Motorway Redesignation sparks huge complaints

L1011

Bards wrote: »

Not true. The Waterford City Bypass will be DC but will be given special treatment between Western Link GSJ and Grannagh GSJ to ban Pedestrians ,Bicycles and Horse Drawn Carriages

See section 8.2 of the following

http://www.nra.ie/PublicPrivatePartnership/TollingDocumentation/file,16116,en.pdf

Thats under a set of toll bye laws. There isn't any provision for these to exist on public, untolled roads.

MLM

The Jack Lynch tunnel has restrictions; no pedestrians, cyclists, or horse drawn vehicles. It is untolled and not a motorway.

KevR

Zoney wrote: »

It's for those reasons that local users should have been inconvenienced, those users should be using the town and not the bypass now that it is firmly part of an M6 (even if it itself remains N) - I don't think people quite appreciate what a deathtrap this bypass will become with motorway traffic flying onto it and mingling with all-purpose traffic. Redesignating it motorway would at least have discouraged some of that.

If driving West along the M6 from the Dublin direction it is extremely difficult to stay at 100kmh on the Athlone Bypass

Also, for tourists or foreign truck drivers who may not be familiar with the area or Ireland's road network - it's not likely that they will expect to be faced with some slow moving vehicle/pedestian/cyclist after coming the whole way West Dublin on motorway with none of that.

It will be the same coming from the Galway side soon.

Stark

mysterious wrote: »

The town bridges suffers chronic congestion and can barely fit two trucks on it. These mattes dont' matter of course. I want my bluuuuuuuuue motorway.

Trucks are allowed use the motorway.

Zoney

mysterious wrote: »

I want my blue signs:D

When there is proper alternate route then I will be up for the Athlone bypass been a motorway.

The town bridges suffers chronic congestion and can barely fit two trucks on it. These mattes dont' matter of course. I want my bluuuuuuuuue motorway.


The decision was made, and logic prevailed. The Athlone bypass is not suitable as a motroway. With the steep gradients and lack of viable alternative routes for non motorway traffic.

If you're quite finished with the childish ranting, you should consider that the decision has not necessarily been made, just that the redesignation has not *yet* happened.

I sincerely hope logic and sense will eventually prevail and we won't have a gap in our motorway network just because of some objectors who shouldn't be using the Athlone bypass at present anyway if they were sensible (slow vehicles, pedestrians, cyclists, learners). Then again, lobbying by local interests (bypassed towns/businesses) has up until now prevented us from having motorway service areas - so maybe logic and sense will not prevail after all.

Tech3

clon wrote: »

28th August 2009

Wow thats not far away. It wont be too long before I'm on the M18 so.

Tech3

mysterious wrote: »

logic prevailed

No because do you remember who signed through these redesignations? Yes it was Noel Dempsey and you have to keep your followers in the midlands sweet. Its clearly a political decision.

L1011

MLM wrote: »

The Jack Lynch tunnel has restrictions; no pedestrians, cyclists, or horse drawn vehicles. It is untolled and not a motorway.

It has signs proclaiming such restrictions, nobody on here was able to find any actual legal basis for those signs when this was discussed before.

lucernarian

I've seen a lot of "negative" reasons about why the athlone bypass should not be left as a DC. The only positive (pro as opposed to anti-anti) reason I've noticed for the redesignation to M6 is...

Pretty blue lines on a map!

And that the road is safer by having no learners or some trailer-towers, pedestrians etc on it. (As opposed to simply slowing down for the small number of ??)

If anyone had a look at the map of athlone town, it's clear there are a lack of alternative routes to go from some areas to the others. It wouldn't really be an issue if there was another bridge crossing somewhere out of the actual town centre.

But there's not at the moment, and the DC is of a relatively low standard even if it's grade separated. So I think that the inconvenience that the ineligible vehicles and drivers would face, outweighs the slight inconvenience that a few vehicles would have by driving behind a slower vehicle.

My feeling is that there is little to be gained by the designation, and that locals in places like athlone must be complaining for a reason. They're more likely to know the uses of a particular DC than the general populace of boards.ie.

