Dublin Metrolink - future routes for next Metrolink

tom1ie

bk wrote: »

Actually the more I think about it, the more I wonder was this location at Beechwood originally set aside as the location for the tie-in. The way those trees and alley curve into the track at almost the perfect angle makes it feel like it was almost deigned for it!

It would also explain why Dunville Avenue wasn't bridged originally, it wouldn't need to be if this was where the Metro emerged.

Yeah but that would point to unbelievable miss communication on the part of the nta in not being told about it and incompetence in not seeing this for the prefered option.

salmocab

Given the railway cut was always there that bit of land might just be a leftover from the original harcourt line, maybe a siding of some sort.

bk

tom1ie wrote: »

Yeah but that would point to unbelievable miss communication on the part of the nta in not being told about it and incompetence in not seeing this for the prefered option.

Actually it would be TII, not NTA. Transport Infrastructure Ireland are the ones who design and run all major infrastructure projects here. They were formed out of the old NRA (National Road Authority) and RPA (Rail Procurement Authority). It was the RPA who designed Luas and the same folks working on Metrolink now.

I'm sure they know, either I'm wrong on this idea or perhaps there are other design or cost reasons that might make it more expensive or difficult.

Edit: salmocab, that would make sense, though looks like a good opportunity to use it as a plan B if necessary.

specialbyte

bk wrote: »

Actually the more I think about it, the more I wonder was this location at Beechwood originally set aside as the location for the tie-in. The way those trees and alley curve into the track at almost the perfect angle makes it feel like it was almost deigned for it!

It would also explain why Dunville Avenue wasn't bridged originally, it wouldn't need to be if this was where the Metro emerged.

If you look at maps of the area from 1900 you see that the angle of the alley has been like that for 120 years. I think this probably has a lot more to do with the embankment that led up to the old railway overpass over Dunville Avenue.

Here's an image of the map: https://imgur.com/a/5t6btfK (You can find the original map on the OSI website GeoHive: http://map.geohive.ie/mapviewer.html > Base Information > Historic Map 25 inch)

Good forward planning on the green line would have been to retain the over bridge over Dunville Avenue instead of knocking it down in 2003/2004 during the Luas construction.

Former Taoiseach and great Irish transport planner Garret Fitzgerald railed against removing the over-bridge and also predicted many of the early issues that the Luas would face in this article from June 2003: https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/from-luas-to-metro-insanity-compounded-1.364287

What your suggesting is pretty similar to option 6(A) - Beechwood South Inline (Pg 48) or Option 6 - Beechwood South (Pg 31) of the Green Line tie-in report. Honestly I feel like this is a much better option to go with that the option near Charlemont if they can't figure out traffic for Dunville Avenue.

Edit: salmocab you beat me to it

bk

Brilliant history lesson there specialbyte, very interesting and it does look to be a decent alternative.

bk

specialbyte looking at the report, yes Option 6 is the area I'm talking about.

Looking at the report, I can see why it isn't that easy. Forgot about the need to put a Metro station there too! That complicates things. Having said that, I'm surprised it takes such a length to tie-in there! It is a bit more expensive then the Ranelagh option, at 80m more, but still WAY cheaper then going SW.

Beechwood North and South are shortlisted options, so they do look like they could be plan B's depending on how everything else works out.

bk

Reading through the docs, Option 6 (at-grade) or Option 6(A) (inline) at Beechwood South look to be really decent alternative options if we end up going for the full HFV, fully segregated option (which we really should) and Ranelagh and Dunville Avenue turn out to be too costly and difficult.

Beechwood South seems far more straight forward, only downside is an extra km of tunnel that will add about 80m cost. Though you might save a lot of that cost on not needing to do the Ranelagh Bridge and Dunville Avenue anyway.

citizen6

Agree that south of Beechwood is a better Metro tie-in than Charlemont. Downside of Beechwood rather than Windy Arbour for Metro tie-in is that it would be very difficult (I'm guessing) to create a portal for a new Luas tunnel between Beechwood Luas station and the Metro tie-in. So Luas would be stuck terminating at Beechwood permanently.

strassenwo!f

If we could just get back to possible alternatives to the proposed metrolink route, which is the main objective for discussion on this thread if you look at the title, it certainly makes one wonder what advantages are gained by a tunnel portal at Beechwood.

