Greenways [greenway map of Ireland in post 1]

Zebra3

MJohnston wrote: »

So is there an up-to-date list of what is complete/in-progress/not started on the Royal Canal Greenway at this stage? The website is out of date. Here's what they have as currently In Progress:

Dublin:

• Phase 2; Upper sheriff St. to North Strand.
• Phase 3; North Strand to Phibsborough
• Phase 4; Phibsborough to Ashtown.
• Blanchardstown to Fingal/Meath Border at Confey. Work on these four sections is in the planning stage and was due to start in 2016-17, see; Royal Canal Way Part 8 (May 2016). However, in September 2016 the upgrade was put on hold. Apparently the money earmarked for these section was diverted to fund work on the Luas, see; RTE (3 Sept 2016). As of September 2017 no new progress

Kildare and Meath:

• Confey to east side of Maynooth Harbour; (Feb 2018). (8 Km). Work on this section is due to start in the first quarter of 2018 and should be completed mid 2018.
• Cloncurry Bridge to Westmeath Border; (October 2017). (22 Km). Towpath is closed with work ongoing which is expected to be completed mid 2018

So are the last two projects finished? Any update on the others?

Jogged from along the greenway from the level crossing close to Intel to Maynooth this morning. No work on that part of it anyway.

L1011

Maynooth-Fingal Border is meant to start in Autumn, not be completed in Autumn. The first bit done happened to roughly coincide with some other public realm improvements around the Harbour in Maynooth and it has made it a much nicer place to be.

The main effort of the non-greenway works were a fast access road for the fire station but the associated works included widening a pinch point on the R406 to have cycle lanes, enhanced right turn sequences on traffic lights, conversion of a heavily walked but not heavily driven street to a shared space paving (was full width tarmac and no paths before), public seating, Sheffield bike stands and all done with high quality materials. Astonishing level of quality from Kildare County Council - they aren't known for it!

marno21

Kerry County Council have started a Part 8 process for Listowel-Limerick county border greenway

http://www.radiokerry.ie/council-starts-planning-process-north-kerry-greenway/

serfboard

marno21 wrote: »

Kerry County Council have started a Part 8 process for Listowel-Limerick county border greenway

http://www.radiokerry.ie/council-starts-planning-process-north-kerry-greenway/

Any idea what the timescale is for this i.e. until it's built?

flazio

What's the status of the line between Navan and Drogheda? Would make a nice Boyne greenway.

marno21

flazio wrote: »

What's the status of the line between Navan and Drogheda? Would make a nice Boyne greenway.

In active freight use. A greenway shouldn't be near the table here let alone on the table

roadmaster

marno21 wrote: »

In active freight use. A greenway shouldn't be near the table here let alone on the table

I do often wonder how come tara still use this line to transport the ore. By road to dublin port from tara is only 45mins via port tunnel. I am not sure if it was caused by a irish rail strike but tara did use trucks a few years ago. Anyway there is a greenway of sorts already from navan to slane along the boyne . They could develop it proparly drogheda to navan and then hook up with the proposed development of the kingscourt navan greenway

Squeaksoutloud

flazio wrote: »

What's the status of the line between Navan and Drogheda? Would make a nice Boyne greenway.

Boyne greenway is proposed to follow the boyne River navigation route. First phase from Drogheda to oldbridge opened few years ago and plans to continue to navan. Haven't heard anything on it for a while now though.

Del.Monte

roadmaster wrote: »

I do often wonder how come tara still use this line to transport the ore. By road to dublin port from tara is only 45mins via port tunnel. I am not sure if it was caused by a irish rail strike but tara did use trucks a few years ago. Anyway there is a greenway of sorts already from navan to slane along the boyne . They could develop it proparly drogheda to navan and then hook up with the proposed development of the kingscourt navan greenway

Tara Mines planning permission was only granted provided the ore was railed out to Dublin Port. Even when the mine finally runs out the line should be retained for possible reopening for passenger traffic. As for a greenway to Kingscourt....why?

Deedsie

Del.Monte wrote: »

Tara Mines planning permission was only granted provided the ore was railed out to Dublin Port. Even when the mine finally runs out the line should be retained for possible reopening for passenger traffic. As for a greenway to Kingscourt....why?

