N25 - Carrigtwohill to Midleton [route options published]

Bacchus

FGR wrote: »

The highlighted bit intrigues me. Are they going to do something about the bridge or is it just remarking the road ?

Two new footbridges (one on either side) for pedestrians. Which means they will be (or at least should be) removing the existing footpath and widen the road there. This work is due to start in February and finish in May (so hopefully by Christmas 2019 )

In an ideal world, I'd love if they developed the abandoned land on the junction to include a car park that would service that end of the village, and then remove a lot of the on-street parking in the village... maybe down as far as Centra to allow for a longer filter lane for traffic turning right towards Garryvoe. Can't see that ever happening though.

FGR

Bacchus wrote: »

Two new footbridges (one on either side) for pedestrians. Which means they will be (or at least should be) removing the existing footpath and widen the road there. This work is due to start in February and finish in May (so hopefully by Christmas 2019 )

In an ideal world, I'd love if they developed the abandoned land on the junction to include a car park that would service that end of the village, and then remove a lot of the on-street parking in the village... maybe down as far as Centra to allow for a longer filter lane for traffic turning right towards Garryvoe. Can't see that ever happening though.

One can only dream! :pac:

marno21

TII saying 2027 for this scheme. Not sure if that's start or finish.

Cork County Council regard this project as "critical".

https://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/cork-county-councillors-approve-plans-for-new-town-development-involving-2500-houses-911266.html

Chris_5339762

Ross Palmer, the county council's senior planner, is on record as saying the connecting road will be designed in a way to discourage speeding.

“It’s got numerous signalised junctions, numerous bends along it that will reduce speed, and it will also include raised (speed ramp) tables,” he said.

Did we suddenly teleport Midleton to the middle of the UK because this is the kind of constrained horror of a road they keep building there.

highwaymaniac

marno21 wrote: »

TII saying 2027 for this scheme. Not sure if that's start or finish.

Cork County Council regard this project as "critical".

https://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/cork-county-councillors-approve-plans-for-new-town-development-involving-2500-houses-911266.html

Just doesn't make sense to me, does the rail station have to be built first at least? How long until calls for N25 to be widened to 3 lanes...?

marno21

highwaymaniac wrote: »

Just doesn't make sense to me, does the rail station have to be built first at least? How long until calls for N25 to be widened to 3 lanes...?

There is LIHAF funding to open up the land for development, which will consist of road upgrades. Surprise surprise: "The proposal included a train station but this element was not considered for funding under LIHAF"

highwaymaniac

marno21 wrote: »

There is LIHAF funding to open up the land for development, which will consist of road upgrades. Surprise surprise: "The proposal included a train station but this element was not considered for funding under LIHAF"

Ha not surprised one bit! We might see 3 lanes cork-midleton before we see dual midelton-youghal. I just think this scheme will actually end up doing more harm than good long term for the overall reliability of the road network.

hans aus dtschl

highwaymaniac wrote: »

Ha not surprised one bit! We might see 3 lanes cork-midleton before we see dual midelton-youghal. I just think this scheme will actually end up doing more harm than good long term for the overall reliability of the road network.

Yeah for me it just went from "good idea" to "terrible idea" in one simple move.

Their entire justification for the development was that it wouldn't increase traffic and queuing on the N25 because they were going to put all their effort into sustainable transport from the outset. Now they're just going to carry on with no train link, no bus link and a woefully shoddy cycle/pedestrian design.

Textbook.

Does anyone know if this gets subsequently reviewed by anyone like ABP?

highwaymaniac

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

Yeah for me it just went from "good idea" to "terrible idea" in one simple move.

Their entire justification for the development was that it wouldn't increase traffic and queuing on the N25 because they were going to put all their effort into sustainable transport from the outset. Now they're just going to carry on with no train link, no bus link and a woefully shoddy cycle/pedestrian design.

Textbook.

Does anyone know if this gets subsequently reviewed by anyone like ABP?

Well said, yes that is the good thing it will have to go to ABP for approval.

hans aus dtschl

highwaymaniac wrote: »

Well said, yes that is the good thing it will have to go to ABP for approval.