L1011

To_be_confirmed wrote: »

And that the road is safer by having no learners or some trailer-towers, pedestrians etc on it. (As opposed to simply slowing down for the small number of ??)

Traffic on a strategic route should not be expected to slow down for unfeasibly slow vehicles, doing so is unsafe in itself.

To ignore the safety claims for redesignation is to to stick ones head so far in the sand that ostriches get jealous.

You then try to make a needs of the few / needs of the many argument in the wrong direction - each of the tiny number of learners who are either breaking the law anyway or don't have the foresight to let their accompanying driver take over that veer off the ramp in to the outer lane at 35km/h affects hundreds of drivers. The number of ineligible vehicles is tiny. The number of eligible vehicles is huge. Each ineligible vehicle causes disruption to many other vehicles, not few.

lucernarian

That "strategic route" as you call it, is a decrepit DC, unlike most of the N6/M6. It was built to fit the traffic needs of the local area- as a bypass, not a section of an intercity motorway network like much of the other "bypasses" in this country.

There are safety reasons to have the DC upgraded, simply to better handle 100kph traffic regardless of it being a DC or motorway, but you seem to leave that out of the argument. My actual point in response to this, is that the pedestrian or slow, inexperienced vehicle is rarely the cause of an accident. The fast driver who crashes into them very often is. And Athlone town centre with its small bridge is not suitable to carry modern farm machinery. I still maintain the bypass is a safer place for such traffic, overall.

The only fair way to deal with existing safety issues is to reduce the speed limit or upgrade the DC/nearby roads.

And if the number of ineligible people are so few, why are there "huge complaints" over such designations?? Including from councillors, who don't exactly take the side of one voter against lots of voters.

Bards

To_be_confirmed wrote: »

That "strategic route" as you call it, is a decrepit DC, unlike most of the N6/M6. It was built to fit the traffic needs of the local area- as a bypass, not a section of an intercity motorway network like much of the other "bypasses" in this country.

There are safety reasons to have the DC upgraded, simply to better handle 100kph traffic regardless of it being a DC or motorway, but you seem to leave that out of the argument. My actual point in response to this, is that the pedestrian or slow, inexperienced vehicle is rarely the cause of an accident. The fast driver who crashes into them very often is. And Athlone town centre with its small bridge is not suitable to carry modern farm machinery. I still maintain the bypass is a safer place for such traffic, overall.

The only fair way to deal with existing safety issues is to reduce the speed limit or upgrade the DC/nearby roads.

And if the number of ineligible people are so few, why are there "huge complaints" over such designations?? Including from councillors, who don't exactly take the side of one voter against lots of voters.

It's the variance in speed that causes problems,

KevR

To_be_confirmed wrote: »

My actual point in response to this, is that the pedestrian or slow, inexperienced vehicle is rarely the cause of an accident. The fast driver who crashes into them very often is.

I couldn't disagree more.

Someone driving at the 100kmh speed limit on the bypass will very rarely (by that I mean effectively never) cause an accident because of their speed.

1. Someone driving very slowly could cause a pile up.
2. Someone driving a tractor half in/half out of the hard shoulder causes dangerous swerving which could easily lead to an accident.
3. Someone merging onto the DC from a standing position in the HS or merging at too slow a speed could cause crash/pile-up.
4. Pedestrians/cyclists in the hard shoulder might not cause an accident as such but what if, in an emergency, someone has to use the hard shoulder/emergency lane? The pedestrian or cyclist could get knocked down (especially in poor visibility).
5. Also, the slow moving vehicles (which really shouldn't be there themselves) which use the HS could hit a pedestrian or cyclist if visibilty is poor.
6. Pedestrians and cyclist who have to cut across the weaving lanes to continue on the mainline could easily be the cause of themselves being mown down by a car travelling at 100kmh.

In reference to your earlier post, I don't live in Athlone but I use the Bypass everyday and have a pretty good idea of its uses.

veryangryman

KevR wrote: »

I couldn't disagree more.

