N25 - Carrigtwohill to Midleton [route options published]

marno21 · 05-01-2018 7:29pm #1

This is finally back on the table, and not before time, with the talks of the new IKEA store in Carrigtwohill.

This project will consist of the closure of all direct accesses onto the N25 between Carrigtwohill and Midleton, and the construction of parallel service roads for access instead. It will also have a new grade seperated junction between Midleton and Carrigtwohill

Cork RDO link here: http://www.corkrdo.ie/n25-carrigtwohill-midleton-interchanges-2/

AugustusMinimus · 05-01-2018 7:35pm

I think this will lead to a possible redesignation to motorway and a 120kph limit all the way to Midleton. There would be shorter stretches of motorway such as the M2.

IMO, this should be bundled with an extra junction for Little Island East.

marno21 · 05-01-2018 9:54pm

AugustusMinimus wrote: »

I think this will lead to a possible redesignation to motorway and a 120kph limit all the way to Midleton. There would be shorter stretches of motorway such as the M2.

IMO, this should be bundled with an extra junction for Little Island East.

The council are pushing ahead with some plan to sort out Little Island - unclear as to what it will be yet.

This scheme will likely be prioritised for the IKEA and/or the Amgen site. The notion of putting traffic lights on the N25 has thankfully not been raised yet.

Aontachtoir · 24-11-2018 1:55am

A flicker of life. The project appraisal plan has been approved by the Department of Transport. Now Cork County Council just have to start designing it.

https://www.eveningecho.ie/corknews/Council-to-redesign-Carrigtwohill-to-Midleton-road-113c62b3-84cd-49e0-b75f-47d6a1b84803-ds

I'm curious to see how far this actually ends up going. It's only 7 km from the end of the improved section by Carrigtwohill to the Midleton roundabout. Will they take the road the extra two kilometres to get out into the countryside again? And if so, why not take it past Castlemartyr (only eight more kilometres in a straight line)? After Castlemartyr it's only another eight kilometres in a straight line to join the Youghal bypass, skipping Killeagh entirely. That's about 25-ish km of new road to have a high-quality link from Cork all the way to Co. Waterford.

marno21 · 24-11-2018 2:32am

Aontachtoir wrote: »

A flicker of life. The project appraisal plan has been approved by the Department of Transport. Now Cork County Council just have to start designing it.

https://www.eveningecho.ie/corknews/Council-to-redesign-Carrigtwohill-to-Midleton-road-113c62b3-84cd-49e0-b75f-47d6a1b84803-ds

I'm curious to see how far this actually ends up going. It's only 7 km from the end of the improved section by Carrigtwohill to the Midleton roundabout. Will they take the road the extra two kilometres to get out into the countryside again? And if so, why not take it past Castlemartyr (only eight more kilometres in a straight line)? After Castlemartyr it's only another eight kilometres in a straight line to join the Youghal bypass, skipping Killeagh entirely. That's about 25-ish km of new road to have a high-quality link from Cork all the way to Co. Waterford.

It'll likely encompass an upgrade of the existing N25 to motorway standard, widening and CPO where required, provision of access roads to faciliate closure of direct accesses onto the N25, a grade seperated junction in the middle, improvement of the existing junctions.

By right it should have been Carrigtwohill-Youghal, but alas it is not.

highwaymaniac · 24-11-2018 2:37pm

marno21 wrote: »

It'll likely encompass an upgrade of the existing N25 to motorway standard, widening and CPO where required, provision of access roads to faciliate closure of direct accesses onto the N25, a grade seperated junction in the middle, improvement of the existing junctions.

By right it should have been Carrigtwohill-Youghal, but alas it is not.

I would have preferred Midleton to Youghal first. I am struggling to see the justification for Carrigtohill to Midleton being progressed first. It's not going to improve capacity. It doesn't include the Lakeview roundabout which is a separate scheme. They will struggle to get a decent cost benefit ratio on this, no journey time savings on the mainline.

The compact junction at Midleton should be removed with the movements catered for in the new junction. There are enough junctions on that stretch as it is. Will just end up like the N40 in 20 years if not careful. Would prefer IKEA rather than a pharma go into that site as traffic demand is spread out during the day opposed to am pm peaks. Little island junction is a mess.

marno21 · 24-11-2018 3:21pm

highwaymaniac wrote: »

I would have preferred Midleton to Youghal first. I am struggling to see the justification for Carrigtohill to Midleton being progressed first. It's not going to improve capacity. It doesn't include the Lakeview roundabout which is a separate scheme. They will struggle to get a decent cost benefit ratio on this, no journey time savings on the mainline.

