Cullen gives go-ahead for long-awaited new motorway

Victor

jank wrote:

1. its not a motorway

Only so the voters that only have provisional licences can use it.

jank wrote:

But if all cities are connected then it would make businesses, government and most all citizens think twice to building more "adamstown" projects in the dublin region and maybe in the "west of the shannon" region.

Be very careful, Adamstown is part of the solution, not the problem. It takes both commercial and residential weight and puts them close enough together not to be utterly car-dependent (like neighbouring Lucan), while at the same time giving it sufficient critical mass to act as a counter-weight to the city-centre.

jank wrote:

If we had a waterford-cork-limerick-galway-sligo high quality dual carriageway link then it would benifit those regions and take resources away from dublin.

Which are being built.

mackerski

murphaph wrote:

The UK's biggest city has an urban population of 11 million. Their 5th largest city is Sheffield with an urban population of 1.1 million. But you can't compare Dublin with 1 million to 70,000 in Waterford to this. I've also said I believe the road should be upgraded from it's present state, that doesn't have to automatically mean new building.

Does Waterford (city) really have a population that high? I'm seeing a figure of 47,000, and that's an extraopated estimate for 2005. Regardless, we should be careful of judging the road's merits based on current population. We see no end of (true) claims here that road-building triggers development. We also see people claiming (rightly) that there'd be a better balance in the country if a bit of development could take place away from Dublin. So the real justification for the upgrade will probably depend on how much we'd like to see Carlow, Kilkenny and Waterford grow.

Dermot

mike65

jank wrote:

If we had a waterford-cork-limerick-galway-sligo high quality dual carriageway link then it would benifit those regions and take resources away from dublin.
Spreading the wealth as you may say.

Indeed I use the N24 every week and its utter sh!te for most of its length with the following slow-spots to overcome - Mooncoin-Carrick on Suir-Clomnel-Cahir-Tipp-Limerick Junction-Monard-Oola-Pallas Green.

As for upgrading the exisiting N9, clearly thats the road to nowhere. Irish roads are dangerous enough without "improving" them in away that encourages faster average speeds but then leaving the road itself passing by countless homes and businesses and minor rd junctions and the attendent dangers of exiting traffic which is on a completely different wavelength to ppl driving from a to b as quick as legally possible.

A couple of Canadians who live here wrote a great book which looked the phenomenon of local traffic and intercity traffic. They concluded the mix of the two was the single biggest cause of crashes on Irish roads.

An inter-city road needs to be dedicated to performing one task, getting ppl from a to b quickly and safely and thats best done on a Motorway (even an Irish style one).

Mike.

Victor

mackerski wrote:

We see no end of (true) claims here that road-building triggers development.

Not quite. While it may deliver some efficiencies (by-passing bottle-necks), most development spurred by new roads is displaced development from urban to sub-urban / semi-rural locations.

mackerski

Victor wrote:

Not quite. While it may deliver some efficiencies (by-passing bottle-necks), most development spurred by new roads is displaced development from urban to sub-urban / semi-rural locations.

But do you not think that an improved infrastructure would boost the appeal to industry (and prospective residents) of places like Waterford?

Dermot

Victor

mike65 wrote:

An inter-city road needs to be dedicated to performing one task, getting ppl from a to b quickly and safely and thats best done on a Motorway (even an Irish style one).

Then we stick in as many interchanges as possible

Victor

mackerski wrote:

But do you not think that an improved infrastructure would boost the appeal to industry (and prospective residents) of places like Waterford?

Perhaps it would, but not in a value for money manner. To divert, why did the put the airport in a place where the least number of people can avail of it (anyone from Carlow, Kilkenny or Wexford needs to go through Waterford to get to the airport, Waterford county people can bypass the city centre)? The airport only really serves Waterford City and Tramore.

This road is mostly parallel to the N11 and the residents of Waterford will see little extra benefit from the investment of €1bn. This road is about trying to secure 5 seats in Carlow Kilkenny, not the 4 in Waterford.

impr0v

Victor wrote:

Only so the voters that only have provisional licences can use it.