Someone driving at the 100kmh speed limit on the bypass will very rarely (by that I mean effectively never) cause an accident because of their speed.

1. Someone driving very slowly could cause a pile up.
2. Someone driving a tractor half in/half out of the hard shoulder causes dangerous swerving which could easily lead to an accident.
3. Someone merging onto the DC from a standing position in the HS or merging at too slow a speed could cause crash/pile-up.
4. Pedestrians/cyclists in the hard shoulder might not cause an accident as such but what if, in an emergency, someone has to use the hard shoulder/emergency lane? The pedestrian or cyclist could get knocked down (especially in poor visibility).
5. Also, the slow moving vehicles (which really shouldn't be there themselves) which use the HS could hit a pedestrian or cyclist if visibilty is poor.
6. Pedestrians and cyclist who have to cut across the weaving lanes to continue on the mainline could easily be the cause of themselves being mown down by a car travelling at 100kmh.

In reference to your earlier post, I don't live in Athlone but I use the Bypass everyday and have a pretty good idea of its uses.

Lads its not ok for pedestrians to walk along ANY dual carriageway or motorway, but its their tough sh1t if their actually THAT STUPID.

KevR

veryangryman wrote: »

Lads its not ok for pedestrians to walk along ANY dual carriageway or motorway, but its their tough sh1t if their actually THAT STUPID.

I agree. Just because it's legal to do something, it doesn't make it at all sensible or right to do it.

The fact something like walking on a high speed Dual Carriageway is legal really annoys me all the same. It should be illegal.

Also, in the event of someone getting knocked down, I would put money on some public body releasing a statement implying that speed (by the driver) was the cause of the accident and no mention of the fact that the pedestrian should not have been there in the first place.

Amtmann

To_be_confirmed wrote: »

That "strategic route" as you call it, is a decrepit DC, unlike most of the N6/M6. It was built to fit the traffic needs of the local area- as a bypass, not a section of an intercity motorway network like much of the other "bypasses" in this country.
.

No. The Athlone bypass was not built for the people of Athlone. It was built to spare the rest of the motoring citizenry from the people of Athlone. That is what bypasses are for.

munchkin_utd

What is needed on the athlone bypass (and other non motorway roads where auld ones should not be out for their power walk) is something along the lines of this type of road in Germany which is designated by this sign:



Its a "Kraftfahrstrasse" which translates roughly into "Road restricted to motor vehicles only" or something along those lines (not necesarily always a dual carraigeway).
Its 60kmh + min speed and no cyclists or pedestrians or animals.

IF its a stupid and unsafe idea to have slow tractors, and IF its a stupid and unsafe idea to have pedestrians, and IF its a stupid and unsafe idea to allow horses and animals on this road, then they should damn well be excluded, banned by law.

Technically I could herd cows down the Athlone dual carraige way as it stands.
And if the guards come what can they say?
What law would i be breaking?
"The law of doing stupid and unsafe things" isnt a law that the guards can charge me with!

This road needs restrictions of some mean or shape to stop stupid people doing stupid things.
(and maybe Ireland should attempt to look beyond the UK / USA for inspiration for road regulation)

loyatemu

they have the same idea in France where they're generally referred to as expressways, but tbh I don't see the point in introducing an extra road type here - just make it a motorway with a 100km/h limit like the M50 - how much extra traffic would end up going through Athlone? bugger all IMO.

mysterious

MLM wrote: »

The Jack Lynch tunnel has restrictions; no pedestrians, cyclists, or horse drawn vehicles. It is untolled and not a motorway.

Now you can see in point plain writing people like Bluntguy just want a pretty road.

Hes not speaking from logic or experience

Hes a road enthusiast.
He wants the road blue. I can put a bet on it. If the council banned cyclists and pedestrians. He would still find some other reason to have blue signs.

The Atlone bypass is not just a bypass I'm sorry lads cut the bul****.

The road through Athlone is not up to spec. It is congested narrow trundles over a bridge a few right and left turns and medieval street plan. and you will have 3 other arterial routes where it feeds onto the bypass.

Putting tight restrictions on the Bypass is only going to exasperate problems further.