Given that the LUAS Green line most probably doesn't need to be upgraded anyway, as there is a lot that can readily be done to increase its capacity, it would seem very wasteful to spend a lot of money building the tunnel as far out as Beechwood, which is well south of the canal, and introduce unnecessary complications for those south of Sandyford and those north of Beechwood in their daily commute.

And, apart from introducing these complications for many users of the current LUAS Green line, it won't noticeably increase the speed into/out of town for users on the proposed metro section.

For the same money you could certainly tunnel to, say, Rathmines, and lay the groundwork for a line (or lines) to/from the southwest of the city, with gradual investment after the initial phase leading to massive reductions in commuting times for people in several areas of the city which are not currently served by any form of rapid transport.

Kellyconor1982

I quite like the idea of gradual tunnelling along towards the sw of the city. This could take place while the upgrades are going on with the green line.

The people on this thread all want world class transport for the city and recognise that it is needed. A large majority of the population of the city want this, even if a lot of people want it on their terms.

Gradual tunnelling with stop openings was not something i previously considered but opens up more of the city. Depending on how it might look, i guess it could mean that areas like rathfarnham, knocklyon and firhouse/tallaght could get a metro stop around 2034-2040. People living near rathmines or harold's cross could benefit in the meantime.

I completely see the counter argument for getting the green line built first. Obviously, my own opinion would do the two lines together but this is ireland with nimbyism and political interests taking priority over the common interest.

jd

Kellyconor1982 wrote: »

Gradual tunnelling with stop openings was not something i previously considered but opens up more of the city.

That's not straightforward - you'd have to build multiple turnarounds.

strassenwo!f

jd wrote: »

That's not straightforward - you'd have to build multiple turnarounds.

It certainly doesn't have to be complicated. It could be, for example, like the current turnaround at Howth, or like St. Stephen's Green was before the link-up.

Sam Russell

strassenwo!f wrote: »

It certainly doesn't have to be complicated. It could be, for example, like the current turnaround at Howth, or like St. Stephen's Green was before the link-up.

Or even the turnaround at GCD. It requires a set of points to change track.

Dats me

Strassenwolf all of your points re green line rely on ignoring the fact that it will exceed the capacity that can be provided by a light rail system, as stated by the NTA in the documentation at metrolink.ie

lucernarian

bk wrote: »

Actually I 100% honestly wrote a long post answering each of your questions, as I've been answering lots of peoples questions here. Your questions on PSD made it clear that you hadn't read the documents for yourself or done any research into it.

I mean it is not a problem in itself that you haven't read them, many people haven't and I'm happy to try and answer peoples questions based on my reading of them.

The problem is that you have been throwing around authoritative statements like "What is relevant is that the documents that have come with Metrolink have obvious, gaping holes in places involving critical decisions like infrastructure choices and cost estimates." when it is very obvious that you haven't actually read any of them yourself!



And how would you know if you haven't read the publicly available documents yourself?



Again, how would you know if you haven't read the documents?

You have been throwing out lots of statements like you have read them, but it is clear from your questions that you haven't read them.



Which has nothing to do with Metrolink.

To quickly answer some of your earlier questions. The HFV option is not just 40 million, it is 40 million higher then the 90m LFV option, which in turn is roughly 40 million higher then the 60m LFV option. So really it is 80m more then 60m LFV and about 120million all in.

While 120m isn't much money overall out of a 3 billion project, it still is a lot of money in it's own right.

PSD's aren't particularly hard or expensive to do. More significant will be the pedestrian overpass bridges and lifts. Yes platforms will need to be raised for HFV, but even with the LFV options they will need to be widened and lengthened anyway, so not a massive difference.

They are some tough engineering problems here, no one is saying it is trivial, but that is what engineers do and I don't see anything impossible here and I don't see anything that shouldn't be possible to fit in a 120m budget.

This is an inane post, how am I to prove I've read through the documents? I'm not posting my submission here. Red herrings spring to mind, when I and others are making salient criticisms of the way the CBA was carried out. High level estimates and all that.

Kellyconor1982

jd wrote: »

That's not straightforward - you'd have to build multiple turnarounds.

Fair point.

It might not be straightforward but it's a really good way of gradually building a better transport service for the city. A metro station at harold's cross or rathmines being operational while the rest of metrolink 2 is being built gives a lot of people in the south central area a transport option. It might not quite hit the knocklyon/firhouse/templeogue/rathfarnham/tallaght populace but there would be a positive knock on impact for them if there were less people in rathmines/harold's cross and even rathgar and possibly terenure driving. Buses would be quicker and commutes would be reduced.

strassenwo!f

Kellyconor1982 wrote: »

Fair point.

