Taxpayers to compensate M3 toll firm for light traffic

drunkmonkey

What kind of an finnfail/green party Idiot agreed to this, basically if we try and cut down traffic to save the environment were going to get penalised and by us I mean me and you the taxpaper, you wonldn't find it in a disney storybook....

Read more: http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/taxpayers-to-compensate-m3-toll-firm-for-light-traffic-422008.html

I hate the very idea of tolls but this really takes the biscut..

Heroditas

It'll apparently cost €11.20 to make a return trip from Kells to Dublin with these new tolls.
Maybe if they reduced the toll, more vehicles would use the road.
It's not exactly rocket science. :rolleyes:

Saab Ed

Well I wasnt gonna use it anyway ( because of the Toll ) but now Im gonna be paying for no matter. Total Bol**x.

robtri

I hate the idea's of tolls....
but there is not enough information in that to tell if this is a good idea or not...

Saab Ed

Heroditas wrote: »

It'll apparently cost €11.20 to make a return trip from Kells to Dublin with these new tolls.

Nevermind the fact that the duty on the fuel accounts for the majority of its cost plus motortax and if you want to cross the M50 you can add another 4 quid to a return journey. They havent got a clue. Mugs the lot of us I tell ya :mad:

Cookie_Monster

Why isin't the NRA funding the difference out of it's given budget?
They're the ones who gave the "expert" advice on traffic volumes in the first place surely? If they get it wrong then it should be their problem.

thebiglad

This is just business.

It costs x to build the road, add on the required profit margin and divide by projected useage (supplied by Contracting party - Government) and you get the toll level.

Then if you are the roads builder/operator why would you just accept the useage figure as supplied and end up subsidising infrastructure? Therefore you have a clause in the contract that if useage is below y then you are reimbursed for differences.

If there was not a PPP here who would pay the entire cost of the road - us, the tax payer - surely it is better to have great roads, those that use them pay the majority of the cost and thereafter everyone else picks up the shortfalls in revenue.

If Ireland is to get back anywhere near its pre-recession state we need a sound infrastructure - with the current financial status of this country, that is not going to happen if left to the public purse.

This is not a political point, every party would have to do the same - except the Greens who of course would not consider building any roads, just turn everything into meadows and canals:P

Solitaire

thebiglad wrote:

If Ireland is to get back anywhere near its pre-recession state we need a sound infrastructure

The one thing Fianna Failure is even better at than screwing us "peasants" is screwing up Ireland's infrastructure :mad:

What the hell is the point of putting in economically unworkable infrastructure? Yes, there's a shiny new road. Which is so insanely expensive to use that casual drivers and those who have a choice won't use it. And we're talking so expensive on a commuting basis that those few commuters left in Meath and Cavan don't even have the choice of using it - they're stuck in the slow lane (the only lane!) on the N3. Oops... I meant the R147 :pac:

So we, the taxpayer, are left paying for the ridiculous eleventy-seven-billion-Euro boondoggle that destroyed a good chunk of Meath yet is so uneconomical no-one can use on a practical basis. Instead we have to use the R147 - the decaying corpse of the real N3 which due to the M3 is no longer funded by the Government and the local council simply hasn't the funds to maintain, because Meath has been Ireland's b!tch since Day One :mad:

So we now have a huge dent in our public finances in return for a net reduction in our national road infrastructure. That's FF's idea of Value For Money - after all, they have a Win-Win clause on the M3 to ensure they can garnish their salaries and their buddies' salaries (who built the monstrosity!) either from the fools who go into personal bankruptcy using it, or from the public finances if no-one can pay the tolls.

Gurgle

thebiglad wrote: »

add on the required profit margin...

Just how many businesses get the opportunity to take on a multi-billion operating contract with a guaranteed profit margin?

(Never mind the fact that just bypassing Kells, Navan and Dunshaughlin would have been as beneficial to the commuters)

spadder

thebiglad wrote: »

This is just business.

