Dublin Metrolink (just Metrolink posts here -see post #1 )

Arthur Daley

Uriel. wrote: »

There's no way the Swords express gets you from Swords to the city in 20mins - at either peak or off peak..

Swords express travel time from first to last stop is now more or less on par with the Dublin bus services. It can take up to 25mins and probably averaging about 18 to 20 mins to get from the terminus to the M1 on ramp

Depends where you go from. If going from Holywell it should generally be close to 20 mins. We are splitting hairs but from their timetable for example this is an early weekday bus:

Airside Central 6.33
Dublin City Centre 6.55

Anyway all of this debate goes to back up that swords would need more than 1 or 2 stops even at current capacity/population. As there is a big difference between north Swords and South Swords and there can be plenty of congestion currently at peak.

Idbatterim

revised metro north had 4 proposed stops for swords...

LXFlyer

Arthur Daley wrote: »

If it becomes one stop for the whole of swords, they are wasting our time and money. Swords would warrant 3 stops for a proper metro service. Otherwise swords express will just kill it as they have stops every few hundred metres and get you into O'Connell bridge in about 20 minutes in comfort. Seriously though, what is metro north adding here?

Uriel. wrote: »

There's no way the Swords express gets you from Swords to the city in 20mins - at either peak or off peak..

Swords express travel time from first to last stop is now more or less on par with the Dublin bus services. It can take up to 25mins and probably averaging about 18 to 20 mins to get from the terminus to the M1 on ramp

Arthur Daley wrote: »

Depends where you go from. If going from Holywell it should generally be close to 20 mins. We are splitting hairs but from their timetable for example this is an early weekday bus:

Airside Central 6.33
Dublin City Centre 6.55

Anyway all of this debate goes to back up that swords would need more than 1 or 2 stops even at current capacity/population. As there is a big difference between north Swords and South Swords and there can be plenty of congestion currently at peak.

If you're going to compare journey times at least take typical off-peak times and also peak travel times, along with similar sample journeys.

06:30 is an extreme travel time - certainly not typical.

For Swords as a whole you'd need to select multiple starting points and compare end to end journey times (in other words include travel time to the Metro stop by feeder bus where appropriate).

A single stop would not be sufficient for all of Swords - you'd need several (P & R Terminus, North, Central and South) which is what I would read the original post as suggesting.

murphaph

I wonder how feasible (and cost effective compared to bored tunnel) it would be to take red line Luas under the canal from Rialto in a box tunnel with the canal in a tub above (all precast in one section, like an upside down "square A shape". That would be an interesting way to make the red line a metro, more or less (the Red line is killed by the on street running from James' to the Point. Agonisingly slow). Maybe it's actually cheaper to get a TBM and go deep, idk.

Could take it all the way to Grand Canal Dock.

Arthur Daley

lxflyer wrote: »

If you're going to compare journey times at least take typical off-peak times and also peak travel times, along with similar sample journeys.

06:30 is an extreme travel time - certainly not extreme.

Not to go too deep into this but 6.30 isn't that extreme around the airport or for a lot of dockland commuters.

the variable here is the time to get through swords rather than south swords to the city. So another bus looks like this from the same stop

Airside central 8.26
Sean O'Casey bridge 8.48.

Anyway one concern is that a lot of potential development around swords will be predicated on metro north. But if metro north is not a real improvement for commuters from all over swords and surrounding areas, there may be a lot of a dissapointment in Dublin Fingal that a tick box metro service and a whole lot of new development has been delivered. I.e. is this infrastructure generally improving quality of life or an excuse to grant permission to build out for nama and the developers.

Uriel.

Arthur Daley wrote: »

Not to go too deep into this but 6.30 isn't that extreme around the airport or for a lot of dockland commuters.

the variable here is the time to get through swords rather than south swords to the city. So another bus looks like this from the same stop

Airside central 8.26
Sean O'Casey bridge 8.48.

Anyway one concern is that a lot of potential development around swords will be predicated on metro north. But if metro north is not a real improvement for commuters from all over swords and surrounding areas, there may be a lot of a dissapointment in Dublin Fingal that a tick box metro service and a whole lot of new development has been delivered. I.e. is this infrastructure generally improving quality of life or an excuse to grant permission to build out for nama and the developers.

They are estimated times. It takes about 20mins alone from exiting port tunnel to Tara Street station on most morning runs for example. Quicker lately with holiday season.

