Athlone thread

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121072310#Comment_121072310

Thats the problem with building a road that is specifically designed to take agri traffic out of the town, you can't do that with a 120k motorway.

To be fair to the residents who live along the road, there is a horrific racket from it all day every day. I don't know if I could live by it myself

roosterman71

The bypass wasn't "specifically designed to take agri traffic out of the town". It was built to take traffic out of town who had no need to be in town going from A to B. No investment such as that bypass is sanctioned to take a few tractors away. The reason it remains at 100km/h despite the motorway being built is due to the many junctions, some of which are on bends (Garrycastle, Monksland) when heading west. The right thing to do when the motorway was being built is build again around Athlone and maintain 120km/h. The cost was prohibitive

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121072434#Comment_121072434

Sorry, bad phrasing on my part. It would be better to say it was never classed as a Motorway to ensure agri traffic could use it

roosterman71

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121072498#Comment_121072498

Once your going 50km/h, which a huge amount of agri stuff are well capable of, you can use the motorway. The reason was primarily safety at the junctions and vehicles motoring at 120km/h. The road itself, due to the safety could never be designated as a motorway and remains a grade-separated dual carriageway, which has a maximum speed of 100km/h designated to such road types. The only way to get the bypass up to motorway standard and speed is huge investment on it. May be cheaper to build a southern bypass of the town and link into the M6 both sides of Athlone.

Nevertheless, reducing speed to 80km/h on it seems mental

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121072573#Comment_121072573

I'm pretty sure the folks living beside it would disagree

Besides, the difference is a grand total of about 1 min 10 seconds of additional time if dropping from 100 to 80k over the roughly 8km length (4 mins 50 seconds to 6 mins)

Not a big deal considering the improvement in quality of life for the residents close by

roosterman71

Personally don't have much sympathy for the residents. Better insulated windows would help. Sow some trees and plants in their gardens to "block" the noise plus the barriers along the residential parts of the road would also help. Even going by the article these reduce noise by ~9 decibels vs. 1.7 for reducing the speed and discommoding the ~35k daily users of the road

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121072693#Comment_121072693

Not sure your opinion (or my own) matters too much. The survey showed the sound limits exceeded the tolerances so it has to be addressed. Only decisions to be made are what options are chosen with the speed limit reduction being one. Whatever is chosen will have to be assessed afterwards and further actions may or may not still be required to get the noise levels down further

flazio

The noise should come down as more and more of the cars using the bypass turn electric. I have to say as a young learner, it was a great help to get some legal experience as to how to drive on a motorway properly.

TomOnBoard

Speed limits on the bypass should be reduced to 80 kph. This would help reduce noise and would also reduce fuel consumption.

Motorway limits should be reduced to 110kph which would save considerably on fuel consumption in a country that must import all its petroleum based products.

TomOnBoard

Road/wind noise as distinct from engine noise will always exist with EVs. Indeed, because of their greater weight due to the heavy battery, they chew up tyres and make more road noise than an equivalently sized ICE vehicle.

Reducing speed makes huge sense for EVs, which mostly hate high speeds anyway, as it kills range.

Greater attention will need to be paid to road surfaces as EV numbers rise, both to quieten road noise and deal with heavier vehicles.

Sunny Dayz

As someone who travels the motorway stretch and the by pass a couple of times a week I can see that many drivers don’t reduce their speed from 120 to 100 as it is when they get to the by-pass, not a fear of them reducing further down to 80.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121074191#Comment_121074191

Easily fixed by a handful of avg speed cameras. These are coming to our roads though I think not until 2025/2026

TomOnBoard

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121074191#Comment_121074191

A speed limit is just that! Whether its on this stretch of road or elsewhere, once its properly monitored and accompanied by speed cameras (fixed or roaming) speed limits will be adhered to. Your comment that speeds are not reduced to 100 from 120 as we speak is proof that cameras are needed, now.

TomOnBoard

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121074202#Comment_121074202

Avg speed cameras were placed on the M7 earlier in the year.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121074312#Comment_121074312

Really? I thought they were still years away, nice to see them in place already

TomOnBoard

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121074558#Comment_121074558

Yeah... Around 15 months in operation on a small section so far.

I was struck by the TII analysis finding 40% of drivers exceeding 120 kph during the asessment period. As far as Im concerned, they should be everywhere, subject to sensible limits being in place.

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/speed-over-distance-cameras-go-live-on-the-m7-in-co-tipperary-1.4860723

murphthesmurf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121072693#Comment_121072693

I agree, and I'm one of those residents. I live right beside it as it becomes a motorway again. Noise not a problem at all. We have a grass bank between us and the road, makes a huge difference.

