Dublin Airport New Runway/Infrastructure.

Irish Steve

The chances of anything sensible happening with public transport in Dublin (let alone the airport) are almost zero while the planning is as badly influenced by the political system. The parish pump mentality means that every boreen in Ballygobackwards will be required to be upgraded before those same parish pump gombeens will vote for "massive" projects for the Dublin area, they conveniently forget the numbers that are living in the East Coast area, who depend on viable infrastructure to operate on a day to day basis, the vast majority of the systems in Dublin are still locked into the unreality that everything happens within the canals in Dublin, even now, there are very few orbital type routes, and even fewer high speed orbital routes to serve places like the Airport, or the large industrial areas in places like Blanchardstown, Ballycoolin, Parkwest, Citywest, and Sandyford, to name just a few, with the result being that huge numbers of people have no alternative other than to use the car to get to these areas, and we all know how well that doesn't work any more.

The Airport desperately needs a significant upgrade in public transport, it's one of (I think) only 2 of similar size in Europe with no rail links, and having done it recently, there's no pleasure in standing around for long periods of time in an open sided "shelter" waiting for a bus that is likely to be running (significantly) late, there's nowhere to wait that's warm and dry, and the schedules can't be relied on, so waiting in the terminal is not an option, there's too much risk of missing the bus if you do that.

At some stage, there will be additional terminal facilities at the Western end of the airport, and sensible links to that area, as well as the existing terminals need to be part of the overall design, not put in as an afterthought that has to be squeezed in somehow into a scheme that wasn't planned to have it. Ideally, the same rail services need to also connect to the long stay and staff car parking, to reduce the number of road journeys that come in to the central areas of the airport, and make commuting for the huge numbers that actually work at the airport a lot easier.

Jamie2k9

Stephen Strange wrote: »

It's madness. In addition to MN, DUB needs the spur from the Northern Line, it would allow people to connect from the DART and Northern Line Services

It would be a typical Irish job if this link was allowed to happen. Completely unfeasible.

Problem also arises of course when you consider that T3 will likely be built out west of the current airfield in a Heathrow T5 type style imaginably, one would hope that this would be considered when building the Metro north so as to have a stop both at the T3 location and then a joint T1/T2 stop as was discussed at the bus Depot at the airport by the Church. This should be considered now before full construction starts on the Metro north line.

Does anyone know the current proposed route for the metro north? Would re-routing it slightly west first to link into T3 be feasible?

Now would be the time to get it done while it's still a greenfield project, not trying to create spur lines 30-35 years down the road, though we've never been great at the future proofing in this country.

Best bet would be a shuttle link underground, re routing isn't really practical or have a split service serving T1,2 & Swords and T3 like underground at LHR.

embraer170

Jamie2k9 wrote: »

It would be a typical Irish job if this link was allowed to happen. Completely unfeasible.

Do you have other ideas how a 55mppa airport (what the Masterplan is about) should be connected to rail public transport?

A light rail Metro North may be part of the solution but is not going to do it alone.

Jamie2k9

embraer170 wrote: »

Do you have other ideas how a 55mppa airport (what the Masterplan is about) should be connected to rail public transport?

A light rail Metro North may be part of the solution but is not going to do it alone.

MN and extra non city center bus routes would easily cater for around 50% of traffic to the city with connections to major bus routes/rail routes. Then you have a significant volume of people from outside Dublin who will use private buses or drive probally another 30%, transit passengers probally 10% while the rest are people who would still drive if the bus stop was outside their front door. N Line branch is not at all practicable in terms of capacity, frequency and speed for people. It ticks the boxes for cheap and messy.

trellheim

This is correct. a Northern line extension to Dub is completely useless - unless you add an extra two lines from the spur at Clongriffin all the way to Connolly - which is essentially impossible - there is no paths for the service you would need

JCX BXC

Irish Steve wrote: »

The parish pump mentality means that every boreen in Ballygobackwards will be required to be upgraded before those same parish pump gombeens will vote for "massive" projects for the Dublin area

I'm gonna to have to call you on this one, the transport outside Dublin is mostly dire, really really terrible. Dublin is the only city in Ireland where I'm confident you'd survive without a car currently. In West Clare it's simply shocking, for example from Kilrush to Ennis it costs €14 one way, yet once in Ennis you can get to Dublin for less on the train! Granted population here is low, however the bus can be quite full and with the subsidies on the route it's amazing to see such ridiculous pricing. Nobody would pay such money for transport for such a short distance on a regular basis.