It takes about 20mins from terminus to M1 on ramp.

On any normal day that's circa 40mins and doesn't cover the 10mins or so on ramp, M1, port tunnel part of the journey.

As regards MN I was always surprised that the main stop for Swords wasn't on the main street in the original plans. Ultimately the metro was bypassing (slightly) the main centre of Swords. I know it's planned for reasonably close to the pavilions but it still seemed silly to me

MJohnston

murphaph wrote: »

I wonder how feasible (and cost effective compared to bored tunnel) it would be to take red line Luas under the canal from Rialto in a box tunnel with the canal in a tub above (all precast in one section, like an upside down "square A shape". That would be an interesting way to make the red line a metro, more or less (the Red line is killed by the on street running from James' to the Point. Agonisingly slow). Maybe it's actually cheaper to get a TBM and go deep, idk.

Could take it all the way to Grand Canal Dock.

Imo, while we're talking fantasy island stuff anyway, we'd be better off leaving the red line as-is and implementing Luas Lucan as a tunnelled Metro instead. Have it run from somewhere in GCD, serve the Liberties and D8, then out along Ballyfermot, though Liffey Valley center, and then Lucan (or further).

bk

Arthur Daley wrote: »

Anyway one concern is that a lot of potential development around swords will be predicated on metro north. But if metro north is not a real improvement for commuters from all over swords and surrounding areas, there may be a lot of a dissapointment in Dublin Fingal that a tick box metro service and a whole lot of new development has been delivered. I.e. is this infrastructure generally improving quality of life or an excuse to grant permission to build out for nama and the developers.

Thing is there is only so much capacity in the Port Tunnel and those roads.

Add an extra 40,000 people to Swords and those times on the Swords Express would be quickly getting far worse.

MN might at the best of times be only slightly faster then Swords Express, but two important points:

- It has the capacity to handle 10's of thousands more people a day comfortably. The roads and port tunnel don't.
- It is reliable.

Sure Swords Express might be just 30 minutes off peak one day. But it can easily be much longer another day. Metro will get you into town in 22 minutes, no matter the time of day and how bad the traffic is. That completely changes people's mindsets.

Don't forget, Luas isn't super fast either, on many routes it can be beaten some days by Dublin Bus. Yet people love Luas and take it every day over DB. The reason, reliability, you leave your home at x time every day knowing that you will almost always arrive at y time in the office. DB can't offer that. Sure some days you might arrive at the office y-5, but another day it might arrive at y+30, because of traffic or an accident or whatever.

murphaph

MJohnston wrote: »

Imo, while we're talking fantasy island stuff anyway, we'd be better off leaving the red line as-is and implementing Luas Lucan as a tunnelled Metro instead. Have it run from somewhere in GCD, serve the Liberties and D8, then out along Ballyfermot, though Liffey Valley center, and then Lucan (or further).

To be honest I've always opposed and remain opposed to Lucan Luas, either tunneled or on street.

Lucan sits between two heavy rail lines that have significant untapped capacity (DU would remedy this) and most of west Dublin should be heading to the city via these rail corridors, fed by frequent orbital bus routes on the arguably good north-south roads (M50, R113, R136 all have bus lanes or space for them but barely a bus route on any of them).

If we are to deep bore anything it should be DU and MN and after that the next deep bored line should really be between red and green lines.

Probably never see any of it though.

MJohnston

murphaph wrote: »

To be honest I've always opposed and remain opposed to Lucan Luas, either tunneled or on street.

Lucan sits between two heavy rail lines that have significant untapped capacity (DU would remedy this) and most of west Dublin should be heading to the city via these rail corridors, fed by frequent orbital bus routes on the arguably good north-south roads (M50, R113, R136 all have bus lanes or space for them but barely a bus route on any of them).

If we are to deep bore anything it should be DU and MN and after that the next deep bored line should really be between red and green lines.

Probably never see any of it though.

Yes, well my Lucan Metro proceeds on the assumption that DU is dead for a long, long time. I'd rather see Maynooth line electrification proceed with some alternative workaround for avoiding Connolly congestion (as I think you or bk have suggested in another thread).

Heartbreak Hank

murphaph wrote: »

Lucan sits between two heavy rail lines that have significant untapped capacity (DU would remedy this) and most of west Dublin should be heading to the city via these rail corridors, fed by frequent orbital bus routes on the arguably good north-south roads (M50, R113, R136 all have bus lanes or space for them but barely a bus route on any of them).