It might not be straightforward but it's a really good way of gradually building a better transport service for the city. A metro station at harold's cross or rathmines being operational while the rest of metrolink 2 is being built gives a lot of people in the south central area a transport option. It might not quite hit the knocklyon/firhouse/templeogue/rathfarnham/tallaght populace but there would be a positive knock on impact for them if there were less people in rathmines/harold's cross and even rathgar and possibly terenure driving. Buses would be quicker and commutes would be reduced.

There's a great deal of sense in this post. You are entirely right that incremental development of an underground towards those areas should also reduce bus times to/from suburbs which haven't yet been reached.

It has been established that there is no suitable route along which a LUAS line can connect the city centre with areas like Terenure, Rathmines, Harold's Cross and Walkinstown. The BusConnects proposal may change that to an extent by, for example, cutting a number of gardens and delivering wider routes along which LUAS lines might eventually be developed. But it is hard to see how pinchpoints like Rathmines can ever be LUAS-friendly.

The current metrolink plan is very flawed because it envisages development of the Swords - Sandyford plan in the years to 2027, and then presumably nothing on the southside or northside in the following 10-12 years or so. This is totally unrealistic because the inevitable success of the plan, if that southside portion of the metro is built, will demand further investment in similar lines for other areas. And it may not be forthcoming. [The timelines are so huge that it is very difficult to be specific]

Munich's first metro line, the U6, which travels between the north and the southwest of that city, did not have any upgrades for several years after it opened, as the city focused on laying the groundwork (other cross-city tunnels - i.e the difficult bits) for other areas of the city to eventually have a similar level of service. When that had been done, work resumed on the U6, and I it has been extended 5 or 6 times, with possible further extensions being looked at.

That city, which now has one of the best public transport systems in the world, and almost certainly the best of any city of a similar size and density to Dublin, didn't leave any suburb out to dry while they were developing their network.

Dublin's current plan is to leave many suburbs out to dry, for decades.

It is my belief that the needs of the Tallaght-Clondalkin corridor, with its 100,000+ people, can only be adequately provided by a new model for the previously proposed interconnector. I understand the Department of Transport has engaged a team of consultants to work on how that project should now be progressed.

Apart from that, my broad outline of how the two metro lines Dublin will probably need might be developed in the coming decades in the southside of Dublin would be as follows:

Line 1a: City to Galloping Green/Cherrywood along the N11 (nicely covering the gap between the DART and the Green LUAS line and reducing pressure on both, and serving areas like UCD, Donnybrook and other places which are not very well served by the DART or LUAS) and sharing a tunnel with line 1b in the city centre, probably to Broadstone;

Line 1b: City to Cherrywood, sharing tunnel with line 1a in the city centre, (probably to Broadstone);

Line 2a: Swords to Walkinstown, sharing tunnel with line 2b in the city centre; and

Line 2b: Swords to Rathfarnham/Firhouse/Knocklyon, sharing tunnel with line 2a in the city centre.

This seems, to me, a sensible plan of action over the next two-three decades or so, for development of Dublin's southside.

Hopefully, if something like my outline plan for the southside comes to pass, the northside of the city will be enjoying similar development over that time. The key thing now is to get the Swords - City metro section built, as a starting point.

Kellyconor1982

strassenwo!f wrote: »

There's a great deal of sense in this post. You are entirely right that incremental development of an underground towards those areas should also reduce bus times to/from suburbs which haven't yet been reached.

It has been established that there is no suitable route along which a LUAS line can connect the city centre with areas like Terenure, Rathmines, Harold's Cross and Walkinstown. The BusConnects proposal may change that to an extent by, for example, cutting a number of gardens and delivering wider routes along which LUAS lines might eventually be developed. But it is hard to see how pinchpoints like Rathmines can ever be LUAS-friendly.

The current metrolink plan is very flawed because it envisages development of the Swords - Sandyford plan in the years to 2027, and then presumably nothing on the southside or northside in the following 10-12 years or so. This is totally unrealistic because the inevitable success of the plan, if that southside portion of the metro is built, will demand further investment in similar lines for other areas. And it may not be forthcoming. [The timelines are so huge that it is very difficult to be specific]

Munich's first metro line, the U6, which travels between the north and the southwest of that city, did not have any upgrades for several years after it opened, as the city focused on laying the groundwork (other cross-city tunnels - i.e the difficult bits) for other areas of the city to eventually have a similar level of service. When that had been done, work resumed on the U6, and I it has been extended 5 or 6 times, with possible further extensions being looked at.