Same reason as any other greenway presumably? Tourism, promote active healthy lifestyle, repurpose an under utilised resource etc etc

Zubeneschamali

Del.Monte wrote: »

Tara Mines planning permission was only granted provided the ore was railed out to Dublin Port.

That could explain why they still use rail freight, alright.

Sam Russell

Zubeneschamali wrote: »

That could explain why they still use rail freight, alright.

And the Malahide Estuary Bridge collapse may explain why they reverted to road for a while.

roadmaster

Del.Monte wrote: »

Tara Mines planning permission was only granted provided the ore was railed out to Dublin Port. Even when the mine finally runs out the line should be retained for possible reopening for passenger traffic. As for a greenway to Kingscourt....why?

Opening Drogheda to navan as passenger rail would be madness as no one would use it by the time you would be in Dublin you would have being there in half the time on the bus. Then you would also be adding extra capacity to a line full as it is , what happens with the dart goes to drogheda and if the enterprise gets the upgrade a train from navan would mess that up. If a train is to come back to navan extend the dunboyne line. As for why a greenway to kingscourt, why not. they are great public amenity that are not just for our continental friends to enjoy but for the citizens of this state to enjoy. They seam to be a success everywhere

Del.Monte

roadmaster wrote: »

Opening Drogheda to navan as passenger rail would be madness as no one would use it by the time you would be in Dublin you would have being there in half the time on the bus. Then you would also be adding extra capacity to a line full as it is , what happens with the dart goes to drogheda and if the enterprise gets the upgrade a train from navan would mess that up. If a train is to come back to navan extend the dunboyne line. As for why a greenway to kingscourt, why not. they are great public amenity that are not just for our continental friends to enjoy but for the citizens of this state to enjoy. They seam to be a success everywhere

Navan/Dublin using the existing alignment could be done in an hour or slightly less than the current bus service.

As for greenways, they are not the panacea for everything and a meandering line between hedgerows to nowhere (Kingscourt) is not going to attract the numbers that you seem to believe. It's not the scenic Great Western greenway or the Waterford/Dungarvan route you're talking about.

roadmaster

Del.Monte wrote: »

Navan/Dublin using the existing alignment could be done in an hour or slightly less than the current bus service.

As for greenways, they are not the panacea for everything and a meandering line between hedgerows to nowhere (Kingscourt) is not going to attract the numbers that you seem to believe. It's not the scenic Great Western greenway or the Waterford/Dungarvan route you're talking about.

Over time bring the greenway to kingscourt because you have a natural route on state land then connect to Dundalk via Carrickmacross and then on to the proposed Drogheda Dundalk greenway. You now have the Great North eastern greenway for tourists and locals. As for the train from navan bringing it via dunboyne has a far better business case as you have more population on that corridor

Del.Monte

Deedsie wrote: »

Do you just come onto this thread to repeatedly have a go at greenways? We get it. You are not a fan.

It's a discussion forum or should it just be for people who all agree with each other?

marno21

Deedsie wrote: »

Do you just come onto this thread to repeatedly have a go at greenways? We get it. You are not a fan.

He's simply advocating against closing down/tearing up active railways for greenways when they have merit as a railway. Whatever about the Kingscourt branch, the Navan-Drogheda line should be nowhere near any greenway plans while it remains an active freight railway and is one of the only attempts made in this country to remove trucks from roads.

It's the same with Midleton-Youghal. A greenway on that line is very short sighted given the way Cork City is going and it's a direct link into Cork City.

roadmaster

I dont think we will ever have to worry about the Drogheda Navan railway line being used for a greenway due to the river boyne. As someone wrote already work has already started on this it seams

here is some interesting info on the Proposed Kingscourt to navan Greenway

http://www.meath.ie/media/media,53399,en.pdf

riddlinrussell

marno21 wrote: »

Kerry County Council have started a Part 8 process for Listowel-Limerick county border greenway

http://www.radiokerry.ie/council-starts-planning-process-north-kerry-greenway/

Thanks marno, updated the map for that.

serfboard

marno21 wrote: »

He's simply advocating against closing down/tearing up active railways for greenways when they have merit as a railway.

He's not actually, as he just asked why anyone would build a Greenway to Kingscourt. That's not "simply advocating against closing down/tearing up active railways".

L1011

riddlinrussell wrote: »

Thanks marno, updated the map for that.