Would a spur from one of those heavy rail lines be a workable solution?

murphaph

Heartbreak Hank wrote: »

Would a spur from one of those heavy rail lines be a workable solution?

For me this would not really be justified while so much of the city has no rail whatsoever. The roads in West Dublin are literally perfect for running north-south feeder routes to take people to the stations on the Kildare Route.

Dublin's transport problems are relatively easy to fix compared to many other places. It just needs €10bn and the will of the Dail to be seen by rural Ireland to actively support our capital. It's the latter that's the problem. I don't believe the money is the problem really.

D.L.R.

murphaph wrote: »

Dublin's transport problems are relatively easy to fix compared to many other places. It just needs €10bn and the will of the Dail to be seen by rural Ireland to actively support our capital. It's the latter that's the problem. I don't believe the money is the problem really.

+1. Rural Ireland's antipathy towards Dublin is our problem historically for sure. That and the state's miserly approach to capital spending.

But as Ireland urbanises - and its doing so at a fair clip now - the rural problem will naturally abate.

I think we're actually starting to see that change manifest in the political arena and it will only grow in strength over the coming decades.

What we need is a shift in culture from "vanity project" to "economic investment". Its not just rural Ireland who have this outdated view of extravagance.

LeinsterDub

D.L.R. wrote: »

What we need is a shift in culture from "vanity project" to "economic investment". Its not just rural Ireland who have this outdated view of extravagance.

Calling MN an extravagance is like calling a life saving operation an extravagance.

Grandeeod

murphaph wrote: »

For me this would not really be justified while so much of the city has no rail whatsoever. The roads in West Dublin are literally perfect for running north-south feeder routes to take people to the stations on the Kildare Route.

Dublin's transport problems are relatively easy to fix compared to many other places. It just needs €10bn and the will of the Dail to be seen by rural Ireland to actively support our capital. It's the latter that's the problem. I don't believe the money is the problem really.

How right you are. To think a mere 10 billion is all it would take to put Dublin in a really good public transport place is frustratingly hard to grasp for so many of our TDs. Combine it with decent planning for housing and commercial sites and the world is our oyster. Such a simple fix and it always has been. When we really need an Irish solution to an Irish problem, we can't deliver one.

I've been saying for many years that the rural mentality of our politicians (even Dublin based) is preventing Dublin from realising its potential. Somebody earlier mentioned that the urbanisation of Ireland is happening and the rural mentality will change. I beg to differ. Only a few weeks ago Newstalk's Down to business show with Bobby Kerr, broadcast from Galway. The amount of positive stuff in the west of Ireland was drowned out by a difinitive display of anti Dublin rhetoric and entitlement from west of Ireland business people. It was very disappointing to listen to. When rural Ireland has a TGV, Dublin may get a Metro.

Donegal Storm

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Calling MN an extravagance is like calling a life saving operation an extravagance.

Everything that costs money is seen as an extravagance or 'white elephant' as the preferred phrase seems to be in the media.

T2 at the airport was a massive waste of money, we should have just let Ryanair build a grimy shed. In reality it's helping Dublin grow into a major Transatlantic hub.

Luas was a waste, nobody would use it. As we know it was at capacity almost immediately.

Port tunnel, nobody would use. 10 years later it's transformed Dublin city centre in taking thousands of trucks off the streets and created a reliable fast route into the heart of the city.

The list goes on..

As someone else mentioned, hopefully when the metro is finally built people will see how beneficial it is and any future extension to the network won't be such a monumental drag

Grandeeod

Donegal Storm wrote: »

Everything that costs money is seen as an extravagance or 'white elephant' as the preferred phrase seems to be in the media.

T2 at the airport was a massive waste of money, we should have just let Ryanair build a grimy shed. In reality it's helping Dublin grow into a major Transatlantic hub.

Luas was a waste, nobody would use it. As we know it was at capacity almost immediately.

Port tunnel, nobody would use. 10 years later it's transformed Dublin city centre in taking thousands of trucks off the streets and created a reliable fast route into the heart of the city.

The list goes on..

As someone else mentioned, hopefully when the metro is finally built people will see how beneficial it is and any future extension to the network won't be such a monumental drag

Could you please back up all you have claimed above.