We're spending money on stupid things like Limerick-Ballybrophy, while other areas nearby hardly have a reliable bus.

In regards to transport, a competent management authority would be great firstly, with adequate investment.

One thing we seem to actually do right in this country is airports.

Stephen Strange

trellheim wrote: »

This is correct. a Northern line extension to Dub is completely useless - unless you add an extra two lines from the spur at Clongriffin all the way to Connolly - which is essentially impossible - there is no paths for the service you would need

To do it, I would turn the Howth Service into a shuttle, running between Howth and Howth Junction only. I'm only a layman though, so what would I know.

Peregrine

NH2013 wrote: »

Would re-routing it slightly west first to link into T3 be feasible?

No. Metro North isn't the solution for T3.

Not saying we don't have to think about a rail link to a future western terminal, I'm saying mangling Metro North isn't the answer. It will probably have to be some sort of shuttle. And possibly a Luas extension from Finglas but that would be very slow. But if we're talking about Terminal 3 then we might as well talk about some sort of realignment of Metro West.

TheFitz13

Given that Aer Lingus, Iberia, Vueling and BA are all IAG subsidiaries, is there any chance that they'll all move over to T some time in the future? BA in particular..

JCX BXC

T2?

Not a chance imo, just look at T2 capacity issues!

TheFitz13

I just thought it would be inevitable that we could see BA at T2 since they are owned by the same company and they have interlining agreements..

The Veteran

2016 passenger volume to and from Uk was just under 10m; Pier 3 couldn’t handle that volume plus Pier 3 is a contact Pier with bridges so FR wouldn’t use it plus the other carriers (in Pier 3 now) would have to be rehomed.

IAG could go to T2 but would mean BA and Iberia using Pier 3 (which they do) as T2 Airlines (this pax walking to main immigration and baggage hall in T2).

TheFitz13

The Veteran wrote: »

2016 passenger volume to and from Uk was just under 10m; Pier 3 couldn’t handle that volume plus Pier 3 is a contact Pier with bridges so FR wouldn’t use it plus the other carriers (in Pier 3 now) would have to be rehomed.

IAG could go to T2 but would mean BA and Iberia using Pier 3 (which they do) as T2 Airlines (this pax walking to main immigration and baggage hall in T2).

BA service to Heathrow goes to the 200's and BA city flyer goes to 300's (70% of the time)

VG31

TheFitz13 wrote: »

BA service to Heathrow goes to the 200's and BA city flyer goes to 300's (70% of the time)

It seems to have changed recently with practically all BA flights using Pier 2. I'd say it's closer to 80% + of BA CityFlyer flights that use Pier 2. Some other airlines that used to use Pier 3 like Vueling and Eurowings now use Pier 2 mostly.

Donegal Storm

On transport, Metro North would be sufficient if bus facilities were significantly upgraded. The airport is the busiest and best connected bus station in the country yet bus facilities basically consist of a load of confusing and scattered shelters with little info available to passengers. They need a real bus terminal type station, one central hub with actual facilities.

And couldn't they just run a shuttle bus from the nearest Northern line station rather than a spur? Not as efficient obviously but essentially the same service for a fraction of the cost

trellheim

On transport, Metro North would be sufficient if bus facilities were significantly upgraded. The airport is the busiest and best connected bus station in the country yet bus facilities basically consist of a load of confusing and scattered shelters with little info available to passengers. They need a real bus terminal type station, one central hub with actual facilities.

And couldn't they just run a shuttle bus from the nearest Northern line station rather than a spur? Not as efficient obviously but essentially the same service for a fraction of the cost

You may be interested to know that far from being publicly minded, DAA charges a lot of money to let buses stop in Dublin Airport for essentially fk-all facilities This will not change unless the Minister for Stepaside actually knocks heads

Regarding a shuttle bus it would have to drill through a lot of crappy traffic to get to Clongriffin Dart or whatever and wait up to 20 mins for another 20 mins to Connolly, when a vastly faster service to the city centre is there for Airlink and Aircoach

Irish Steve

The issue with buses is the dwell time, the first issue being the time taken to put cases into the "hold", then the actual boarding, for a maximum of around 70 passengers, for rail, the cases go with the passenger, and each train takes possibly as many as 400 passengers, which makes for a much more effective and appropriate service level, which is why almost every airport the size of Dublin has a dedicated rail link.