The compact junction at Midleton should be removed with the movements catered for in the new junction. There are enough junctions on that stretch as it is. Will just end up like the N40 in 20 years if not careful. Would prefer IKEA rather than a pharma go into that site as traffic demand is spread out during the day opposed to am pm peaks. Little island junction is a mess.

On the other hand it would be very cheap. It'll be a small scheme and has already passed the pre-appraisal stage. It won't take long to get to the construction stage so will likely be built around 2022/3 when there are no bigger schemes ready to go due to planning delays.

I agree re: Midleton-Youghal but Midleton-Youghal has never been a priority either nationally or locally. I don't think a route was ever selected.

highwaymaniac · 24-11-2018 5:25pm

marno21 wrote: »

On the other hand it would be very cheap. It'll be a small scheme and has already passed the pre-appraisal stage. It won't take long to get to the construction stage so will likely be built around 2022/3 when there are no bigger schemes ready to go due to planning delays.

I agree re: Midleton-Youghal but Midleton-Youghal has never been a priority either nationally or locally. I don't think a route was ever selected.

I don't think it will be that cheap, land for parallel roads and junction won't be and also it is assuming the scheme will be similar in scale to that previuosly approved. I accept that I am not comparing like for like Midlelton-Youghal.

It is good that they are starting again form scratch, I can't see the previous scheme rehashed
getting past an bord pleanala unless if it was phase 1 of a wider intergrated transport and demand management strategy for Midleton, carrigtohill, glanmorr and little Island. This is based on my interpretation of recent decisions by an bord pleanala eg M7 naas widening where they imposed demand management studies in the conditions and although the inspector did recommend approval she did discuss refusing the scheme in her report.

There are already 6 junctions in the 16 kilometres between lakeview and dunkettle which takes about 10mins to drive in normal traffic conditions. This is already too many.

Chris_5339762 · 24-11-2018 10:18pm

Carrigtwohill to Midleton was rushed forward to serve Amgen. When that fell through this got dumped and the recession was used as an excuse.

Its cheap. Most of the CPOs are done (houses etc were bought, they are still there, albeit derelict).

AFAIK the old scheme ended at the western junction for Midleton, not the Lake View roundabout. The Midleton bypass itself (an exceptionally high quality build for the 80s) was not included. That was to be done as Midleton - Youghal.

marno21 · 24-11-2018 10:35pm

Chris_5339762 wrote: »

Carrigtwohill to Midleton was rushed forward to serve Amgen. When that fell through this got dumped and the recession was used as an excuse.

Its cheap. Most of the CPOs are done (houses etc were bought, they are still there, albeit derelict).

AFAIK the old scheme ended at the western junction for Midleton, not the Lake View roundabout. The Midleton bypass itself (an exceptionally high quality build for the 80s) was not included. That was to be done as Midleton - Youghal.

Indeed, important to re-emphasis that point in bold. There wasn't much movement on Midleton-Youghal back then either unfortunately.

The reserved corridor by Cork County Council is as far as the Midleton West junction, it's not clear yet if this scheme will extend east of there but if it does it will start ramping up the cost.

Was there ever any published information as to where the Midleton-Youghal scheme would route around and east of Youghal? There isn't that much room given that Midleton's sprawl is mainly north-south.

highwaymaniac · 24-11-2018 11:05pm

Chris_5339762 wrote: »

Carrigtwohill to Midleton was rushed forward to serve Amgen. When that fell through this got dumped and the recession was used as an excuse.

Its cheap. Most of the CPOs are done (houses etc were bought, they are still there, albeit derelict).

AFAIK the old scheme ended at the western junction for Midleton, not the Lake View roundabout. The Midleton bypass itself (an exceptionally high quality build for the 80s) was not included. That was to be done as Midleton - Youghal.

Can you give an estimate when you say cheap?

Development plans should preclude large workforce sites next to Junctions on the National Road network full stop.

Previous plan of a temporary junction was a terrible fudge and the proposed grade seperated junction not much better.

A few houses may have bought by negotiation but CPOs were not done.

Chris_5339762 · 25-11-2018 10:24am

I have no idea about cheap I'm afraid but with the CPOs done one could imagine it would be a lot cheaper than a new offline build.

I don't think there ever was anything published about Midleton - Youghal at all, I don't think they got that far. I did email the NRA years ago about what would happen with Lake View and the houses there, but they didn't know even whether there would be a GSJ put in there (I would imagine so).