That city, which now has one of the best public transport systems in the world, and almost certainly the best of any city of a similar size and density to Dublin, didn't leave any suburb out to dry while they were developing their network.

Dublin's current plan is to leave many suburbs out to dry, for decades.

It is my belief that the needs of the Tallaght-Clondalkin corridor, with its 100,000+ people, can only be adequately provided by a new model for the previously proposed interconnector. I understand the Department of Transport has engaged a team of consultants to work on how that project should now be progressed.

Apart from that, my broad outline of how the two metro lines Dublin will probably need might be developed in the coming decades in the southside of Dublin would be as follows:

Line 1a: City to Galloping Green/Cherrywood along the N11 (nicely covering the gap between the DART and the Green LUAS line and reducing pressure on both, and serving areas like UCD, Donnybrook and other places which are not very well served by the DART or LUAS) and sharing a tunnel with line 1b in the city centre, probably to Broadstone;

Line 1b: City to Cherrywood, sharing tunnel with line 1a in the city centre, (probably to Broadstone);

Line 2a: Swords to Walkinstown, sharing tunnel with line 2b in the city centre; and

Line 2b: Swords to Rathfarnham/Firhouse/Knocklyon, sharing tunnel with line 2a in the city centre.

This seems, to me, a sensible plan of action over the next two-three decades or so, for development of Dublin's southside.

Hopefully, if something like my outline plan for the southside comes to pass, the northside of the city will be enjoying similar development over that time. The key thing now is to get the Swords - City metro section built, as a starting point.

Good points there and interesting to hear about Munich. I think there will be hell to pay among a lot of wealthier people in terenure and rathfarnham over busconnects with them losing gardens etc and this could turn into a political hot potato.

The Na Fianna incident and the political manouvering of Paschal et al will probably be replicated and sink busconnects in terenure/rathfarnham. The irony is that it may (hopefully) lead to metro 2 along this route being looked at faster than it otherwise might because a lot of these people have political clout and wealth and metro 2 would be more to their satisfaction than losing their big front gardens. In fairness, many of these gardens are quite beautiful so aesthetically i think it would be a shame if they were lost. As you say, it's hard to see Rathmines being widened anyway so these buses will only hit a bottle neck there.

Eamon Ryan makes sensible points. I think the concerns of most of us are more an indictment of the political parties and the terrifying thought that metrolink 1 is further delayed or heavan forbid doesn't go ahead than what he is saying. It is essential that it is built as planned.

I would love to see metro 2 going out through rathmines, terenure, rathfarnham, knocklyon and on to tallaght. Clondalkin/lucan needs to be really looked at in metro 3 asap. Consideration should be given to an orbital route but I can see how this might be a long way down the line.

tom1ie

Kellyconor1982 wrote: »

Good points there and interesting to hear about Munich. I think there will be hell to pay among a lot of wealthier people in terenure and rathfarnham over busconnects with them losing gardens etc and this could turn into a political hot potato.

The Na Fianna incident and the political manouvering of Paschal et al will probably be replicated and sink busconnects in terenure/rathfarnham. The irony is that it may (hopefully) lead to metro 2 along this route being looked at faster than it otherwise might because a lot of these people have political clout and wealth and metro 2 would be more to their satisfaction than losing their big front gardens. In fairness, many of these gardens are quite beautiful so aesthetically i think it would be a shame if they were lost. As you say, it's hard to see Rathmines being widened anyway so these buses will only hit a bottle neck there.

Eamon Ryan makes sensible points. I think the concerns of most of us are more an indictment of the political parties and the terrifying thought that metrolink 1 is further delayed or heavan forbid doesn't go ahead than what he is saying. It is essential that it is built as planned.

I would love to see metro 2 going out through rathmines, terenure, rathfarnham, knocklyon and on to tallaght. Clondalkin/lucan needs to be really looked at in metro 3 asap. Consideration should be given to an orbital route but I can see how this might be a long way down the line.

