon, it'd be like going to Leitrim for the Weekend........Boring. I'm sorry to the Leitrim Boardsies for that comment

galwayrush · 02-02-2009 11:04pm

Riddle101 wrote: »

An esculator to the moon? Why would you want to go to the moon, it'd be like going to Leitrim for the Weekend........Boring. I'm sorry to the Leitrim Boardsies for that comment

No, an escalator does not require Boring. a Tunnel however does.:D
A Tunnel to NY would be the biggest Boring project ever.:D

Should Ireland and Britain build a bridge/underground

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