DART+ (DART Expansion)

Pete_Cavan

I presume the initial capacity increase will come from new/extended rolling stock rather improvements to the infrastructure which would come later.

Consonata

https://www.businesspost.ie/news/plan-to-move-dart-line-inland-from-crumbling-coast-deemed-too-costly/

Shocking to be honest.

brianc89

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120232652#Comment_120232652

What exactly is shocking about it?

They plan on spending 230m ensuring the line isn't washed away....

Consonata

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120232735#Comment_120232735

The tunnel needs to be two tracks. Just stopping it from falling into the sea isn't going to be enough as the tunnel already acts as a significant bottleneck on services, particularly services down to Wexford. Spending 230m now when they're going to have to redevelop it again with a new line when populations are there in 10 years is the same type of thinking that stopped them doing Metrolink to Sandyford.

Realistically they need a new line that goes round the mountain, but they're more worried about upsetting the owners of Bray Golf Club than doing decent infrastructure seemingly.

brianc89

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120232804#Comment_120232804

Got yeah. I hadn't realized part of this line is single track. Which parts exactly are not double?

prunudo

I think the golf course is the least of the problems, how do you propose to get the line through the residential areas around Raheen Park and Newcourt rd? But alas, this is also a problem that should have been forseen 50 years ago and lands sterilised to allow double tracking.

AngryLips

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120231253#Comment_120231253

https://www.dartplus.ie/en-ie/projects/dart-west

A little bit down the page there's a few bullet points, one of which says:

"The project will see:

• Increase train capacity from the current 6 trains per hour per direction up to 12 trains per hour per direction subject to demand. Passenger capacity will increase from 5,000 in 2019 to 13,200 passengers in 2025."

I guess it's not a promised delivery date if you remove all reference to it after announcing it.

prunudo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120232843#Comment_120232843

Its single track all the way from Bray to Rosslare bar some passing loops in some but not all stations.

xper

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120232866#Comment_120232866

I don't know what the proposed inland route that has supposedly been examined and rejected actually is (is it even set out in the pay-walled Business Post article?). I don't imagine that the inland route could be just the other side of Bray Head - the required incline would seem prohibitive to get a rail line from south of Bray Station up to the level of Newcourt Road and follow around the contour south from there (it would never go near the Bray Golf Club lands which are all higher again). An earlier inland turn south of Bray Station would be impossible without ploughing a massive cutting through the heart of the town.

The only options I could see working would be just heading dead straight south of Bray Station and tunnelling the whole way under Bray Head to pop out more or less beside the current southernmost tunnel and rejoin the existing alignment on the north approach to Greystones. Such tunnels are perfectly feasible from an engineering perspective but €€€€€!

A more radical approach would be to turn inland north of Bray station, abandoning it, and pick a route along the the Dargle valley which would give you a more feasible climb to skirt around the bulk of the town and then head south through the Kilruddery estate between Bray head and Little Sugarloaf. You probably still need a tunnel, albeit shorter, through the high ground in the Windgates area to again rejoin the existing line north of Greystones. The replacement station could perhaps be placed on the undeveloped section of the old golf club lands and you could also put in a second station serving the south end of Bray (which would be a bonus benefit, the current Bray station is not optimally placed to serve most residential areas in the town). But again, €€€€€.

It does all seem like kicking the can down the road. Serving the transport demand from south of Bray to Dublin is a growing headache. The idea of building essentially a second dual carriage way route between the M11/M50 merge and Kilpedder/Newtownmountkennedy has been proposed and subsequently rejected in favour of improving public transport links (which is correct imo) but then you've got to build up significant additional capacity somehow.

Bsharp

We're building dublin suburban homes in wicklow and wexford and then questioning why people aren't travelling sustainably.

The current plan is more homes, no additional rail capacity south of Bray, and more buses on a redesigned N11/M11 existing corridor to make up the shortfall.

Usually they won't have considered what happens all those additional buses when they get further inbound onto city streets.

Solution, on paper, likely to be:

- use the new woodbrook shanganagh rail station as a bus/rail interchange if there's any room to get on DART+ services.

- extend the Luas for connectivity east-west to Sandyford (alot of commuters go here)

I can't see it ending well. The M7 won't get any quieter as people continue to chose between the two road based options.

LXFlyer

Well the NTA are talking about using some of the new BEMU (battery electric multiple units) trains that are on order to potentially operate to/from Wicklow, and they would be extensions of existing Greystones DART services.

xper

They are and there’s a proposed passing loop between the Bray Head tunnels and Greystones (I dont know if that’s included in the €230m package mentioned in the article above) and that would all be an improvement to current capacity but there is only so much you can do with a single track.

loyatemu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120247332#Comment_120247332

the "passing loop" basically involves doubling from Greystones station to the first tunnel, which would allow 3 trains per hour in each direction (currently max 2 per hour). It's expected to be part of Dart+ but that part of the plan hasn't even gone to consultation yet.

As mentioned above, if you want to double the whole line, a tunnel under Bray Head is the only practical (if expensive) option - there's far too many houses etc in the way going inland, it would be difficult to connect to Bray and Greystones stations and you'd probably have to build a tunnel anyway at Windgates.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120247377#Comment_120247377

Currently there are six potential paths between Bray and Greystones each hour and that’s used by 2 x DART in each direction (4) and the other two reserved for services south of Greystones.

The extended double track would mean eight paths an hour.

Pete_Cavan

Would double-tracking from Bray station south to around where the cliff walk begins help further with additional paths? Could provide a new station too at Putland Road.