Incorrect. As you well know the particular law you are referring to is very seldom if ever enforced. The road is to dual carriageway standard because the traffic volumes don't warrant constructing the road to the more expensive motorway standard.

Victor

impr0v wrote:

Incorrect. As you well know the particular law you are referring to is very seldom if ever enforced. The road is to dual carriageway standard because the traffic volumes don't warrant constructing the road to the more expensive motorway standard.

As best I know all the "high quality-dual carriagways" are being built to motorway standard, except they have a broken yellow line, instead of a solid yellow line on the hard-shoulder.

Lennoxschips

Interesting:

Taken from this link:
http://homepage.tinet.ie/~camway/roads_projects/N25/waterfordbypass/oral_hearing/waterford_dublin_motorway.html

It is also significant that despite the consultants to the Waterford Bypass, Eubank Preece O'Heocha, using a sophisticated computer modelling system to determine predict traffic flows, Ms. Connie Feeley, an engineer working with the NRA in their Tramore office, changed the size of the N9 from a 2 lane road to a 4 lane motorway/dual-carriageway in February 2000 as a result of nothing more than a telephone call from the NRA head office.

impr0v

Victor wrote:

As best I know all the "high quality-dual carriagways" are being built to motorway standard, except they have a broken yellow line, instead of a solid yellow line on the hard-shoulder.

They do call the scheme a high quality dual carriageway in the EIS, and previously that spec would have been very close to Motorway levels, but as you can see here the cross section is significantly narrower than a motorway, with a new jersey style concrete barrier in the median.

Specifically the carriageway is 0.5m narrower than the corresponding motorway width (7.0 vs 7.5m), the hard shoulder is similarly 0.5m narrower (2.5m vs 3.0m) and the central reservation is 3.0m wide as opposed to 7.0m on a motorway. Also, there is a 5.0m working strip acquired on each side on this scheme, when 8.0m is the usual size of the strip with a motorway cross section.

As you can imagine, the above differances account for a substantial decrease in the amount of land needed to be acquired, and can lower the cost of the scheme significantly. The lower design speed of 100km/h also gives more flexibilty with the design of the horizontal alignment as the curve radii don't need to be as high as those needed on a motorway, which can aid in the reduction of severance of farm holdings and the avoidance of other constraints, which again can help to reduce the costs.

Lennoxschips

If it's reducing costs we're after then why not a 2+1 road? The traffic on that road does not warrant four lanes.

spacetweek

Lennoxschips wrote:

If it's reducing costs we're after then why not a 2+1 road? The traffic on that road does not warrant four lanes.

Build for the future, not for now. In Ireland there is far too much revisiting and head scratching and people commenting on how something should have been made bigger in the first place. Look at the M50. If the N9 was only 2 lanes we'd be back to it in 10 years wondering why we didn't make it a DC.

I think it was in 1999 when the NDP was launched, that the decision was made that all planned interurban roads would be made DC's even if traffic currently wasn't enough to justify them. I totally agree with this. With a DC for Waterford, you won't need to touch the road, once opened, for 20-30 years at least. It's called making something future-proof.

As for the difference between a "high quality dual carriageway" and motorway, there are several points:

1. Cheaper due to smaller cross section and junctions, and less junctions
2. Less time to build: usually 24 months vs. around 36 for an m-way
3. More friendly to adjacent landowners as access is not just permitted at junctions - ideal for rural area

A motorway would be overkill for a road to a city the size of Waterford, so the HQDC is ideal.

Lennoxschips

I think it was in 1999 when the NDP was launched, that the decision was made that all planned interurban roads would be made DC's even if traffic currently wasn't enough to justify them. I totally agree with this. With a DC for Waterford, you won't need to touch the road, once opened, for 20-30 years at least. It's called making something future-proof.

Perhaps, but then why not just upgrade the road from New Ross to Enniscorthy to a DC, to link Waterford up to the N11, and make the N11 a full DC. That way you kill two birds with one stone. The current approach is like trying to kill one bird with two stones.

mike65

Thats a fair point Lennoxchips, the reason the "costal route" was'nt chosen was entirely down to local politics in Carlow and Kilkenny.