If we can get the bus connects corridor built as far as rathmines, but then have a metro station built in rathmines as part of the metrolink plan (if the metrolink tie in occurs just north of windy Arbour) then I think this would be a cost effective method for reducing traffic gridlock on the south side.
Obviously integrated ticketing would have to be up and running, but the idea would be, you hop on a bus in rathfarnham, you have an uninterrupted brt bus running to rathmines via a qbc, where you can change to the metro to go swords/airport, or south to cherrywood/sandyford or get metro to ssg and change for green line to finglas (eventually) or get off at Tara for heavy rail options, or stay on the bus to go cc, or get off at ssg or rathmines where there would be dcc rent a bike stations where you cycle 5 or 10 mins to your workplace.

citizen6

tom1ie wrote: »

If we can get the bus connects corridor built as far as rathmines, but then have a metro station built in rathmines as part of the metrolink plan (if the metrolink tie in occurs just north of windy Arbour) then I think this would be a cost effective method for reducing traffic gridlock on the south side.
Obviously integrated ticketing would have to be up and running, but the idea would be, you hop on a bus in rathfarnham, you have an uninterrupted brt bus running to rathmines via a qbc, where you can change to the metro to go swords/airport, or south to cherrywood/sandyford or get metro to ssg and change for green line to finglas (eventually) or get off at Tara for heavy rail options, or stay on the bus to go cc, or get off at ssg or rathmines where there would be dcc rent a bike stations where you cycle 5 or 10 mins to your workplace.

Another benefit of Metro tunnelling to Windy Arbour - it's only 1.2km from Windy Arbour to Roebuck Rd. You could put the Luas from Windy Arbour into a tunnel to Roebuck Rd and continue overground into the middle of UCD.

This would be as well as or instead of Luas tunnel from WA to Rathfarnham. If you do both the UCD-WA section would be a shuttle.

Qrt

Kellyconor1982 wrote: »

Clondalkin/lucan needs to be really looked at in metro 3 asap. Consideration should be given to an orbital route but I can see how this might be a long way down the line.

Most of Lucan and a fair bit of Clondalkin is a sprawly hell with plenty of road space so I don't think a metro would be ideal, especially since the railway line runs through the area. Now if this metro 3 were to be an orbital route...

tom1ie

Kellyconor1982 wrote: »

Good points there and interesting to hear about Munich. I think there will be hell to pay among a lot of wealthier people in terenure and rathfarnham over busconnects with them losing gardens etc and this could turn into a political hot potato.

The Na Fianna incident and the political manouvering of Paschal et al will probably be replicated and sink busconnects in terenure/rathfarnham. The irony is that it may (hopefully) lead to metro 2 along this route being looked at faster than it otherwise might because a lot of these people have political clout and wealth and metro 2 would be more to their satisfaction than losing their big front gardens. In fairness, many of these gardens are quite beautiful so aesthetically i think it would be a shame if they were lost. As you say, it's hard to see Rathmines being widened anyway so these buses will only hit a bottle neck there.

Eamon Ryan makes sensible points. I think the concerns of most of us are more an indictment of the political parties and the terrifying thought that metrolink 1 is further delayed or heavan forbid doesn't go ahead than what he is saying. It is essential that it is built as planned.

I would love to see metro 2 going out through rathmines, terenure, rathfarnham, knocklyon and on to tallaght. Clondalkin/lucan needs to be really looked at in metro 3 asap. Consideration should be given to an orbital route but I can see how this might be a long way down the line.

I really don’t think Lucan needs a metro or a Luas. If any bus connects rout is going to work it’ll be the n4 corridor which has the potential to give uninterrupted qbc all the way to Hueston and then the quays are getting qbc’s aswell so you would have a high frequency high capacity bus going to Lucan. Local feeder busses could feed into it and this route could have a minimal amount of stops that enable commuters to change onto orbital routes if required and thus onto other radial routes be they brt or light/heavy rail.

schemingbohemia

citizen6 wrote: »

Another benefit of Metro tunnelling to Windy Arbour - it's only 1.2km from Windy Arbour to Roebuck Rd. You could put the Luas from Windy Arbour into a tunnel to Roebuck Rd and continue overground into the middle of UCD.

This would be as well as or instead of Luas tunnel from WA to Rathfarnham. If you do both the UCD-WA section would be a shuttle.

And how much would that 1.2km tunnel cost? Compared to walking it in 15 minutes?

bk

schemingbohemia wrote: »

And how much would that 1.2km tunnel cost? Compared to walking it in 15 minutes?

It does show we need to also solve the last mile problem.