Well thank god for that. It shouldn't pass even a cursory oversight in its current form, IMO: the original documentation made heavy reference to the high quality of sustainable travel being provided and emphasized that the (already occurring) N25 queues wouldn't occur according their Powscar analysis.

annfield1978

This has come out to Tender - Phase 1 to 4

hans aus dtschl

I shouldn't be surprised this got the go-ahead in it's current form, but I still am.

The council will probably call for upgrade of the N25 to 3 lanes after they've put a massive number of unsustainable houses into the Midleton west exit.

Gunner3629

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

I shouldn't be surprised this got the go-ahead in it's current form, but I still am.

The council will probably call for upgrade of the N25 to 3 lanes after they've put a massive number of unsustainable houses into the Midleton west exit.

The JLT needs priority over any of this but yes. Its welcome.

annfield1978

Tender for this has come out for Phases 1 to 4

marno21

SWECO appointed for Phases 1-4

https://www.echolive.ie/corknews/Sign-off-for-major-road-upgrade-in-Cork--ac3495bd-2209-4585-8b05-6ebc2e722159-ds

Cork Trucker

This is one project i'm not too upto date on, having read the article i see it has been handed over to a contractor, when is the kick off?

highwaymaniac

Cork Trucker wrote: »

This is one project i'm not too upto date on, having read the article i see it has been handed over to a contractor, when is the kick off?

That's the design fees I'm afraid! It's a post 2027 scheme for construction per the NDP.

Cork Trucker

highwaymaniac wrote: »

That's the design fees I'm afraid! It's a post 2027 scheme for construction per the NDP.

Ah ffs..................

marno21

wrote:

I'd throw any "NDP" timelines out the window now, given that the NDP is a Fine Gael political document only.

As it stands, they plan to go to ABP in mid 2022. Construction could start in late 2024 given that this is a minor scheme.

Interestingly, the article suggests a 7km scheme. The previous scheme was 5km from Carrigtwohill East to the Midleton West junction (just by Abernethy's). It's a further 2km on to the Lakeview Roundabout, but I'm not sure what work is needed east of the Midleton West junction other than potentially standardising the road width as the road is already grade separated.

Chris_5339762

Hopefully they'll relay it, but without extremely major work (for the benefit) the bridges over the river/estuary wouldn't be widened. They aren't wide enough for a hard shoulder.

Maybe they'll get through Phase 1 - 4 and decide it doesn't need any more than a lick of tar, which makes sense. Until Midleton - Youghal gets done (ha) when hopefully they'll see sense and grade seperate Lakeview.

Gunner3629

marno21 wrote: »

I'd throw any "NDP" timelines out the window now, given that the NDP is a Fine Gael political document only.

As it stands, they plan to go to ABP in mid 2022. Construction could start in late 2024 given that this is a minor scheme.

Interestingly, the article suggests a 7km scheme. The previous scheme was 5km from Carrigtwohill East to the Midleton West junction (just by Abernethy's). It's a further 2km on to the Lakeview Roundabout, but I'm not sure what work is needed east of the Midleton West junction other than potentially standardising the road width as the road is already grade separated.

Whats the benefit of this other than providing official ingress and egress junctions for all vehicles?

Can we by-pass Castlemartyr instead?

marno21

wrote:

That's exactly it. Also providing the grade separated junction for access to the Amgen site/possibly Water Rock and sealing the median.

It would be sinful for them to complete this upgrade and not design it to 120km/h motorway standards by improving some of the curves and sightlines if it's a €70m upgrade.

Gunner3629

marno21 wrote: »

That's exactly it. Also providing the grade separated junction for access to the Amgen site/possibly Water Rock and sealing the median.

It would be sinful for them to complete this upgrade and not design it to 120km/h motorway standards by improving some of the curves and sightlines if it's a €70m upgrade.

I guess its not the most costly or complex of projects.

Definitely Motorway standard, can't cost much more.