AngryLips

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248399#Comment_120248399

In fairness, Bray is big enough to support two stations.

prunudo

I often wondered was the lack of commitment to any major infrastructural improvements south of Bray was more to do with the constraints further north along the line rather than the cost of any project. Given the population growth in the towns along the east coast of Wicklow and Wexford I think a good reliable and quick service would be well received. Which could cause management further headaches with capacity issues.

loyatemu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248399#Comment_120248399

there's already double track as far as the sidings at the bottom of Putland Road, I think Dart+ includes some resignalling south of Bray as well as on the Greystones side to facilitate a higher frequency.

Can't see the point of a station at Putland road, it's less than a kilometre from the existing station. There's long been talk of a station at Redford on the Greystones side but IMO it would just lead to traffic congestion if it was built with parking. They are about to build a massive new housing development nearby though (to go with several others built in the last decade), so maybe it'll appear on the plans.

strassenwo!f

There was an interesting article by Frank McDonald in yesterday's Irish Times, which I think is relevant to this thread. I don't believe I'm allowed to post the content, but here is the link for those who can get beyond the paywall:

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/2023/02/16/frank-mcdonald-darttunnel-is-the-missing-link-in-dublins-transport-plans/

strassenwo!f

I'm a bit surprised that the 2070 working team, mentioned by Mr McDonald, still seem to see St. Stephen's Green as a necessary location on the DART Underground route.

Should a DART Underground route reappear, it's hard to see why that would be a location. Many people felt St. Stephen's Green needed to be a stop, in the original plan, because the LUAS was stuck there. But we've moved well past that now, with the LUAS extension, so a direct cross-city (Spencer Dock - Pearse - City Centre - Christchurch -Heuston) route should be possible. If a suitable route can be found.

And without any of the contortions from the original plan required to bring it to St. Stephen's Green to meet up with the LUAS.

brianc89

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120255175#Comment_120255175

Well presumably if DU is built, that city centre location will be SSG East to interchange with Metro.

I don't believe it'll ever happen given the proposed New Spencer Dock station would need to be dug up, but we'll have to wait and see what ABP say about New Spencer Dock on the Dart+ W RO.

cgcsb

If the route is similar to the old route then Stephens Green makes sense because there's not much space to dig out a central station elsewhere except maybe the sports grounds of trinity.

If there's a totally new route, say from Heuston to Fairview Park there could be a stop at Smithfield, perhaps where the current giant hole in the ground is beside the luas stop and perhaps another stop under the inner George's Dock connected to Connolly.

spacetweek

A stop at Smithfield?

Nah, no way - DU has to go southside. Northside has a Luas east-west and will soon have a DART the same (maynooth). Also it'd need a gentle curve to head north, which means swinging wide.

We could consider something like Fairview alright instead of Spencer Dock, but not sure about the civil engineering details.

CatInABox

Fairview has the Port Tunnel going right through the park, no way to surface there. I suppose that you could run it further north and surface in Clontarf Golf Club, but I don't know if there's enough room there either.

D.L.R.

Always thought Clontarf Golf Club was a good place for a portal to join the line into Connolly (in theory anyway). But private interests usually block these ideas. Look at the GAA club on the northside which forced the metro to move. The state is too weak to do anything about private self interest. They barely faced down a swimming pool at Tara ffs.

D.L.R.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120232652#Comment_120232652

Is anyone surprised this car obsessed country has once again evaded a major rail project?

Who'd live in Wicklow and work in Dublin. Probably the most underinvested transport corridor in the country by traffic volume.

Massive, empty motorways out west and here you've got a crappy, dangerous 1980s dual carriageway and a single track of Victorian rail to serve the entire Southeast seaboard.

Pathetic.

CatInABox

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120263463#Comment_120263463

Ah, I think that if it's the only way for it to happen, then it'll happen. When they want to, the state usually wins these kinds of things, with a long history of successfully CPOing land for major projects. Even the swimming pool at Tara St, along with the houses and apartments, was never really a problem. Sure, they ran another report into it, but they never looked like going somewhere else.

Anyway, with Clontarf Golf Club, they already sold their land once, only for it to fall through, so I think that they'd be ok with being purchased.... for the right price, anyway.

EDIT: Huh, turns out that DCC owns much of the land, with the Golf Club having a long term lease.

D.L.R.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120263772#Comment_120263772

I feel like the state's default position is to avoid these types of confrontations altogether. Which feeds into the inertia of nothing ever getting done.

It only faced down the Tara St issues after painting itself into a corner with the new metro route. If they could have moved it again (politically) I believe they'd have tried that first. The hysterical press doesn't help either with their lunatic/backward opinion pieces.

I can't think of another western european country so weak on advancing critical infrastructure in its capital city.

cgcsb

In Spain when there's a major public project the local municipality contacts directly impacted parties only, e.g. People who own or rent the property that will be taken.

Anyone else can look up up coming projects in their area on a public works website if they're interested. If they don't keep tabs on the website they find out when the diggers turn up. There are no non statutory public consultations or media campaigns. They deliver public works for about 60% of what we pay in Ireland. Spain also has rampant corruption but vastly superior infrastructure in most of the country, perhaps with the exception of remote islands, so maybe its a trade off do we want good public scrutiny or fast cheap projects. Perhaps we can meet in the middle somewhere.

Pete_Cavan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120265882#Comment_120265882

They still have statutory consultations, non-statutory consultations here are just a sop to the permanently outraged, makes little difference really.

Spain is a lower cost economy generally and operates on a different scale to Ireland, what is a mega project here is just a project there.