Palmerston lights, will they be changed?

doolox

Is there any plans to replace the Palmerstown lights with a grade separated junction in order to relieve the traffic congestion that occurs ONLY at that accursed junction????

The govt has done an excellent job in stopping congestion along most of the M50 and the junctions leading off the M50 are much improved, thanks for that.

There are no other obstructions to progress from Dublin Heuston all the way to Galway except the lights at Inchicore and the lights at Palmerstown.

While the lights at Inchcore may be logical, to calm traffic entering a major builtup area, the lights at Palmerstown make absolutely no sense. The govt have found the resources and the will to improve junctions elsewhere in the greater Dublin area to freeflow standards. Why can't they do it to Palmerstown??????

geogan

Something badly needs to be done about the two traffic light junctions in Palmerstown. They cause massive tailbacks for miles along the main N4 road every evening and I'm sick of it. Don't the idiots who set the timings on these light realise that if you stop a massive line of traffic on the main road moving then it takes much longer for it to get going again as each idiot driver in the chain waits for the car in front of it to drive away before starting to move. Sometimes only a few cars get through because they are blocked by cars stuck at the next junction under the pedestrian bridge. It is so annoying sitting there and watching two or three cars saunter out from the palmerstown estate and lights sitting red for another 2 minutes while 300 cars are sitting in a huge queue all the way back around nearly to Heuston station. It's come to the stage where the main N4 is too slow and it is much better and quicker to do a rat-run through Ballyfermot and around by Liffey Valley instead of sitting in huge queues on the N4 before Palmerstown. I reckon if you surveyed the traffic clogging up Ballyfermot main street any time between 4 and 6.30 any day and you'd find half of them are just using it as a rat run to avoid N4 bottleneck at palmerstown.
Apart from the sheer boredom it is very tiring going first gear, second gear, brake, repeat for 5 miles an evening and not good for car either. Who's going to pay for petrol and wear and tear on my clutch - can I give bill to dublin corporation or what?
They NEED to change the timing on palmerstown lights between 4 and 6 on weekday evenings so they STAY GREEN MUCH LONGER on main road - let the idiots coming out of the estates wait 10 minutes instead of entire dublin trying to get home from city center on N4!!!
Are there any local politicians we could put pressure on about this?

Mental Mickey

geogan wrote: »

Something badly needs to be done about the two traffic light junctions in Palmerstown. They cause massive tailbacks for miles along the main N4 road every evening and I'm sick of it. Don't the idiots who set the timings on these light realise that if you stop a massive line of traffic on the main road moving then it takes much longer for it to get going again as each idiot driver in the chain waits for the car in front of it to drive away before starting to move. Sometimes only a few cars get through because they are blocked by cars stuck at the next junction under the pedestrian bridge. It is so annoying sitting there and watching two or three cars saunter out from the palmerstown estate and lights sitting red for another 2 minutes while 300 cars are sitting in a huge queue all the way back around nearly to Heuston station. It's come to the stage where the main N4 is too slow and it is much better and quicker to do a rat-run through Ballyfermot and around by Liffey Valley instead of sitting in huge queues on the N4 before Palmerstown. I reckon if you surveyed the traffic clogging up Ballyfermot main street any time between 4 and 6.30 any day and you'd find half of them are just using it as a rat run to avoid N4 bottleneck at palmerstown.
Apart from the sheer boredom it is very tiring going first gear, second gear, brake, repeat for 5 miles an evening and not good for car either. Who's going to pay for petrol and wear and tear on my clutch - can I give bill to dublin corporation or what?
They NEED to change the timing on palmerstown lights between 4 and 6 on weekday evenings so they STAY GREEN MUCH LONGER on main road - let the idiots coming out of the estates wait 10 minutes instead of entire dublin trying to get home from city center on N4!!!
Are there any local politicians we could put pressure on about this?

Why the constant need to refer to the people coming out of the estates as idiots? Do you think that this term adds weight to your argument? You raise some very good points, but you let yourself down by the constant use of that one word. Do you not think that the traffic coming from the village/out of the estates has as much right to get to where they are going??

geogan

Mental Mickey wrote: »

Why the constant need to refer to the people coming out of the estates as idiots? Do you think that this term adds weight to your argument? You raise some very good points, but you let yourself down by the constant use of that one word. Do you not think that the traffic coming from the village/out of the estates has as much right to get to where they are going??

I called the people coming out of estates that ONCE. Not constantly.

