M11/N11 - M50 (J4) to Coyne's Cross (J14) [options published]

I think this point is missed by many objecting and jumping on social media campaigns. The same could be said for those against the link roads, surely its better to seperate local traffic, by doing so it will also have the benefit of creating new and safer pedestrian and cycling routes.

Hadn't seen it shared but I noticed a couple weeks back that they've closed the minor road access to the kilmurry cottages between jn8 and 9 southbound. Not sure if this was always planned with the Kilmac works but it had been mentioned in the Arup information that it was on the cards with main improvements project.

Which got me thinking, wonder will they contuine to close these smaller acces points where possible even before the main project goes ahead.

Also Tii in their wisdom have installed bollards along the road beside the bus stop off jn9 northbound, behind the Glen Garage. It had developed into a bit of an unoffical park n ride but obviously Tii were having none of it, so much for trying to encourage public transport use.

I could never understand why they left mainline access to the cottages in place when they widened the road, when they're connected to J7. Same goes for Quill Road on the other side.

I had seen the temporary barriers alright for a few months but had presumed it was to do with traffic management for the kilmac scheme.

Regarding Quill road, there's a few more commercial premises on that road compared to Kilmurry Cottages so not sure the residents on the northern end would appreciate more traffic and trucks on the narrowest section of that road.

true, but it's going to be closed anyway. There is the possibility they could widen the road back to J8 but it's little more than a boreen.

Lot of material published today - Option Selection Report

And an interim bus priority scheme

Sort of related but unrelated. Any idea why the speed limit southbound through Kilmac is still 60kph even after the works associated with the auxiliary lane have been completed.

It is proposed to cross close where the existing Drummin junction is. Essentially fixing the link that was removed when they closed the median in the early 2000s.

money prioritised for public transport and walking/cycling I guess; quid pro quo for greenlighting some less environmentally sustainable projects elsewhere (the Galway bypass for one).

the bus-lane project has funding but I've heard the scope has been reduced to just extending them as far as J6 rather than J9 as had been the plan.

TBH my reaction is "meh" - the changes wouldn't have added a huge amount of capacity and I'm not aware that's it a particularly dangerous stretch of road; they may have decided that it just doesn't represent value for money. I'm disappointed to hear the bus-lane element is being curtailed though. Some of the offline elements might be advanced as local projects.

The focus always should've been on the bus lane/ PT/ active travel element. We know that building new roads ultimately leads to the filling up with more traffic. That really needs to be prioritised with the amount of building along the corridor.

This was always going to be contentious. I had favoured the tunnel option and conversion of the old alignment to a regional distributor (including bus corridor), but that’s not what was chosen. I feel that there’s so much population growth here now (and in future) that the only viable way of dealing with it is to encourage a modal shift: bring Dublin’s rail transport out to the towns that feed the N11’s traffic problems, and allow people to get in or out of the city via mass transport. If you reduce the morning/evening commuting peaks, the existing road will be well able to deal with the traffic on it.

That’s way more expensive than widening a road (even this one), but long term, it’s the only thing that will actually help.

Yes but the biggest problem is the Bray to Greystones section of the railway. It desperately needs a more inland route that is double track. And that will be very expensive and likely just as contentious as the road.

Ideally both would be done - road and rail... but this is Ireland where we often do with neither.

they'll never move the railway inland in North Wicklow, apart from the expense of the infrastructure you'd have to demolish swathes of houses in Bray and Greystones to bring it through the towns. New tunnel through Bray Head and extensive coastal defences at the vulnerable sections would probably be cheaper and less contentious

They could possibly move it inland south of Greystones though by moving it closer to Kilcoole and Newcastle and moving Wicklow station up towards Rathnew. AFAIK though the current plan for there is extra sea defences.

I'm skeptical of this idea that they'll return to this plan a few years down the road when the pesky Greens are out of govt - is the climate crisis going to have been solved by 2025? Will we go back to the mindset where more roads are considered the answer to congestion? The next govt could contain the SDs who have been complaining about the Greens not being "green" enough.

I understand that, but how much money are we really talking. One of the biggest problems during the last recession was that they pulled the money from the design teams to save pennies. Then when the public finances improved we were left with nothing available and projects having to go back to square one. The only people who win are the consultancy firms.

obviously this is with the caveat "if it happens", but Dart+ will increase frequency to Greystones (probably take 10 years for the infrastructure works though), and the arrival of new battery rolling stock in 3 years or so will possibly free up units to increase frequency further south.

There is an alternative, and it’s even better for the Habitats Directive: reduce the whole road down to 80km/h, set out as one lane general traffic plus one bus lane each way, with an offline N11 bypassing the whole Glen: in other words, do what should have been done back in the 1990s. Unfortunately, there was that most sacred of sites – a golf club – on the best route for such a plan, so instead we end up with this nonsense.

Here’s the Glen. The hatched area is the Special Area of Conservation, the orange is the area protected by the Habitats Directive.

Thats exactly what happened, and when the first group got their way, the engineers went back, drew up revised plans and then a new group appeared and they weren't happy, rinse and repeat.

Not just here but there are important projects up and down the country that are badly needed but are taking far to long to get through not even planning but through the consultation periods.

I wouldn't say they're ignorant, probably more selfish, they don't want change and want to contuine living and doing as they've always done without realising some infrastructure is more important than local issues.

Could they do a twin cut and cover tunnel through the existing route? The tunnel traffic could be for mainline traffic through the Glen and the existing road network relaid over it for all the local distributor roads. Similar to the underpasses in Paris/Munich on the internal ring roads, but on a bigger scale. Traffic through the Glen would be reduced to single lane for a couple of years of pain while it's being done. But it would avoid the NIMBY and ECO vetoes.