Limerick74

How is the €70m project cost being quoted when they haven’t started phase 1 yet?

hans aus dtschl

You guys are all possibly forgetting a few minor sticky details: there are houses directly on this stretch of road and the alternative routes are quite poor at present.
What would the gain from this project be? The majority of crashes seem to happen on the HQDC standard section between Little Island and Carrigtohill, where an M status could more or less be put in place overnight. So this seems like a terrible use of public money to me. It's the county council trying to encourage car-dependent sprawl just outside the city. Again. Next step will probably be some crappy car-dependent outlet mall on the Amgen site.

I drive this road a hell of a lot and I can think of way way better uses of €70,000,000 even within the local area.

It's like we're stuck in the 19070's or something.

And for what it's worth, I agree that Lakeview roundabout and everything East of Midleton needs an upgrade. But west of Midleton? That's just the county trying to encourage sprawl again.

hans aus dtschl

Gunner3629 wrote: »

Can we by-pass Castlemartyr instead?

Agreed.
If it's €70m, I'd rather it wasn't on roads.
But if it must be roads then Castlemartyr first please, then Killeagh.
West of Midleton isn't a problem other than that the County want to generate more money from the road.

Gunner3629

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

Agreed.
If it's €70m, I'd rather it wasn't on roads.
But if it must be roads then Castlemartyr first please, then Killeagh.
West of Midleton isn't a problem other than that the County want to generate more money from the road.

After the upgrades to Killeagh and Castlemartr villages - sewage, roads, lighting - in the last 18 months, there isn't a hope they'll get anything for a long time - but they should. Atleast they are getting a greenway, although that just irks the people feeling they should reinstate the rail link.

Ya West of Midleton is fine, its even 120km already from Carrigtwohill Juntion 4 to Dunkettle. Very little to do there.

marno21

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

You guys are all possibly forgetting a few minor sticky details: there are houses directly on this stretch of road and the alternative routes are quite poor at present.
What would the gain from this project be? The majority of crashes seem to happen on the HQDC standard section between Little Island and Carrigtohill, where an M status could more or less be put in place overnight. So this seems like a terrible use of public money to me. It's the county council trying to encourage car-dependent sprawl just outside the city. Again. Next step will probably be some crappy car-dependent outlet mall on the Amgen site.

I drive this road a hell of a lot and I can think of way way better uses of €70,000,000 even within the local area.

It's like we're stuck in the 19070's or something.

And for what it's worth, I agree that Lakeview roundabout and everything East of Midleton needs an upgrade. But west of Midleton? That's just the county trying to encourage sprawl again.

I don't see this costing €70m. It's a safety upgrade and one of the few remaining terrible stretches of dual carriageway. A similar section in Donegal is being improved also (4km stretch of N13).

My guess is the houses will either be CPO'd and demolished or the dual carraigeway shifted in the other direction by a few metres and access roads provided. Full alternative routes between Barryscourt and Midleton West will be provided and all accesses onto the N25 closed.

If I were to guess the cost of this project I would say in the region of €30-40m, of which a certain proportion would have to be spent on resurfacing at some stage soon anyway.

hans aus dtschl

marno21 wrote: »

I don't see this costing €70m. It's a safety upgrade and one of the few remaining terrible stretches of dual carriageway. A similar section in Donegal is being improved also (4km stretch of N13).

My guess is the houses will either be CPO'd and demolished or the dual carraigeway shifted in the other direction by a few metres and access roads provided. Full alternative routes between Barryscourt and Midleton West will be provided and all accesses onto the N25 closed.

If I were to guess the cost of this project I would say in the region of €30-40m, of which a certain proportion would have to be spent on resurfacing at some stage soon anyway.

That's fine, I totally agree with regularising the N25/M25 but again what's the primary purpose of this? There's loads of houses on the 100kmh single-carriageway stretch East of Midleton too.
This looks like another "to unlock development land" project from what I can see. And that's totally inexcusable to me, given it's on a rail line and they don't have the money for all of the sustainable transport projects around the place.

niloc1951

I remember reading about using the eastbound carriageway as a local two way service road, and building a new carriageway adjacent to the existing westbound one which has no dwellings. That delivers a dedicated HQDC/Mway from Jct.4 to Jct.5 and a non Mway route between the the towns of Carrigtwohill and Midleton.