Yes they have a right to get out of the estates but they do NOT have the right to have equal light time. A car arrives at the estate junction and is out onto N4 in less than 5 minutes. At the same time the two palmerstown lights add HALF AN HOUR to my journey time most evenings. Why should people trying to get home from work sit waiting that long for two bloody badly setup and timed triffic light junctions. They should be timed so they do not CAUSE more than 100m-200m of traffic to build up on N4. At the moment they are directly causing 1-2KM of traffic to build up every evening with not enough time for that queue to get back up to speed and through the junction. It's very basic flow control. Let the people coming out of estates wait longer at these rush hour times.

Saruman

Don't forget the people turning from the N4 to get in to the estates. That adds traffic light time as well.

It is not only people trying to get out. In the morning you could be 20 minutes trying to get from Palmerstown on to the N4.

Stark

geogan wrote: »

Why should people trying to get home from work sit waiting that long for two bloody badly setup and timed triffic light junctions.

Probably because they're idiots like the people coming out of the estates. They should be made to wait for 10 mins before being allowed to leave their car parks.

stoneill

The N4 sliced through Palmerstown and Lucan, cutting both communities in half.
Some remedial work was done to upgrade the junction at Lucan and the N4 there has had less impact. But for the people of Palmerstown and surrounding areas who still need to do their daily business the N4 acts as a barrier.

Why should they have to wait for commuters passing through getting preference at lights? The people of Palmerstown have every much right to use the road as anyone else. Pity you sitting at a traffic light for 3 minutes twice a day.

geogan

stoneill wrote: »

Why should they have to wait for commuters passing through getting preference at lights? The people of Palmerstown have every much right to use the road as anyone else. Pity you sitting at a traffic light for 3 minutes twice a day.

Believe me if I could bypass Palmerstown I would - you think we want to crawl through it twice a day? And who said 3 minutes extra - it's nearly 30 minutes extra to get through the place. Can you not get your local politicians to dig a hole under the N4 and sort out this mess for the people of Lucan, Leixlip, Celbridge and the rest that you hold up every day? The junction at Woodies was done years ago, and Superquinn/Hillcrest was done recently... if it wasn't for those lights we could get from city center to Lucan, Leixlip, Maynooth, Celbridge in 20-30 minutes in the evening.

lendmeyourear

Oh I am feeling my blood pressure rising....I remember sitting in traffic for four hours just before Christmas(Heuston to Palmerstown) and mind you gladly turning back to the city at the Palmerstown junction when my poor kidneys called it a day ...I so envied all the men who abandoned their cars and headed for the trees along the route that evening...and all because cars could not get up the 'hill' at Liffey Valley....but back to the junctions of the thread, could we find the name of the person in the Roads Department of South County Dublin and harass him rather than harassing ourselves...what positive thing could we do here .... I am all for action... I use this road too often and suffer so enough is enough, delighted to see this thread.

Any of you posters there that particular evening...was it the 21st or 22nd Dec. met some really friendly chaps who helped push me up a bit of the way when I was in dire trouble sliding sideways.

stoneill

geogan wrote: »

Can you not get your local politicians to dig a hole under the N4 and sort out this mess for the people of Lucan, Leixlip, Celbridge and the rest that you hold up every day?

I don't hold anyone up - the lights do.
The thread started about giving the N4 preference (and calling residents idiots).
Residents have equal right to use the road, they live there.
They were there before the road was built, they were they while it was being built and will still be there long after you have finished using it.

Mitzy

Quote:
Originally Posted by geogan
Can you not get your local politicians to dig a hole under the N4 and sort out this mess for the people of Lucan, Leixlip, Celbridge and the rest that you hold up every day?

Well forgive me please for causing you so much inconvenience. I bought my house over 45 years ago LONG before that road was built. I have every right to enter & exit my estate when I wish!

geogan

Mitzy wrote: »

Well forgive me please for causing you so much inconvenience. I bought my house over 45 years ago LONG before that road was built. I have every right to enter & exit my estate when I wish!

Do you have "every right" to cause a 2km 30 minute tailback into dublin every evening so you and the other two people don't have to wait an extra 2 minutes?

stoneill

Eh - they have the right to use the N4 just as much as you. It's not your road.

If that causes a 20 min tailback that's not Mitzy fault.

Mental Mickey

geogan wrote: »

Do you have "every right" to cause a 2km 30 minute tailback into dublin every evening so you and the other two people don't have to wait an extra 2 minutes?