It's like people who buy houses besides airports.

Sick to death of every time I look at my phone or listen to the radio there's some new law/tax/crackdown. Why must busy bodies intrude on every aspect of life.

murphthesmurf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121074609#Comment_121074609

Do you even drive?

I lived in the UK most my life, these cameras are absolutely everywhere. It's hell! Constantly watching speedo. Cameras pointing at you everywhere you go. Take your eye off the speedo for a minute to look at the scenery and boom you got a fine and points.

Speed really isn't the bogey man some people make it out to be. I've driven well over a million miles in 31yrs, cars, vans, motorbikes, small trucks, HGV trucks the length and breadth of UK and Ireland. The problem is the standard of driving, and more recently mobile phones.

No amount of cameras solve either.

I see people do unbelievable things every week that are insane. Cameras won't detect any of it.

They're a cash cow, that's all.

TomOnBoard

Yep! I've been driving for 50+ years.

Rationalisation of general speed limits is long past due in Ireland. We have excellent stretches of road limited to 80 with similar limits often applying to boreens.

Sadly, many drivers forgot basic driving rules once the test has been passed, with speed limits generally used more as a target than as an absolute maximum.

Its clear that local authorities will be required to make significant changes between here and 2025. 100s in many places will be reduced to 80, and many 80s will be dropped to 60. These changes will be accompanied by increased enforcement measures, including ANPR based averaging. These changes are happening in other places also, with countries like France having dropped their 90 kph single carriageway limit to 80 on their Routes Nationales, in the interests of fuel saving. It's been implemented there since 2020 and it's been accepted.

roosterman71

Why don't they start with enforcing the existing rules and see how that goes?

TomOnBoard

I agree that enforcement is indeed poor in many respects, while inappropriate limits can lead to shooting fish in a barrel, which undermines the whole system.

I suspect that average speed monitoring will be implemented far more widely once the current review is completed.

roosterman71

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121079263#Comment_121079263

But they aren't going to put average speed cameras on rural roads. Maybe more motorway and national primary routes alright but the speeds on those aren't mentioned for changing

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121079397#Comment_121079397

That's where road engineering comes in by making it physically difficult to go above the limit through the use of lane narrowing, chicanes, bumps etc etc

That, coupled with the incoming speed limit alerts in vehicles, would do a lot.

That being said you would be looking at a few hundred billion to do it for every rural road.

Crazy that it would have to come to that to stop dumbasses killing people

roosterman71

Enforcement of the existing rules should be priority #1 before billions get spent on nonsense. One of the problems with a successful economy is clowns try their hardest to spend the excess on shite.

What are the speed limit alerts you mention? Hadn't heard of those. Heard of limiters alright but unless they are geo-fenced then they are useless too. Alerts can be ignored.

We've been on a great trajectory in terms of road deaths over the past decade or so, despite more cars on the roads at the existing speed levels. Mass reductions due to one bad year is a kneejerk reaction IMO.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121079516#Comment_121079516

What are the speed limit alerts you mention?

It's coming from the EU, all manufacturers have to have a system where the driver gets an alert if they exceed the speed limit.

What that alert consists of can vary (audible, vibration, acceleration pedal push back etc) and the alert can be ignored but it will not cease.

Maybe we're thinking of the same thing by different names?

https://road-safety.transport.ec.europa.eu/statistics-and-analysis/statistics-and-analysis-archive/esafety/intelligent-speed-adaptation-isa_en

roosterman71

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121079570#Comment_121079570

Maybe. Most cars already have a limiter fitted to 155km/h. There was talk of making that more stringent down to 120km/h, and then geo-fencing it based on traffic signs. A lot of cars can read the speed signs and display on the dash (in way too many cases, this is an optional extra) so it would be easy to tie the limiter to that. Perhaps the alert then is if you exceed the limiter or something.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121079632#Comment_121079632

Afaik the alerts would be triggered based on the prevailing speed limit which would be detected based on cameras seeing signs and/or the GPS location

On a side note, I think we're well outside anything Athlone at this point

veryangryman

Revenue collectors to have a field day

Quite a bit of additional information from the recent council meeting on the topic of the noise levels from the N6 bypass

https://www.westmeathindependent.ie/2023/09/10/multi-million-euro-project-needed-to-reduce-noise-levels-on-athlone-bypass/

FlicFlak

Any word yet on when the bus stop outside the barracks will move back down the road to the gallery? I seen the temporary zebra crossing is gone but the stop is still there and the bus still stops at the barracks.