The present bus service is a nightmare, simply because there's no real facilities for the intending passenger, and there's no timetable information anywhere other than in the small, exposed and cold "shelters" at the multiplicity of stops that are used. If the bus only runs once an hour, and is then running late (which is most of the time on the 109A), there's no pleasure at all to be standing at the stop waiting for it, and no way to go somewhere warm and dry while waiting, as the display cannot be relied on to be accurate, only recently, it was saying 35 minutes late, and then, with less than 20 minutes to go, the late time changed to less than 10 minutes, so if we'd been anywhere else to try and keep warm etc, we'd have missed it due to the inaccuracy of the "real time" information.

DAA has very little interest in providing any services for departing passengers, as they are not generating revenue, and arriving buses arrive when they arrive, so there's no real facilities needed other than enough space to drop off and go without queuing, which probably explains why things are so bad at present.

Shuttle bus services to the existing rail network are unlikely to be used significantly, it's quicker and simpler to get the bus to/from the centre of town and come out through the Port Tunnel, albeit that there are still issues with dwell time for loading and unloading due to the structure of the buses, which properly designed rail can and does overcome.

The issue is (as always) Political will, which is sadly lacking, partly because politicians don't use public transport, and partly because of the ongoing issues with short term (next election) viewpoints, and partly because of parish pump issues. A good integrated road and rail public transport system, with links to long term parking as well would make a huge difference to the environment around the airport, but achieving that is unlikely to happen any time soon. If it was done properly, it could also make life a little easier for the massive number of people that work at the airport, and who have to struggle on a daily basis to get through the mess that is the present access systems.

MJohnston

trellheim wrote: »

You may be interested to know that far from being publicly minded, DAA charges a lot of money to let buses stop in Dublin Airport for essentially fk-all facilities This will not change unless the Minister for Stepaside actually knocks heads

Regarding a shuttle bus it would have to drill through a lot of crappy traffic to get to Clongriffin Dart or whatever and wait up to 20 mins for another 20 mins to Connolly, when a vastly faster service to the city centre is there for Airlink and Aircoach

Presumably the talk of a DART spur is not about serving Dubliners, but about giving those travelling from north of Clongriffin (ie. Drogheda, Dundalk, Northern Ireland, etc.) an option to get to the airport without having to go into the city centre first.

I still think a coach is faster for those people, but I don't think the point of the spur was to serve Dublin.

trellheim

Presumably the talk of a DART spur is not about serving Dubliners, but about giving those travelling from north of Clongriffin (ie. Drogheda, Dundalk, Northern Ireland, etc.) an option to get to the airport without having to go into the city centre first.

I still think a coach is faster for those people, but I don't think the point of the spur was to serve Dublin.

I see what you are on about, but without massive improvements in the railway track from Newry north which is very slow, the bus from Belfast will be more or less same time as the railway or better , so no point in a spur without huge investment North and south for very limited paths - it would have to fit between DARTs, existing northern Line , and Existing enterprise.

I think MN is the right answer as it gives a better answer

Irish Steve

OK, I have made the time, this is the Dublin Airport new runway/Infrastructure thread, it is NOT an opportunity to go into the whole Brexit, CTA and related issues again, so, I have stripped out the posts from the last few days that are immigration etc related and make a specific BREXIT thread, but we reserve the right to move it to a different forum if it goes off track again

rushfan

Irish Steve wrote:

OK, I have made the time, this is the Dublin Airport new runway/Infrastructure thread, it is NOT an opportunity to go into the whole Brexit, CTA and related issues again, so, I have stripped out the posts from the last few days that are immigration etc related and make a specific BREXIT thread, but we reserve the right to move it to a different forum if it goes off track again

Thank Christ.

roadmaster

The new tower being built by bam beside cityjet will it have restricted working hours due to cranes eventually being used or can they operate cranes during normal hours as no aircraft would be in the air in that area anyway?

LXFlyer

The Veteran wrote: »

I don’t think a spur from the northern line makes sense as it will cost a bunch of money and will only add to congestion on the northern line and i the central loop between Connolly and Pearse stations. To make it worthwhile, DART would have to be extended to Swords (essentially splitting northern DART services to Howth, Malahide and Swords) AND the tracks increased from 2 to 4 from at least Clongriffin to allow northern Commuter and Enterprise services to function.