Mike.

spacetweek

Lennoxschips wrote:

Perhaps, but then why not just upgrade the road from New Ross to Enniscorthy to a DC, to link Waterford up to the N11, and make the N11 a full DC. That way you kill two birds with one stone. The current approach is like trying to kill one bird with two stones.

In fairness I agree with you here. I suspect, though, that their thinking was as follows:

1. We need a road Dublin-Waterford
2. We need to improve the coast road

They considered the two in isolation, without making the link.

More specifically, they could have upgraded the N30, the road between Waterford and Enniscorthy, where you could have linked up with N11 improvements south of Gorey, and connected to the N25 Waterford bypass. This would save you having to build the entire N9.

However, as mike65 says, this would have left everyone in Carlow and Kilkenny in the lurch.

impr0v

mike65 wrote:

Thats a fair point Lennoxchips, the reason the "costal route" was'nt chosen was entirely down to local politics in Carlow and Kilkenny.

I see where you and other posters are coming from with this, but surely it's about giving the Carlow/Kilkenny region, and to an extent the entire N9 corridor, as good access to Dublin as the rest of the country and the same opportunities to grow as a commerical or otherwise centre rather than local or party politics. The same people making this argument will be in other threads making points about Dublin being allowed to develop too much and the lack of decentralisation and jobs outside of Dublin.

In regard to the question of the magic '2+1' number that seems to be the buzz word in the forum of late and some sort of magic bullet to fix all ills, how do the people calling for the country to be criss-crossed with a network of these roads even know they'll work in an Irish context? The NRA think they will, but there isn't even any scheme on the ground in the country as yet (to the best of my knowledge) to test that hypothesis, the first one is going to construction soon enough on the N20 in Cork as part of a pilot programme. I know that they have been shown to work well in a scandanavian environment but I'm sure Irish drivers will react to them in their own unique way. As soon as it's built there'll more than likely be a member of the 'I'm not against roads for the sake of it' brigade on here complaining about the number of accidents on it or the relatively narrow width of the carriageways, or the wire rope barriers, etc.

If the N9 was built to a 2+1 standard, or the N9 was left entirely off the cards and the traffic channelled towards the coast route, then when the N11 is choked in 5, 10 or 20 years time, some of the same arguments would be being made then as are being made now in relation to the M50. 'Why couldn't it have been planned properly from the outset?' or 'Why didn't they have the foresight to put two lanes each way on it?' There is no pleasing some people.

murphaph

2+1 works very well elsewhere, not just Scandinavia. I've driven on it in France and Canada myself. No problems. Don'tsee why it wouldnt work here. If people can't drive properly in Ireland it's not because of the road type-it's becase driver education is so damned poor. 2+1 is not a vote-winner however.

thejollyrodger

I have to agree, the dual carriage way is the best option. Its future proof. It can be upgraded to motorway if need be in the future and its safe and quick to build. The road to Waterford is a discrace.

impr0v

murphaph wrote:

2+1 works very well elsewhere, not just Scandinavia. I've driven on it in France and Canada myself. No problems. Don'tsee why it wouldnt work here. If people can't drive properly in Ireland it's not because of the road type-it's becase driver education is so damned poor. 2+1 is not a vote-winner however.

I mentioned Scandanavia because Sweden is acknowledged as being the country which has led the way in research and development of the road type, though I wasn't aware that France and Canada had embraced them. I'm not saying that there will be problems with their use, just that it would be prudent to wait until there is at least one scheme on the ground before pronouncing them the solution to the Irish infrstructure deficit.

The 'vote-winner' thing is often used to throw negative light on something, i.e. if a plan is a vote-winner then it's been done for selfish and parochial reasons, and the implication is that it's contrary to the common good. This seems to me to detract from the obvious fact that if some initiative or plan is a vote-winner it means the majority of the people want it, even though you may not. For better or for worse, this is democracy.

Rosser

Yet another waste of money, if there was any real need to have a motorway to Waterford it should be a spur off the N11 at Roslare, if Cullen hadn't have survived his 'Monica Gate' this would be dead in the water.

