N4 - Collooney to Castlebaldwin [open to traffic]

marno21

The first 2.5km on the Sligo side is an online widening/upgrade which includes the construction of a parallel road to facilitate access

veryangryman

marno21 wrote: »

The first 2.5km on the Sligo side is an online widening/upgrade which includes the construction of a parallel road to facilitate access

The access road hardly needs 2 years of stop/go though. Just seems like poor inefficient engineering.

The unmarked cop at Castlebaldwin will be redundant if the stop/go is near him.

marno21

Some nice shots of early works on this scheme courtesy Sligo County Council

https://twitter.com/sligococo/status/1116696235799457792

steeler j

marno21 wrote: »

Some nice shots of early works on this scheme courtesy Sligo County Council

https://twitter.com/sligococo/status/1116696235799457792

nice photos

marno21

Blasting now underway 4km north of Castlebaldwin for 8 months

https://twitter.com/sligococo/status/1142108211526426624

Geogregor

Same news but one more photo:
https://www.oceanfm.ie/2019/07/04/blasting-works-start-on-route-of-new-n4-route-between-collooney-and-castlebaldwin/

marno21

N4 scheme website set up: https://www.n4realignment.ie/

Q1 Newsletter: https://www.n4realignment.ie/media/1538/n4-newsletter-q1-2019-rev1.pdf

marno21

Also, a flythrough over the most northern part of the scheme: https://vimeo.com/337560892

marno21

Pics of site prep May 2019:












June 2019 earthworks:












All credit to Roadbridge @ www.n4realignment.ie

This is scheduled for a Q4 2021 opening. Seems a long way off (even with the required online upgrade at the northern end) for a basic 14km 2+2 scheme with no major structures.

Donegal Storm

Nice, haven't been down the N4 in a while and wasn't aware it was so advanced, good progress being made

marno21

Earthworks drone footage from early July.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIKKOWo0R4Y

road_high

Delighted to see this death trap go. What standard road will it be? DC standard but same as motorway? Or lesser?

marno21

road_high wrote: »

Delighted to see this death trap go. What standard road will it be? DC standard but same as motorway? Or lesser?

Type 2 Dual Carriageway aka 2+2. Two lanes each way with no hard shoulder.

road_high

marno21 wrote: »

Type 2 Dual Carriageway aka 2+2. Two lanes each way with no hard shoulder.

Pity they didn’t just Motorway it to hell- think the traffic figures are pretty high anyway here

Donegal Storm

The 2+2 section around Roosky is perfectly adequate (apart from annoying roundabouts) and usually half empty, motorway would be nice but even basic 2+2 should future proof it for the foreseeable

marno21

road_high wrote: »

Pity they didn’t just Motorway it to hell- think the traffic figures are pretty high anyway here

AADT at the southern terminus is 7k. 2+2 is absolutely plenty. 2+2 has a capacity of ~20k remember

shanec1928

marno21 wrote: »

All credit to Roadbridge @ www.n4realignment.ie

This is scheduled for a Q4 2021 opening. Seems a long way off (even with the required online upgrade at the northern end) for a basic 14km 2+2 scheme with no major structures.

What are the chances of it been done early. They seem to be making ferocious progress. Still flat out 18.30 tonight.

road_high

marno21 wrote: »

AADT at the southern terminus is 7k. 2+2 is absolutely plenty. 2+2 has a capacity of ~20k remember

Didnt realise the traffic levels were that low. Assumed it was higher. Love a bit of blue signage where possible!

marno21

road_high wrote: »

Didnt realise the traffic levels were that low. Assumed it was higher. Love a bit of blue signage where possible!

Indeed, there is a sharp drop off south of Castlebaldwin until Carrick where it begins to pick up again towards Dublin.

Looking like the only chance of motorway grade road on the N4 will be Mullingar-Longford, and that's yet to be finalised.

road_high

Motorway definitely needed to beyond Longford and probably Carrick but already some upgrades between Newtown and Carrick done which couldn’t be incorporated

serfboard

marno21 wrote: »

Indeed, there is a sharp drop off south of Castlebaldwin until Carrick where it begins to pick up again towards Dublin.

Not that much though. The AADT between Carrick and Longford is only 7.7K.

road_high

serfboard wrote: »

Not that much though. The AADT between Carrick and Longford is only 7.7K.

Any data around Carrick? Data seems a bit spartan around the N4

serfboard

road_high wrote: »

Any data around Carrick? Data seems a bit spartan around the N4

Indeed. The only counters that you’ll see on the TII site (https://www.tii.ie/roads-tolling/operations-and-maintenance/traffic-count-data/) are the aforementioned ones just south of Castlebaldwin (7K), and between Carrick and Longford (7.7K), although in fairness, they are probably all that’s needed for long-distance planning on this stretch of the N4.

Donegal Storm

From my own experience on the N4 traffic only really gets noticeably heavy once the N5 merges in Longford, from Colooney to Longford is fairly quiet. There're plenty more pressing schemes that should be prioritised over dualing the rest of Longford - Colooney (Carrick bypass aside)

marno21

N4 newsletter Q2 2019 (April-August):

https://www.n4realignment.ie/newsletters/q2-newsletter/

marno21

N4 earthworks July 2019:

marno21

Earthworks August 2019 part 1:

marno21

Earthworks August 2019 part 2

marno21

Earthworks September 2019 part 1

marno21

Earthworks September 2019 part 2