The rail service would be servicing the city not the northern towns and cities as there are already hourly services serving Drogheda and Dundalk; as well as three services (BE\Translink, Aircoach and Dublin coach) serving Belfast.

Fully agree that whilst daa boasts that it hosts the busiest coach\bus depot in the country, it sadly lacks facilities (toilets, information, seating, shop, etc). For me, the bus station should be where T2 Surface parking is now with Aircoach and Airlink cleared from the T1 Arrivals Road.

Taking part of The Veteran's post that was moved elsewhere to another thread...

I think you're making the same mistake as many people do when the DART spur comes up for discussion. You're clearly assuming that the status quo in terms of service provision on the Northern line out of Connolly remains the same.

If the spur were built, there would have to be changes in how the service operates. Off-peak at least, Howth would be served by a shuttle from Howth Junction (this would, incidentally, enable service levels to be doubled on the branch).

The existing Howth DART services would be diverted to the Airport. By increasing the Northern line services to half-hourly, some of the Malahide DART services could also be diverted.

Incidentally, there is going to have to be some form of capacity enhancement between Connolly and Clongriffin sooner rather than later, regardless of whether a DART spur to the Airport gets built or not, in the form of a third or fourth line between Clontarf Road and Raheny, to facilitate outer suburban trains overtaking stopping services as frequency increases. Otherwise journey times on those services will become unacceptably long. Again, I wouldn't be using that as an excuse not to connect the DART line to the Airport.

Such a spur would facilitate northern towns, by offering a one stop connection at Clongriffin. I would expect that the Enterprise would stop there to offer connections to/from the North if such a spur were built.

Personally speaking, I would see the DART spur as being something that should only be invested in if DART Underground takes place - it should in my view be a full part of that project (along with increasing the Northern Line capacity). It would then open up the Airport to the full national rail network.

Very tall tower crane being erected over at the new tower site. Easily 250-300ft tall. Looks like we will see the new tower rising out of the ground shortly.

Gaoth Laidir

Deleted User wrote: »

Very tall tower crane being erected over at the new tower site. Easily 250-300ft tall. Looks like we will see the new tower rising out of the ground shortly.

Not bad, it looks to be around 350 tall (600 ft amsl).

N0007/18
OBST ERECTED - CONSTRUCTION CRANE OBSTACLE ACTIVE POSITION: 532543.896N 0061552.072W ELEVATION 185.8M/600FT AMSL - LIGHTED EIDW AD 2.10 13 JAN 2018 08:00FROM: 27 JAN 2018 08:00

Ben D Bus

Gaoth Laidir wrote: »

Not bad, it looks to be around 350 tall (600 ft amsl).

Crappy picture from the 400 gates but you can see the height of the crane relative to the existing tower.

Bussywussy

Gaoth Laidir wrote: »

Deleted User wrote: »

Very tall tower crane being erected over at the new tower site. Easily 250-300ft tall. Looks like we will see the new tower rising out of the ground shortly.

Not bad, it looks to be around 350 tall (600 ft amsl).

N0007/18
OBST ERECTED - CONSTRUCTION CRANE OBSTACLE ACTIVE POSITION: 532543.896N 0061552.072W ELEVATION 185.8M/600FT AMSL - LIGHTED EIDW AD 2.10 13 JAN 2018 08:00FROM: 27 JAN 2018 08:00

Think it automatically adjusts too for wind when not being used....

LiamaDelta

Bussywussy wrote: »

Think it automatically adjusts too for wind when not being used....

Cranes are normally left in 'free float' they can rotate to the point of least resistance of the wind. It's mainly the counterweight that takes a wind loading the rest being predominantly tubular.

View Profile

LiamaDelta wrote:

Cranes are normally left in 'free float' they can rotate to the point of least resistance of the wind. It's mainly the counterweight that takes a wind loading the rest being predominantly tubular.

Good giant windsock so.

The strobes on it are fairly bright too!

irishgeo

Deleted User wrote: »

Very tall tower crane being erected over at the new tower site. Easily 250-300ft tall. Looks like we will see the new tower rising out of the ground shortly.

is this needed for the second runway