LXFlyer

Grandeeod wrote: »

Could you please back up all you have claimed above.

I think that poster is saying that's what people said, rather than what they themselves believed - and they're right! So much negative crap gets spouted about any Irish infrastructure project beforehand but once it's built people change their tune!

Grandeeod

lxflyer wrote: »

I think that poster is saying that's what people said, rather than what they themselves believed - and they're right! So much negative crap gets spouted about any Irish infrastructure project beforehand but once it's built people change their tune!

That's fair enough. But we've a mod making massive assumptions too in relation to the original luas project and now DU. All based on speculation and personal opinion based on yet more misguided speculation. This all happened in the early noughties too and it took a hell of an effort from volunteers to put projects like DU back on the agenda via a very defined explanation of the project to the media. The most important rail project in Dublin is being buried yet again under political ignorance and incompetence. It annoys me that the public just accept it and even on this forum MN is seen as a panacea. By all means build MN, but Dublin will still have a big PT issue unless DU is bulit.

LXFlyer

Grandeeod wrote: »

That's fair enough. But we've a mod making massive assumptions too in relation to the original luas project and now DU. All based on speculation and personal opinion based on yet more misguided speculation. This all happened in the early noughties too and it took a hell of an effort from volunteers to put projects like DU back on the agenda via a very defined explanation of the project to the media. The most important rail project in Dublin is being buried yet again under political ignorance and incompetence. It annoys me that the public just accept it and even on this forum MN is seen as a panacea. By all means build MN, but Dublin will still have a big PT issue unless DU is bulit.

Who are you telling? ;-)

It is undoubtedly the more important element.

D.L.R.

Grandeeod wrote: »

Somebody earlier mentioned that the urbanisation of Ireland is happening and the rural mentality will change. I beg to differ.

Its happening. Slowly, but undeniably. Maybe not individual mindsets, but the balance of power is changing.

You'll always have that rural anti city mindset. But the point is, they are losing influence as a group and will continue to lose influence as our cities grow and start to drown them out.

The world is moving to the city. No rural politician can stop it. No policy can stop it. Nothing can stop it.

Donegal Storm

Grandeeod wrote: »

Could you please back up all you have claimed above.

I don't have the time to be trawling the internet looking for sources, my general point was that all of the above were unpopular with the public and ridiculed in the press yet area now considered invaluable and their benefit clearly obvious. I don't think that's a controversial opinion.

The metro had already won half the battle in that sense from what I've seen with most people seemingly behind it. Just a shame politicians don't seem to share the same urgency.

bk

Grandeeod wrote: »

How right you are. To think a mere 10 billion is all it would take to put Dublin in a really good public transport place is frustratingly hard to grasp for so many of our TDs. Combine it with decent planning for housing and commercial sites and the world is our oyster. Such a simple fix and it always has been. When we really need an Irish solution to an Irish problem, we can't deliver one.

For the love of god, don't tell them that it is going to cost 10 billion+ to fix Dublin problems!

You aren't wrong, but if you tell people that, NOTHING will get built!

Had you told people that the intercity motorway network would cost 8 billion, then it would have never been built. Instead it was broken up into many smaller projects and phases over many years, 200 million here, 300 million there. Which left it fly under the radar.

It is a pity we can't break MN and DU up similarly. They are going to be a hard sell as it is. Tell people it will cost 10+ billion and nothing will get built.

I'm hoping what is happening, is that DU will still happen, but they don't want to talk about it now as two multi billion projects at the same time would freak people out.

Instead just focus on MN first, once done turn their attention to DU and then after that future extensions built around these core networks. In some ways a similar phasing to the motorway network.

plodder

Donegal Storm wrote: »

I don't have the time to be trawling the internet looking for sources, my general point was that all of the above were unpopular with the public and ridiculed in the press yet area now considered invaluable and their benefit clearly obvious. I don't think that's a controversial opinion.

The metro had already won half the battle in that sense from what I've seen with most people seemingly behind it. Just a shame politicians don't seem to share the same urgency.

I'd question unpopular with the public. It's all driven by the media. The port tunnel leaks was a classic example. Especially this time of year when "real" news is thin on the ground, the same amount of copy has to be written. The front page headline on the Herald shouts at you exactly the same way, each day.

The public will moan and grumble all right, but I don't think it's all necessarily serious. Like the weather. Scepticism that anything will happen is probably the worst thing, as it can be self-fulfilling.