That's it exactly, and if you don't do your research and business plan correctly you loose money- Tough.

I don't see Ryanair getting bailed out 'cause passenger numbers are down.

Berty

Do you remember Dubs suggested that the cost of Tolling on the M50 should be charged through Tax to the entire countries population but people in Valentia island(example) complained they HAVE NEVER AND WILL NEVER use the M50 so why should they pay.

You could argue the same thing about the toll on the M3. Its not my problem people dont use the road enough to make money for them.

Lots of companies have closed down because of lack of business. Maybe I should pay more money in Tax to support those companies thinking of closing.

PAH FVCKING PAH

spadder

All the incompentent hallmarks of Noel Dempsey, remember this is the man that brought us E-voting:mad::mad::mad:


http://www.shane-ross.ie/archives/347/m50-directors-unmasked/

Del2005

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

Why isin't the NRA funding the difference out of it's given budget?
They're the ones who gave the "expert" advice on traffic volumes in the first place surely? If they get it wrong then it should be their problem.

You do know where the NRA gets it's money from? Doesn't mater who's budget it comes out of it's still OUR TAX money that's paying the bill.

Saruman

Mental....

Saab Ed

Best bit is we just dismantled one Toll bridge a year ago and here we are building another one 3 miles up the road from it. ...Nuts :mad: People of Meath / Cavan / Westmeath / where ever else , look forward to queing good and long first thing in the morning and on the way home too or like me just take the old road.

ardmacha

There won;t be long queues on any toll gate opened in recent years, as the max length of the queue is specified (6 cars?) and the operator has to open the gate if they cannot collect the loot.

This new route should have mutiple express lanes and only a couple of lanes requiring a full stop. A lot of people will have tags as many will be going south on the M50 from the N3. This will be expensive, but should not be slow as well!

Saab Ed

ardmacha wrote: »

There won;t be long queues on any toll gate opened in recent years, as the max length of the queue is specified (6 cars?) and the operator has to open the gate if they cannot collect the loot.

This new route should have mutiple express lanes and only a couple of lanes requiring a full stop. A lot of people will have tags as many will be going south on the M50 from the N3. This will be expensive, but should not be slow as well!

I hope you're right but I just dont trust anything signed off by that shower of twonks in Kildare street. Its way too expensive though for what in essence is a by-pass.

Seth Brundle

Saab Ed wrote: »

Best bit is we just dismantled one Toll bridge a year ago and here we are building another one 3 miles up the road from it. ...Nuts :mad: People of Meath / Cavan / Westmeath / where ever else , look forward to queing good and long first thing in the morning and on the way home too or like me just take the old road.

I have no sympathy for them. I recall when giving out about the road (because of the Tara Skryne vandalism), so many people came back saying how they needed the road etc. and if any mention about the fact that two tolls plus the possibility of the M50 toll was ignored.

Saab Ed

kbannon wrote: »

I have no sympathy for them. I recall when giving out about the road (because of the Tara Skryne vandalism), so many people came back saying how they needed the road etc. and if any mention about the fact that two tolls plus the possibility of the M50 toll was ignored.

Different arguments in fairness though. Even if it took another route we'd still be giving out about the toll.

Seth Brundle

My point was that even when confronted with the idea that there was going to be two tolls on the motorway they still wanted it built! Now they are getting it and I have no sympathy for them!

IIMII

Saab Ed wrote: »

Different arguments in fairness though. Even if it took another route we'd still be giving out about the toll.

I don't agree. On the M3 as built, there is nothing between Dunshaughlin and Navan. The M3 should have taken a westerly route and had Trim linked in too, and then you would have had more commuters and possibly allowed flexability on the tolling. I only intend using the M3 between Navan and Dunshaughlin, and the either going through Dunshaughlin on the old N3 or cutting across the new R125 to the Dublin-Trim road (as I regularly do now, but at Ross cross). Unless I am late. I think it is rediculous that I'll have to pay 2 tolls each way to go from Dunshaughlin to the Ballymount exit on the M50.