Lts get real.

Give it special road status and leave the blue map **** alone.

KevR

In all honesty, it's you who keeps bringing up blue signs and blue lines on a map topic.

It has gotten to the stage where I think you desperately want green signs and map lines for some reason.

The Bypass being more than just a Bypass is irrevevant because, as already stated, the vast majority of local traffic will still be eligable to use the road if motorway. It will have a very small effect on vehicular traffic - a tiny minority will have to go through the town.

If the Council want to ban pedestrians, cyclists and the like (and get it done ASAP) and sign some sort of legally binding document that will prevent themselves ever granting planning permission for extra access points onto the Bypass or inappropriate developments near the Bypass then there is no need to redesignate it.

I doubt the Council would have the balls to ban pedestrians or cyclists though and I don't think they would to keen in banning themselves from ever giving planning permission. If there's any hope of banning them and protecting the route, it has to come from central government (the Transport Minister) in my opinion and that would probably mean a redesignation.

L1011

To_be_confirmed wrote: »

That "strategic route" as you call it, is a decrepit DC, unlike most of the N6/M6. It was built to fit the traffic needs of the local area- as a bypass, not a section of an intercity motorway network like much of the other "bypasses" in this country.

It was built as a bypass of a strategic route - it was not built as a local access road for Athlone. That the rest of said route wasn't motorway when its built is irrelevant. It needs resurfacing, as all 20 year old roads do. Thats all thats 'decrepit' about it

To_be_confirmed wrote: »

There are safety reasons to have the DC upgraded, simply to better handle 100kph traffic regardless of it being a DC or motorway, but you seem to leave that out of the argument. My actual point in response to this, is that the pedestrian or slow, inexperienced vehicle is rarely the cause of an accident. The fast driver who crashes into them very often is. And Athlone town centre with its small bridge is not suitable to carry modern farm machinery. I still maintain the bypass is a safer place for such traffic, overall.

The entire safety advantages of motorways don't come from slowing down traffic, they come from removing as close as possible to all risks to high speed traffic.

To_be_confirmed wrote: »

The only fair way to deal with existing safety issues is to reduce the speed limit or upgrade the DC/nearby roads.

There is little "fair" in road safety.

To_be_confirmed wrote: »

And if the number of ineligible people are so few, why are there "huge complaints" over such designations?? Including from councillors, who don't exactly take the side of one voter against lots of voters.

The "lots of votes" of those who are impacted aren't local. Councillors *never* look beyond their own ward.

mysterious

MYOB wrote: »

It was built as a bypass of a strategic route - it was not built as a local access road for Athlone. That the rest of said route wasn't motorway when its built is irrelevant. It needs resurfacing, as all 20 year old roads do. Thats all thats 'decrepit' about it

Not quite it was built as a relieft for Athlone town. To move all the heavy traffic from the only town bridge.Back in 1991, N6 traffic would be minimal on the "strategic route"

The entire safety advantages of motorways don't come from slowing down traffic, they come from removing as close as possible to all risks to high speed traffic.

This is not a high speed route.

Its a town bypass that is a standard DC that has curve and many accesses to it including a second crossing of the River. This route provides all movments for the 3 secondary roads that converge onto it around the town.


Get your facts right.

L1011

mysterious wrote: »

Not quite it was built as a relieft for Athlone town. To move all the heavy traffic from the only town bridge.Back in 1991, N6 traffic would be minimal on the "strategic route"

No, it was built as an N6 bypass for Athlone. You are the one thats invented this idea of it being a "relief road".

mysterious wrote: »

This is not a high speed route.

One of the reasons why its currently unsafe. Anyway 100km/h is 'high speed' in most peoples eyes, seeing as its above the standard speed limit for the bulk of roads in the country.

mysterious wrote: »

Its a town bypass that is a standard DC that has curve and many accesses to it including a second crossing of the River. This route provides all movments for the 3 secondary roads that converge onto it around the town.

And none of these will be changed by it being reclassified.

mysterious wrote: »

Get your facts right.

Says the man to whom facts are an alien invention.