Metro and DU are different though given the enormous money involved. Said it before, that while some people have a vision of what is possible out of it all, the vision hasn't been communicated effectively to the public or to politicians. A rail link to the airport is understandable by the public, but they haven't gotten their heads around the rest of it at all.

Dardania

bk wrote: »

Grandeeod wrote: »

How right you are. To think a mere 10 billion is all it would take to put Dublin in a really good public transport place is frustratingly hard to grasp for so many of our TDs. Combine it with decent planning for housing and commercial sites and the world is our oyster. Such a simple fix and it always has been. When we really need an Irish solution to an Irish problem, we can't deliver one.

For the love of god, don't tell them that it is going to cost 10 billion+ to fix Dublin problems!

You aren't wrong, but if you tell people that, NOTHING will get built!

Had you told people that the intercity motorway network would cost 8 billion, then it would have never been built. Instead it was broken up into many smaller projects and phases over many years, 200 million here, 300 million there. Which left it fly under the radar.

It is a pity we can't break MN and DU up similarly. They are going to be a hard sell as it is. Tell people it will cost 10+ billion and nothing will get built.

I'm hoping what is happening, is that DU will still happen, but they don't want to talk about it now as two multi billion projects at the same time would freak people out.

Instead just focus on MN first, once done turn their attention to DU and then after that future extensions built around these core networks. In some ways a similar phasing to the motorway network.

Totally agree - we Irish aren't typically long term people, in comparison with other peoples:
https://geert-hofstede.com/ireland.html

MJohnston

I actually think Irish people are fairly open to infrastructure if it is presented to them correctly, but our media is awful at communicating the value of infrastructure projects, and indeed they probably find greater click bait value these days in advocating against it. The government play their part by being unable to properly present coherent strategies for a lot of different types of infrastructure, you just need to look at Irish Water for proof of that.

There's not much we can do about the politicians, but we can influence the media, or build better media. Papers like Dublin Inquirer should be supported as they're much more interested in proper journalism than the likes of the Irish Times or RTE.

Dardania

MJohnston wrote: »

I actually think Irish people are fairly open to infrastructure if it is presented to them correctly, but our media is awful at communicating the value of infrastructure projects, and indeed they probably find greater click bait value these days in advocating against it. The government play their part by being unable to properly present coherent strategies for a lot of different types of infrastructure, you just need to look at Irish Water for proof of that.

There's not much we can do about the politicians, but we can influence the media, or build better media. Papers like Dublin Inquirer should be supported as they're much more interested in proper journalism than the likes of the Irish Times or RTE.

Agreed (Irish people open to infrastructure generally) but if communicating it, 
it must be in terms of what people know (e.g. MN is a development on the Luas idea), 
and it has to be possible to break it into stages to decrease (perceived) risk of failure

The media do need to have an open mind about these things...they don't realise the influence they have. And how does one tell the media how to report on things?

LeinsterDub

http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/television/tv-news/five-things-we-learned-from-leo-varadkars-final-appearance-on-tonight-with-vincent-browne-35972552.html

The review of capital spending by Public Expenditure Minister Paschal Donohoe has been well flagged but the Taoiseach said the overall figure will be “in the region of €80bn” over the next decades. This money will be used for big infrastructure projects like the Metro Dublin. “We’re planning for a country with a population of 5.5m by 2040. It’s about giving people opportunities to better themselves,” he said.

I must check TV3 player on lunch

AlmightyCushion

LeinsterDub wrote: »

http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/television/tv-news/five-things-we-learned-from-leo-varadkars-final-appearance-on-tonight-with-vincent-browne-35972552.html



I must check TV3 player on lunch

I really like it being called Metro Dublin. It implies that it's more than just Metro North that will be built.

Yourself isit

D.L.R. wrote: »

+1. Rural Ireland's antipathy towards Dublin is our problem historically for sure. That and the state's miserly approach to capital spending.

But as Ireland urbanises - and its doing so at a fair clip now - the rural problem will naturally abate.

I think we're actually starting to see that change manifest in the political arena and it will only grow in strength over the coming decades.

What we need is a shift in culture from "vanity project" to "economic investment". Its not just rural Ireland who have this outdated view of extravagance.

The whole rural anti Dublin thing is overblown. Fact is Dublin should be able to find it self or in part. TDs are not elected to run Dublin either.