Don't be so bloody smug.

Mental Mickey

geogan wrote: »

I called the people coming out of estates that ONCE. Not constantly.

Yes they have a right to get out of the estates but they do NOT have the right to have equal light time. A car arrives at the estate junction and is out onto N4 in less than 5 minutes. At the same time the two palmerstown lights add HALF AN HOUR to my journey time most evenings. Why should people trying to get home from work sit waiting that long for two bloody badly setup and timed triffic light junctions. They should be timed so they do not CAUSE more than 100m-200m of traffic to build up on N4. At the moment they are directly causing 1-2KM of traffic to build up every evening with not enough time for that queue to get back up to speed and through the junction. It's very basic flow control. Let the people coming out of estates wait longer at these rush hour times.

1. Learn to spell
2. Make a better attempt at trolling.

geogan

I think I see now the cause of the traffic problems in the Palmerstown area - the locals have made sure the lights favour them because it's their little patch and everyone who has to travel through this place daily are just an unwanted inconvenience. If that's what the locals want, that's what the local politicians will give them and that's what they will force the corpo to do. There will be no change to light timings, just have to continue rat runs through Ballyfermot.

geogan

Mental Mickey wrote: »

1. Learn to spell
2. Make a better attempt at trolling.

If you have nothing worthwhile to input to this thread then shutup and stop trying to increase your post count to make yourself feel more important.

Stark

geogan wrote: »

I think I see now the cause of the traffic problems in the Palmerstown area - the locals have made sure the lights favour them because it's their little patch and everyone who has to travel through this place daily are just an unwanted inconvenience. If that's what the locals want, that's what the local politicians will give them and that's what they will force the corpo to do. There will be no change to light timings, just have to continue rat runs through Ballyfermot.

The lights coming out of the estates go green for about 2 seconds every 5 mins these days. There used to be a lot more green time.

stoneill

Goegan -
You are missing the entire point.
The lights are not just an inconvenience for you.
They are an inconvenience for everyone.
Expecting right of way to the detriment to local users is not the answer.
Why should people who live out further west be granted the right to get home to their families over people who live in Palmerstown and surrounding areas.

Bad planning, bad engineering and bad decisions built that road.
Local objections were dismissed, alternate plans were dismissed.
The original proposed design of a continuous carriageway with graded slip roads was changed for a cheaper option with traffic light as we see today, even though the European Structural Fund had already been acquired.
It has been alleged that the monies appropriated were then used to build some type of aqua park in Kerry. This is not my allegation, but was openly said for years.

Now, I suggest that you get onto your local representative, because the people of Palmerstown, Ballyfermot and Cherry Orchard have been fighting this battle for over 30 years to no avail.

lendmeyourear

geogan wrote: »

If you have nothing worthwhile to input to this thread then shutup and stop trying to increase your post count to make yourself feel more important.

gosh..I had no idea that joining a thread like this would end up with trading insults...or is that par for the course... I thought it might have been helpful in determining a course of action... something all interested parties could share a common purpose....at the moment we have all these politicans calling to our very doors, we do not have to do a thing but offer up this big problem we all share...

As a newbie, what is the big deal about notching up post numbers? does that make one a druid or what if you have over X no. of posts...

Just wondering about that....

Heroditas

Strange how this thread descended into a flame war.

From my own point of view, I used to use the N4 inbound from Lucan to work every day and then in through Chapelizod.
Ever since the Newcastle junction has been upgraded, the N4 backs up all the way from Palmerston to well past Liffey Valley. It was backed up to the Celbridge junction yesterday! :eek:
Nowadays I use, along with more and more people every month, Strawberry Beds.

What's the answer to the issue? An upgrade similar to the Newcastle junction?
Is there enough room to do this and fix the two junction?
Also, imagine what will happen when all that traffic flows into Chapelizod and also in towards Heuston in the morning.
I can't help but feel that any upgrade of Palmerston would have more serious consequences further in.
A prime example is how bad it is from the M50 to the Ashtown roundabout in the mornings now. That stretch used to take 5mins. It now takes at least 15, sometimes 20.

lendmeyourear

Heroditas wrote: »

Strange how this thread descended into a flame war.

From my own point of view, I used to use the N4 inbound from Lucan to work every day and then in through Chapelizod.
Ever since the Newcastle junction has been upgraded, the N4 backs up all the way from Palmerston to well past Liffey Valley. It was backed up to the Celbridge junction yesterday! :eek:
Nowadays I use, along with more and more people every month, Strawberry Beds.