We need to encourage people to cycle and take e-scouters to get to and from stations as most people do in places like Amsterdam.

schemingbohemia

Well that, and for people not to be lazy. I read a report a while ago that stated people were driving around UCD looking for a free car parking space for longer than their drive to UCD, that's just stupid.
If you really don't want to walk from Windy Arbour to UCD then wait for a 17 - we certainly don't need to spend mad money on a tunnel for such a short journey.

tom1ie

schemingbohemia wrote: »

Well that, and for people not to be lazy. I read a report a while ago that stated people were driving around UCD looking for a free car parking space for longer than their drive to UCD, that's just stupid.
If you really don't want to walk from Windy Arbour to UCD then wait for a 17 - we certainly don't need to spend mad money on a tunnel for such a short journey.

Agreed. Although I’m pretty sure there’s people on this forum that’ll be looking for a metro line in between metrolink and the dart once metrolink is built
I jest of course.

cgcsb

tom1ie wrote: »

Agreed. Although I’m pretty sure there’s people on this forum that’ll be looking for a metro line in between metrolink and the dart once metrolink is built
I jest of course.

You can bet a Beaumont-City-Tallaght metro will be sought, and rightly so.

Sam Russell

schemingbohemia wrote: »

And how much would that 1.2km tunnel cost? Compared to walking it in 15 minutes?

According to data published on the metrolink.ie site, you could use the ballpark figure of €100 million per km up to €150 million depending on configuration.

See the individual studies.

citizen6

schemingbohemia wrote: »

And how much would that 1.2km tunnel cost? Compared to walking it in 15 minutes?

That's a fair point. You certainly wouldn't dig that tunnel unless you were digging another one anyway.

It's worth bearing in mind though that some people have a long journey before they get to WA. Drive to a P&R, get a train, change to Metro. The extra 15 minute walk at the end is the last straw on choosing public transport.

We have the same problem if you spend 90 minutes on a bus to OCS and then have to get to Merrion Square. Or Heuston to SSG. Cycling is probably the answer but it doesn't work for everyone.

strassenwo!f

tom1ie wrote: »

Agreed. Although I’m pretty sure there’s people on this forum that’ll be looking for a metro line in between metrolink and the dart once metrolink is built
I jest of course.

There's no need to jest, tom. We are already here:)

I worked for a time in Frankfurt, Germany, and i occasionally used the city's no. 32 bus to travel along a section of the city's inner orbital road, which would broadly be similar to the South or North Circular Road in Dublin. My local stop was Danziger Platz, down by what is now the HQ of the European Central Bank, which backs on to the main river (the Main) flowing through the city. My destination was usually the 'German National Library' stop.

I'm not sure of the distances involved, but the journey usually took about 20 minutes. In Dublin terms you're probably looking at me living somewhere close to the Samuel Beckett Bridge, travelling from that bridge along Guild Street, Seville Place and the North Circular Road to a destination somewhere around Saint Peter's Church in Phibsboro or the start of the Navan Road.

My bus stop there was shared with a tram travelling between the suburb Fechenheim and the centre of the city. The next stop was for access to the U6 metro line between Ostbahnhof and the centre of the city. The next one was the Habsburgeralle stop, for access to the U7 underground line (which runs between the suburb Enkheim and the city centre), and the stop after that could be used for connection to a tram (Number 14) which runs between the major suburb Bornheim and the centre of the city.

The next one was a connection to Hohenstrasse (on the U4 line, which links other parts of Bornheim with the city centre), then a couple of stops with didn't link with anything, as far as I remember, followed by a link with tram #12 at Rothschildallee (which links the city centre with other parts of the Bornheim suburb), a couple of stops where I don't remember any link to other transport and a final stop at the National Library where the option was there to get onto the metro lines U1, U2, U3 (and now the U8, which wasn't there in my time) which travel between the centre of the city and various suburbs.

There is no getting away from the fact that Frankfurt is the financial capital of the fourth largest economy in the world, and as such it has enormous power to source capital if it needs to make an investment, to (for example) achieve the kind of transport integration which I witnessed over a three-year period in that city.

Dublin's situation is obviously very different, but there are lessons to be learnt from places like Frankfurt. It wasn't always so rich, but the focus was definitely on making sure that everyone had ready, quick access to the city, where they could do an effective days' work, not burdened by a very lengthy journey at the beginning of the day or at the end of the day.

It doesn't make sense to me, at this stage, to develop the N11 corridor as a LUAS/metro line, because it already has a very fine bus lane and bus service. But when the time comes that pretty well all other areas of the city have access to a rapid connection along a route to/from the city, then a LUAS or metro connection along that route should be built. That seems obvious, to me anyway.