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Why is there no channel tunnel between Ireland and the UK?

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    #62
    BlueCam
    Registered Users Posts: 159 ✭✭BlueCam


    LordSutch wrote: »
    I could see a bridge being built in the distant future going between the Antrim coast over to Galloway on the south-west of Scotland, I would invisage a road/dual carriageway as being the obvious option, (instead of a rail corridor) which would have the complication of different rail guages, with 1600 mm (5'3") used in ROI/NI and 1435 mm (4' 8.5") guage as used in Britain! (tunnelling would be too expensive).

    If high-speed rail ever comes to Ireland (and I imagine it would be built concurrently with this tunnel), it would almost certainly be the British/European 1435mm gauge that is used - this is what Spain did when they built their high-speed network instead of the wider Iberian gauge.


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    #63
    westtip
    Registered Users Posts: 4,282 ✭✭✭westtip


    n900guy wrote: »
    No need for a tunnel, with the fast ferries travelling at 80kph, a train would likely be 160kph max, like in the eurotunnel.

    A much much better way is to link up the boarding to the trains, so that you stop in the ferry, right on it. Somehow :)

    A big problem is not the speed of the ferry, it's the aweful connection that requires a bus or a taxi from Dublin Port for example. A special train carriage that went from e.g., Connolly to the Port, and got *onto* the ferry, and then attached to another train at the other side would be sweet. Reduce the hassle, and number of changes.

    A tunnel would simply cut 99 minutes to probably 50-60 minutes. Save a half hour at most with acceleration and deceleration of the train. You'd save the same time by sorting out the boarding onto the ferry and exit to the train at the other side.

    Like the good old days with the "boat train" from connolly (amiens street) turning off the through the tunnel to the dockside at dun Laughaire. Great to see all the plebs with their cardboard suitcases and long trench coats, flasks and cheese sandwiches boarding the boat to blighty at 1 in the morning. That was the way to move people.


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