50/50 on whether you should change the end of the Letterkenny-Burtonport to Completed as while there's a few sections that are actually still open to cars it is either asphalt or compacted gravel for a few km from Burtonport, all open to walkers/cyclists and signposted.

http://www.therosses.ie/burtonport-old-railway-walk.html

riddlinrussell

I've updated it to "Planned/In Progress"

I'd like to have a colour for "Considered finished by the council but not Greenway standard" but I'd probably have to introduce a Standard system based on something like the Dutch or European standards and it would get a bit hectic... might require a separate map.

riddlinrussell

riddlinrussell wrote: »

I've updated it to "Planned/In Progress"

I'd like to have a colour for "Considered finished by the council but not Greenway standard" but I'd probably have to introduce a Standard system based on something like the Dutch or European standards and it would get a bit hectic... might require a separate map.

You should consider using openstreetmap. You can tag the routes any way that suits and then represent them on something like Umap. Much greater level of design freedom and easier to expand going forward but requires a bit of work upfront in the mapping / tagging of the routes

Depends on what you see as being the use case for the map

riddlinrussell

I've had a look at openstreetmap but the furthest Ive gotten is pulling some of the gps tracks from it to use in my maps. The accuracy level of my routes isn't perfect, a lot of the canal routes etc just follow the actual canal not the most suitable route for an actual greenway, its more 'representational'.

All the GPX files for my routes are open for downloading though so if you wanted to put them up on openstreetmap then fire away. I might get to it when I have time.

32km South Kerry Greenway application & CPO on way within weeks

https://m.independent.ie/regionals/kerryman/news/greenway-application-cpo-on-way-within-weeks-37102051.html

riddlinrussell

Good to see progress on it, I think its unfortunate that it had to go to CPO stage, I think with something like this with major community backing maximum effort should be made to ensure a workable solution is come to with farmers. I can only imagine there were one or two who basically either point blank refused to work with the council or only offered totally unworkable solutions.

riddlinrussell

riddlinrussell wrote: »

Good to see progress on it, I think its unfortunate that it had to go to CPO stage, I think with something like this with major community backing maximum effort should be made to ensure a workable solution is come to with farmers. I can only imagine there were one or two who basically either point blank refused to work with the council or only offered totally unworkable solutions.

I think those would be the only reasons to go the CPO route

riddlinrussell

Yeah, that this has dragged on for 4 years is ridiculous, I sincerely hope the lessons learned from Waterford/Westport and the failures of going gung ho CPO on EuroVelo 2 to Galway will significantly smooth the process for new routes, especially in those areas where the Community is fully behind the project

serfboard

Deleted User wrote: »

32km South Kerry Greenway application & CPO on way within weeks

https://m.independent.ie/regionals/kerryman/news/greenway-application-cpo-on-way-within-weeks-37102051.html

That's quite a remarkable report.

The Kerryman wrote:

There is huge local support for the project, particularly from the business community but also from local landowners ...

The consensus among the wider community is that it is the only way to save South Kerry ...

The 32km-South Kerry Greenway is one of the county's biggest tourism projects and it is estimated that it could be worth up to €5 million annually to the region. Pat Kavanagh of IRD Kells Foilmore said that a lot of thought went into deciding how best to use the old railway line, and he said that a greenway is the best option.

"It is a lifeline for the future. We are very lucky to have this opportunity of this in our area. The sooner it is past the post and gets start the sooner it will reveal the full potential. It will turn the place around" he said.

There are, IMO, only two options for economic opportunities in rural areas - whatever (very) small bit of farming is left and Agri-tourism, including Greenways.

The people of South Kerry get it.

serfboard

From The Examiner:

The Irish Examiner wrote:

Fáilte Ireland ... has ...begun an advertising campaign for ‘Ireland’s Hidden Heartlands’, the country’s latest tourism experience.

Long overlooked and living in the shadow of the much higher profile Ancient East and Wild Atlantic Way, this midland region of lakes, walks, and blueways could well turn out to be a source of rich visitor revenue in the years ahead. Extending across the heart of the country, from Leitrim down to east Clare and through Longford, Roscommon, Galway, Westmeath, and Cavan, it offers an Ireland relatively untouched in comparison to the other well trafficked regions that surround it.
...
The latest addition seems well-placed to appeal to the growing tourism trend for a softer vacation experience, encouraging visitors to be ‘active in nature’ and to explore off the beaten track through activities such as walking, cycling, fishing, and food.