I've often looked at maps thinking about Youghal.... the pie-in-the-sky plans were to upgrade the Youghal bypass, presumably to 2+2 but where a new Youghal bridge would go I don't think was decided. I do remember that the bumpf on the old NRA website said that the scheme would continue "to the Waterford end of the Youghal bypass". Strictly speaking though, that does NOT include the Youghal bridge. Lets face it, that bridge is old, and there is not an alternative for many miles north.

highwaymaniac · 25-11-2018 2:42pm

Chris_5339762 wrote: »

I have no idea about cheap I'm afraid but with the CPOs done one could imagine it would be a lot cheaper than a new offline build.

I don't think there ever was anything published about Midleton - Youghal at all, I don't think they got that far. I did email the NRA years ago about what would happen with Lake View and the houses there, but they didn't know even whether there would be a GSJ put in there (I would imagine so).

I've often looked at maps thinking about Youghal.... the pie-in-the-sky plans were to upgrade the Youghal bypass, presumably to 2+2 but where a new Youghal bridge would go I don't think was decided. I do remember that the bumpf on the old NRA website said that the scheme would continue "to the Waterford end of the Youghal bypass". Strictly speaking though, that does NOT include the Youghal bridge. Lets face it, that bridge is old, and there is not an alternative for many miles north.

Agree Youghal bridge is on its last legs, not that old though comparatively speaking, opened mid 60s but it is in a poor state structurally and will probably need to be replaced in the next 20 years or at lest have weight restrictions. It is a post tensioned concrete bridge in a marine environment so they need to really keep an eye on it.

I haven't seen anything published about Midelton - Youghal - the route really needs to be planned Midleton - Youghal - Dungarvan (tying in around lemybrien) The only hope for it is the bridge being in poor nick and its on the TEN-T route. I don't think a 2+2 can be retrofitted on the Youghal bypass there doesn't appear to be the cross section available.

The N25 Carrigtohill - Midleton Scheme could cost around €50 Million if as per the previous scheme. What is driving the investment - ie need for the scheme?- safety, local commuter traffic, local housing needs and a potential business park site say circa 1000 jobs. You have to look at the opportunity cost. It certainly isn't badly needed. Housing for now needs to focused around the railway line. Plenty of IDA land in Ringaskiddy and can be used once M28 is built. Short-term focus on housing needs to be around the City (South Docklands and Tivoli)

The whole driver of this scheme is because Amgen were going to create 1000 jobs on a most unsuitable site 10 years ago.

Chris_5339762 · 25-11-2018 3:00pm

What worries me about the Youghal bridge is that the next upstream crossing is Lismore/Cappoquin which is a massive diversion and is not suitable for the traffic it would generate. Not to mention the hairpin near Tallow.

I can see Carrigtwohill - Midleton becoming a thing again once Ikea decide where to go. They swear blind they are not going to the Amgen site, but it makes sense for them to.

AugustusMinimus · 25-11-2018 3:23pm

Was a new junction planned for the Amgen site. There appeared to be a LILO built but were we expecting a full junction?

Youghsl to Cappoquin must be one of the longest section of river in Ireland without a crossing?

Chris_5339762 · 25-11-2018 3:52pm

Yes and no.

Full traffic lights were put up on the mainline when the Amgen site was cleared and they were most definitely positively coming. They caused mayhem. Once Amgen decided not to come, the traffic lights were eventually switched off and taken down altogether.

The original plan was for there to be a Carrigtwohill East junction pretty much there, with a connecting road back into Carrigtwohill, a link down to the Quarry and various roads for development in Carrigtwohill.

highwaymaniac · 25-11-2018 4:48pm

Chris_5339762 wrote: »

What worries me about the Youghal bridge is that the next upstream crossing is Lismore/Cappoquin which is a massive diversion and is not suitable for the traffic it would generate. Not to mention the hairpin near Tallow.

I can see Carrigtwohill - Midleton becoming a thing again once Ikea decide where to go. They swear blind they are not going to the Amgen site, but it makes sense for them to.

Exactly it would be a horrible diversion - i hate to even think about it! No obvious new N25 upgrade route Youghal - Dungarvan.

Going back to need for the N25 Carrigtohill Midleton upgrade.

Take for example the Waterrock Masterplan
https://corkcocoplans.ie/wp-content/uploads/bsk-pdf-manager/2016/07/Water-Rock-Framework-Masterplan-Document.pdf

Main focus of the plan is for 2,500 housing units. However it states "Major improvements to the N25 will be required by the National Roads Authority." Why? Where is the strategic traffic increase? At a macro level why does a housing development need a major improvement to an existing dual carriageway National Road?! Housing needs to be targeted in the right location not just because there is land available.