Priority should be to get a Motorway to:
Galway / Cork / Limerick
Upgrade the existing N3 and reopen the line to Navan ('cause all the new road will do is bring more cars to a stand still in Clonee)
Build the Dublin Metro properly futured proofed (no half arse measures like Luas)

mike65

Rosser wrote:

Yet another waste of money, if there was any real need to have a motorway to Waterford it should be a spur off the N11 at Roslare, if Cullen hadn't have survived his 'Monica Gate' this would be dead in the water.

Priority should be to get a Motorway to:
Galway / Cork / Limerick

It would be a damned perverse spur from Rosslare! You must mean Enniscorthy. As for the Cork/Limerick/Galway mentality - well bog off we're here too.

Mike.

Lennoxschips

You could build a spur off the N11 from Enniscorthy to Waterford, and then make the N25 from Waterford to Cork a full dual carriageway (much of it already is), and hey presto, you've got a Dublin-Cork motorway. I think it would be nearly the same length as the current N7/N8 route.

The you could upgrade the N9 (yes, the current road is a disgrace) to a high quality, safe, national route and people in Carlow and Kilkenny can make safe and quick journeys to Dublin and/or Waterford.

It's three roads for the price of one and a half. It's all about getting the most bang for your euro. Unfortunately nobody at the NRA can think like a civil engineer, and even if they can, they are ignored by politicians who can't think on a national level.

murphaph

Sounds like an interesting alternative Lennoxchips. I Wonder was it even considered by the NRA. I like how it connects multiple towns on the south coast. The M9 need only come as far as Kilkenny (if it's even needed) and 2+1 or whatever from there to Waterford. I know one thing-there are more ways to think about things than 1 way. You're 100% correct about getting value for money. This country has a healthy balance sheet but we must be very careful not to squander precious resources on ill conceived projects that deliver little by way of return.

dowlingm

From: Dublin,Dublin
To: Cork,Cork
Via: Enniscorthy,Wexford
Total Distance: 297.7 kilometres
Total Time: 4 hr 27 min

From: Dublin,Dublin
To: Cork,Cork
Via: Waterford,Waterford
Total Distance: 286.8 kilometres
Total Time: 4 hr 6 min

From: Dublin,Dublin
To: Cork,Cork
Total Distance: 253.3 kilometres
Total Time: 3 hr 31 min

mike65

From: Dublin,Dublin
To: Cork,Cork
Via: Waterford,Waterford
Total Distance: 286.8 kilometres
Total Time: 4 hr 6 min

From: Dublin,Dublin
To: Cork,Cork
Total Distance: 253.3 kilometres
Total Time: 3 hr 31 min

30 kms more and 35 mins more - all the difference can be attributed to Waterford not having a by-pass!

Mike.

jd

Lennoxschips wrote:

You could build a spur off the N11 from Enniscorthy to Waterford, and then make the N25 from Waterford to Cork a full dual carriageway (much of it already is), and hey presto, you've got a Dublin-Cork motorway. I think it would be nearly the same length as the current N7/N8 route.

:eek: Jayzus- how many lanes would the N11 need to be between Belfield and Wexford in that case!

PoolDude

Another slant:

From: Dublin,Dublin
To: Waterford,Waterford

Total Distance: 101.2 miles
Total Time: 2 hr 15 min


From: Dublin,Dublin
To: Waterford,Waterford
Via: Enniscorthy,Wexford

Total Distance: 108.0 miles
Total Time: 2 hr 36 min

So I guess the key would be where you are starting your journey from. If you live east of the Mad Cow and once the M50 is open in a few months the N11 is arguably the best route. Given that the Gorey bypass is to start this year and both Enniscorthy and New Ross bypasses are currently in the planning process this will probably be the quickest route. Maybe the Nothern section of the N9 to Powerstown or extended to Kilkenny will be enough. They could also then upgrade the N80 linking the N9 and N11

Victor

mike65 wrote:

30 kms more and 35 mins more - all the difference can be attributed to Waterford not having a by-pass!

You forget New Ross where you have to double back twice on the "bypass" and the real bypass will knock 3-5 km off the journey.