What's the answer to the issue? An upgrade similar to the Newcastle junction?
Is there enough room to do this and fix the two junction?
Also, imagine what will happen when all that traffic flows into Chapelizod and also in towards Heuston in the morning.
I can't help but feel that any upgrade of Palmerston would have more serious consequences further in.
A prime example is how bad it is from the M50 to the Ashtown roundabout in the mornings now. That stretch used to take 5mins. It now takes at least 15, sometimes 20.

Ah Heroditas,
we travel the same roads... For some strange reason I thought that I would be able to get to Lucan quickly last week, joining the M4 at the Celbridge Interchange, c.8.30 a.m. When I got beyond Leixlip the traffic came to a grinding halt and I could feel my panic...I could not understand why this was so...no lights up to Palmerstown...so big mistake, I opted to drop down into Lucan village where we came to another halt and inch by inch travelled along. up to where children were being dropped off for school, sigh.... I arrived at my meet point, worn out at 9.35 a.m.

The moral of the story is that we have to revert to the old roads and when we are joined by the rest of men, sure we can try the motorways again. There is some inherant flaw in all of this planning.

I use the Navan Road these days to head out towards Meath.. at least the road is vastly improved from Ashtown to the M50.. I did not know there was a problem on the inbound side in the mornings so thanks for the heads up on that....I leave my home at 5.30 a.m. so there is really only me and me and me on the road at that time...I can recommend it to you

BenShermin

The word "idiot" has been thrown around this thread a lot. I can safely say that anybody who uses the Ballyfermot Road as a rat run in the evenings is an idiot:pac:. You can spend up to 40 minutes some evenings getting from Ballyfermot Village to the start of the Coldcut Road as there is a stupid amount of traffic lights on that strech of road. I don't believe for a second that people from Lucan and beyond use Ballyfermot to by-pass the by-pass...

For a start I don't have any conspiracy theories on the subject, geogan's suggestion that the lights favour Palmerstown residents is laughable. The solution to the problem doesn't lie in a multi million flyover, it lies in proper public transport. We are suffering 14% unemployment and yet the traffic is worse, it doesn't add up. This corrridor used to have frequent express Dublin Buses along with normal Dublin Buses and a frequent peak service from Mortons. All it has now is a deminished and unrealiable Dublin Bus service.

One has to ask the question why these problems are not as bad on the N11, which has much more traffic light junctions. I think the fact that Luas and Dart running parrallel either side of the N11 explains it.


There's a lot to be said for car pool lanes aswell, it's somewhat of a taboo subject. Pity, as it could be part of a solution to Dublin's National road conjestion problems.

Capt'n Midnight

doolox wrote: »

Is there any plans to replace the Palmerstown lights with a grade separated junction in order to relieve the traffic congestion that occurs ONLY at that accursed junction????

...
There are no other obstructions to progress from Dublin Heuston all the way to Galway except the lights at Inchicore and the lights at Palmerstown.

While the lights at Inchcore may be logical, to calm traffic entering a major builtup area, the lights at Palmerstown make absolutely no sense. The govt have found the resources and the will to improve junctions elsewhere in the greater Dublin area to freeflow standards. Why can't they do it to Palmerstown??????

Didn't they do the one at Newcastle road instead of Newlands cross because they were so confident the money would be more readily for the latter later ?


Heading in to town, maybe something needs to be done about the right hand turn after the M50, queues for that can go back to the roundabout

Heroditas

lendmeyourear wrote: »

I use the Navan Road these days to head out towards Meath.. at least the road is vastly improved from Ashtown to the M50.. I did not know there was a problem on the inbound side in the mornings so thanks for the heads up on that....I leave my home at 5.30 a.m. so there is really only me and me and me on the road at that time...I can recommend it to you

Inbound from the Ashtown roundabout takes ages now in the morning. Any time after 7.30 in the morning and it's a crawl.
However, in the evenings, you can do the reverse journey in 2mins - before the upgrade was done it regularly took 30mins!

geogan

BenShermin wrote: »

The word "idiot" has been thrown around this thread a lot. I can safely say that anybody who uses the Ballyfermot Road as a rat run in the evenings is an idiot:pac:. You can spend up to 40 minutes some evenings getting from Ballyfermot Village to the start of the Coldcut Road as there is a stupid amount of traffic lights on that strech of road. I don't believe for a second that people from Lucan and beyond use Ballyfermot to by-pass the by-pass...