Google maps is currently saying 23mins from Ballincollig Junction 2 to Midleton Lakeview (light traffic - 34km) The Tunnel is at capacity - Dunkettle upgrade not going to change that - any accident here has major knock on effects. Its just going to be an extension of the N40 south ring road with far too many junctions and ultimately end up like the M50 dominated by short commuter trips. Nothing learned from past mistakes of all the housing allowed in Passage West, Rocherstown, Maryborough, Douglas.

Focus needs to be on demand management and protecting the existing road assets, not encouraging more commuter traffic. We might as well downgrade it to an urban distributor road and instead build Cork North Ring Rathduff to Watergrasshill and a N25 Type 2 Dual east from Watergrasshill via Cappoquin to Lemybrien east of Dungarvan.

The more I think about this "upgrade" the less sense it makes.

marno21 · 26-11-2018 1:24am

Carrigtwohill-Midleton is in the NDP because it's cheap, passes lots of tests on paper and deals with an overcapacity section of the N25 on paper by removing safety issues and improving flow.

The lack of Midleton-Youghal is disappointing but not surprising.

hans aus dtschl · 26-11-2018 10:41am

highwaymaniac wrote: »

A few houses may have bought by negotiation but CPOs were not done.

Can confirm this.
Plenty people still living directly on the N25.

hans aus dtschl · 26-11-2018 10:54am

highwaymaniac wrote: »

Exactly it would be a horrible diversion - i hate to even think about it! No obvious new N25 upgrade route Youghal - Dungarvan.

Going back to need for the N25 Carrigtohill Midleton upgrade.

Take for example the Waterrock Masterplan
https://corkcocoplans.ie/wp-content/uploads/bsk-pdf-manager/2016/07/Water-Rock-Framework-Masterplan-Document.pdf

Main focus of the plan is for 2,500 housing units. However it states "Major improvements to the N25 will be required by the National Roads Authority." Why? Where is the strategic traffic increase? At a macro level why does a housing development need a major improvement to an existing dual carriageway National Road?! Housing needs to be targeted in the right location not just because there is land available.

Google maps is currently saying 23mins from Ballincollig Junction 2 to Midleton Lakeview (light traffic - 34km) The Tunnel is at capacity - Dunkettle upgrade not going to change that - any accident here has major knock on effects. Its just going to be an extension of the N40 south ring road with far too many junctions and ultimately end up like the M50 dominated by short commuter trips. Nothing learned from past mistakes of all the housing allowed in Passage West, Rocherstown, Maryborough, Douglas.

Focus needs to be on demand management and protecting the existing road assets, not encouraging more commuter traffic. We might as well downgrade it to an urban distributor road and instead build Cork North Ring Rathduff to Watergrasshill and a N25 Type 2 Dual east from Watergrasshill via Cappoquin to Lemybrien east of Dungarvan.

The more I think about this "upgrade" the less sense it makes.

I think this is the classic Cork problem though: the City council wants high density in the City and not have sprawl, but the County council wants to encourage sprawl as much as possible, both have directly opposing incentives.

AugustusMinimus · 26-11-2018 10:56am

hans aus dtschl wrote: »

I think this is the classic Cork problem though: the City council wants high density in the City and not have sprawl, but the County council wants to encourage sprawl as much as possible, both have directly opposing incentives.

This is why extending the city boundary well beyond current bounds is key. County driven sprawl doesn’t make sense when the development is happening 10 miles from the city.

hans aus dtschl · 26-11-2018 12:51pm

AugustusMinimus wrote: »

This is why extending the city boundary well beyond current bounds is key. County driven sprawl doesn’t make sense when the development is happening 10 miles from the city.

Midleton will still be county under the proposed boundary extension. As will Carrigtwohill and Little Island. And it's hard to argue that Midleton is in Cork metro area, so the County will retain these and will continue to try to develop them to the maximum.

By comparison, the city's big hope/dreams are the docklands and Tivoli areas.

As an aside, I'm not against the Water Rock development, but the existing Midleton west junction is totally inadequate at this point.

Cork Trucker · 30-11-2018 1:04pm

Will this not just exacerbate between Lakeview Roundabout-Loughaderra-Castlemartyr even further. From the former amgen site to the start of the Youghal bypass is a route that is badly needed on top of the Railway, but the costs would be hugely prohibitive with CPO's and so on?

Bacchus · 01-12-2018 1:32pm

Cork Trucker wrote: »

Will this not just exacerbate between Lakeview Roundabout-Loughaderra-Castlemartyr even further. From the former amgen site to the start of the Youghal bypass is a route that is badly needed on top of the Railway, but the costs would be hugely prohibitive with CPO's and so on?