I wonder is this report designed to ward off the possability of competition from the railway line to Navan?

L1011

Saab Ed wrote: »

Best bit is we just dismantled one Toll bridge a year ago and here we are building another one 3 miles up the road from it. ...Nuts :mad: People of Meath / Cavan / Westmeath / where ever else , look forward to queing good and long first thing in the morning and on the way home too or like me just take the old road.

Traffic figures through this toll are guaranteed to be lower than through the M50. I have never, ever been caught in a queue at any other tolling booth in the country and I spend >100 euro a month on the damn things!

Solitaire

kbannon, I think the people who agreed with the tolls were the developers and their pet TDs and their flunkies who'd be picking up the cash from the tolls rather than paying any tolls! :mad:

Can't think of a single person who uses the N3 (sorry, R147 :rolleyes: ) who agreed to this monstrosity. Some town bypasses, improved flow measures and some more stretches of dual carriageway were what we needed. NOT this obscenity against the State!

Saab Ed

Solitaire wrote: »

Can't think of a single person who uses the N3 (sorry, R147 :rolleyes: ) who agreed to this monstrosity. Some town bypasses, improved flow measures and some more stretches of dual carriageway were what we needed. NOT this obscenity against the State!

Going off topic slightly here but I still cant understand why the country has built 2 new motorways ( 1 to the far side of Ashbourne and 1 to Kells ) when surely one 3 lane M-way somewhere in the middle ( maybe by-passing Slane too ) would have done. Some dual carraige way link roads between Kells, Navan, Slane and Ashbourne would have done the job!!!

_Kaiser_

Have to agree with a few posters here..

Why isn't the whole thing barrier-free from the start? Oh wait.. presumably to keep toll booth operators in a job, and then so they can charge another fortune to remove the barriers a few years down the line right?

It's bad enough as it is with the proposed costs (side question: is the Navan toll going on the Kells or Dublin side does anyone know?) without then writing in a clause that EVERYONE will have to fund this latest FF debacle if people don't use it - which, at those prices, they won't!! It'll be like the M4 - deserted most of the time!

_Kaiser_

IIMII wrote: »

I don't agree. On the M3 as built, there is nothing between Dunshaughlin and Navan. The M3 should have taken a westerly route and had Trim linked in too, and then you would have had more commuters and possibly allowed flexability on the tolling.

But it wasn't cause that's where Dempsey lives! Isn't that why the first outbound toll booth isn't till AFTER you pass the Trim/Ratoath turnoff? :mad:

mosse

Sheer madness. We have just spent a load of money buying the toll bridge in dublin off a private company and now we have done another mad deal with another private company which in a few years we will probably end up having to buy that one as well. Has no one in the government any understanding of economics.............well i guess not, look at the mess we are in! Mad as hell!!:mad:

ardmacha

NOT this obscenity against the State!

It may have a guarantee if the traffic volumes fall, but it will have as much traffic as the M9 which has been entirely paid for by the State, however much traffic uses it. And before someone says that it doesn't go anywhere, there are about the same number of people living in Fermanagh and South Donegal as live in County Waterford.

IIMII

Saab Ed wrote: »

Going off topic slightly here but I still cant understand why the country has built 2 new motorways ( 1 to the far side of Ashbourne and 1 to Kells ) when surely one 3 lane M-way somewhere in the middle ( maybe by-passing Slane too ) would have done. Some dual carraige way link roads between Kells, Navan, Slane and Ashbourne would have done the job!!!

Well, Dunshaughlin wasn't / isn't supposed to be a growth centre, so I have always wondered why the new N2 wasn't extended to Navan and on to Kells. It might sound a stretch until you look at the map

By the way, I thought that the tolling arrangement was supposed to be €1.40 per booth, not €2.80. The Herlad / Indo may have their wires crossed with their articles.. Hopefully.

http://www.herald.ie/national-news/taxpayer-will-foot-bill-if-m3-toll-profit-falls-short-of-target-1855789.html