For a start I don't have any conspiracy theories on the subject, geogan's suggestion that the lights favour Palmerstown residents is laughable.

Who cares if you don't believe it - people do it because most evening it IS much quicker to go through Ballyfermot than sit in jams on the N4 before Palmerstown. I do use Ballyfermot to by-pass the by-pass at rush hour...

If i'm going to be stuck in traffic I'd prefer to be stuck in traffic going through Ballyfermot than on the no escape one-way jam of N4.

Why is my "suggestion" about lights favouring residents laughable? They DO favour them.They are set so they don't hold up people coming out of junctions for more than 3-5 minutes (or about this) at the expense of traffic flow on main road which doesn't even start moving again by more than a couple of dozen cars by the time the lights go red again. Everybody knows the concertina effect of long lines of stopped cars moving off...

LXFlyer

geogan you make a valid point regarding the impact of the signalled junctions on the N4 on through traffic, but I'd have to say that you're really going about it the wrong way and managing to insult a lot of people by doing it in the manner you're explaining yourself.

The traffic lights are set as green for far longer for the N4 than the side roads at both sets of lights. That is certainly fact. The problem is the fact that there are two sets of lights and the phasing of the light changes.

No one disagrees with you regarding the impact that the lights have on the N4, but realistically the length of phasing is actually very short for the various non-through movements, while the N4 does get priority. Your estimations of the numbers of cars passing through each phase be it on the N4 or out of the side roads is I would suggest understated.

The lights at Kennelsfort Road upon going red for the N4 traffic go through three phases before going green again. One phase to allow traffic turn right from the N4 onto Kennelsfort Road (both outbound and inbound), another to allow traffic out of Palmerston village and a third to allow traffic out of Kennelsfort Road (south side of N4).

Based on my (almost daily) observations from the bus, the first phase facilitates far more than a few cars. There is frequently a huge queue to turn right off the N4 inbound onto Kennelsfort Road in the morning peak. The next two phases do not just suit residents, they also serve the sizeable number of people working in the industrial areas on both sides of the N4 (yes believe it or not there are several major businesses in the Palmerston Village area).

The second set of lights at the garage also remains green for a much shorter length of time for the traffic exiting the Palmerstown Estate or the Village, and has two phases. One for the two side roads exiting onto the N4, and a second for pedestrians crossing (primarily to serve the bus stop and also the village).

The fundamental problem is the number of phases that have to be gone through. Three at Kennelsfort Road and two at the garage. There is no other way of doing it given the current setup at both junctions. Simply removing the junction at the garage would cause even more chaos at the junction at Kennelsfort Road.

Personally, I would think that a grade separated junction at Kennelsfort Road is the obvious solution and at the same time the removal of the junction at Palmerstown Drive/Palmerstown Park opposite the garage, with a pedestrian footbridge installed at that location to facilitate the large number of pedestrians crossing here. Traffic from both sides would then use the Kennelsfort Road junction which would flow quicker if grade separated.

However, that requires funding - something we are a bit short on at the moment.

I would suggest that managing to alienate everyone who uses the other roads is not the most constructive way of addressing the problem - it is a problem for all road users and pedestrians and not simply N4 users.

Mental Mickey

@ geogan - you need to realise that you are not the only one who uses that road, and insulting people will not do you any favours.

Mental Mickey

geogan wrote: »

If you have nothing worthwhile to input to this thread then shutup and stop trying to increase your post count to make yourself feel more important.

PMSL.................oh, and post reported.

Victor

geogan wrote: »

Mental Mickey wrote: »

1. Learn to spell
2. Make a better attempt at trolling.

If you have nothing worthwhile to input to this thread then shutup and stop trying to increase your post count to make yourself feel more important.

Knock it off both of you.

lendmeyourear

Heroditas wrote: »

Inbound from the Ashtown roundabout takes ages now in the morning. Any time after 7.30 in the morning and it's a crawl.
However, in the evenings, you can do the reverse journey in 2mins - before the upgrade was done it regularly took 30mins!

I know all about that, I sat there most evenings...well sometimes did the River Run from Ashtown...saved a few minutes... but I am glad you told me about the tail back in the mornings...I will stick with coming in at 6 a.m. As to the N4, it can be neat nipping over on the M50 from Blanchardstown and skipping the Palmerstown problem, downside of course being, that it costs a toll charge.