I don't know what exactly the plan is (has anything been published?) but it sounds like they are just making improvements to the existing N25 and improving junctions/access to the N25, which will improve the safety of that stretch of road. I'm not sure if that'll have a huge impact on the bottleneck areas further along.

You gotta think they have an eye on the impact the new Dunkettle Junction is going to have though in a few years time. This upgrade is probably part of that vision but it's literally kicking the can down the road. Lakeview needs to be addressed next... and then a bypass around Castlemartyr and Killeagh.

Chris_5339762 · 03-12-2018 11:43am

Midleton (western junction) to Youghal (far end of the bypass but AFAIK not the bridge) was in the plans years ago but it got suspended before any plans were made public.It is not in the Capital Plan I don't think, and inexplicably there seems to be no plans to do anything about it.

JupiterKid · 04-12-2018 1:57pm

This is one of the oldest sections of dual carriageway in the country, dating from circa 1970. It is not a long section and should be easily upgraded. The main issue is accesses to private dwellings on the road.

But IMO much more pressing is bypassing Killeagh and Castlemartyr, both bottlenecks and upgrading the Youghal bypass to 2+2 DC as it has tiny sections of D1 at the junctions which IMO can be confusing and even dangerous.

FGR · 04-12-2018 3:13pm

Lakeview and Castlemartyr have become as bottlenecked as they were during the boom. Traffic is often backed up in both locations at 7:30am which is crazy.

I remember it being said as far back as 20 years ago that the dual carriageway should have continued from lakeview to beyond Killeagh. It's sad to think that there won't be anything done here for at least another 10 years.

Considering that Limerick is soon going to be the second most connected city on the island (with the M20 and massive N24 upgrades) and Wexford has New Ross/Enniscorthy bypasses being built - Does the lack of front bench politicians from East Cork/Waterford have anything to do with the lack of investment on this route?

marno21 · 04-12-2018 3:52pm

According to TII Midleton-Youghal will be operating at around 100% of capacity in 2030. Which I think is daft as it's clearly operating above 120% of capacity right now.

Chris_5339762 · 04-12-2018 9:48pm

Midleton - Youghal AADT = 16,000 in 2017 but it feels far busier than that.

I heard somewhere that Lakeview was originally supposed to have been more than it is, but there were problems with the CPOs on that line of houses to the east of it. Thats all I know though, and I always say that the Midleton bypass, for the 1980s, was an exceptionally high quality build for what was probably not a massive bottleneck back then.

Also I read an article today that they have to go right back to Project Appraisal for the Carrigtwohill - Midleton section, as per the new NRA/TII guidelines.

highwaymaniac · 05-12-2018 11:13pm

Chris_5339762 wrote: »

Midleton - Youghal AADT = 16,000 in 2017 but it feels far busier than that.

I heard somewhere that Lakeview was originally supposed to have been more than it is, but there were problems with the CPOs on that line of houses to the east of it. Thats all I know though, and I always say that the Midleton bypass, for the 1980s, was an exceptionally high quality build for what was probably not a massive bottleneck back then.

Also I read an article today that they have to go right back to Project Appraisal for the Carrigtwohill - Midleton section, as per the new NRA/TII guidelines.

16,000 is very high for a single carriageway, its way over the design capacity of 11,600 (level of service D).

And rightly so, they will have a hard time getting the business case to stand up on this project, will need the politicians if this is going to get built. Dare I say but based on the N40, which this scheme is just an extension of, and the accident induced traffic chaos, (case in point this week) by adding another junction this scheme could actually reduce journey times in long term!

The road network in Cork City and surrounds is over capacity, removing a choke point like lakeview is only going to exarcerbate the problem as will this scheme as well as the M28.

Bacchus · 06-12-2018 7:50am

highwaymaniac wrote: »

The road network in Cork City and surrounds is over capacity, removing a choke point like lakeview is only going to exarcerbate the problem as will this scheme as well as the M28.

I agree that fixing Lakeview just moves the problem down the road but I don't think it exacerbates it. Also, naive as this may be, you have to consider upgrades such as Dunkettle, the N28, the N25, Lakeview flyover as part of an overall plan to improve traffic flow. The problem with the big picture though is that the stretch from Midleton to Youghal doesn't seem to have a plan... and westbound from Dunkettle is going to be a car park.

Personally, in fantasy world, I'd rather keep that stretch as it is, stop focusing on putting dual carriageways everywhere, and focus on rail links to encourage drivers off the road and onto trains going from Waterford/Dungarvan/Youghal to Midleton/Carrigtwohill/Little Island/City. That'll never happen though

N25 - Carrigtwohill to Midleton [route options published]

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