DART+ West - mini-consultation on revised plans for Ashtown that leave the stables intact
https://www.dartplus.ie/en-ie/news/2022/revised-ashtown-preferred-option
I see they're sticking with ramps only for the station, with no lifts.
Is that a shallow underpass at the existing level crossing?
It's just a ramp and steps at the current level crossing.
It's pretty much the same underpass but 75 metres west. It requires demolition of a few warehouses and would result in the removal of a load of trees in the Ashton House estate north of the canal.
It gets the job done though. Hopefully that's the end of that.
Seems a pretty good solution. I still can't understand why they insist on having the cycle lanes at the same level as the road going under the canal. The cycle lanes could be two metres higher and still have plenty of headroom, that reduces the incline making it an easier cycle and provides good separation from the road making it much safer.
They could do a bit more work to integrate it at the far end too:
Hopefully that will be feedback that's commonly received in the public consultation
If the cycle lane was higher than the road, presumably it would be able to connect to the existing road between there and Ashtown Road without a ramp. That would mean cyclists could turn right at that point to access the houses/shops in the area or continue along the canal towards the city.
It would be great if a junction with that road (between there and Ashtown Road) could also be provided. That would mean that section of Ashtown Road between the level crossing and existing roundabout could become one way, allowing for wider footpaths and maybe a bit of a plaza beside the canal. Maybe the levels dont allow for a junction there.
Tender for topographical and utility surveys for DART+ Coastal
https://irl.eu-supply.com/ctm/Supplier/PublicPurchase/211770/0/0?returnUrl=ctm/Supplier/publictenders&b=ETENDERS_SIMPLE
Anybody who has been in Dublin in the last year-and-a half, or so, might reckon that the vast construction sites around the old Hawkins House and Apollo House on Townsend Street, Tara Street and Poolbeg Street, along with the impending development adjacent to Tara Street Station itself, where demolition has already taken place, might have presented an opportunity to build a city centre rail interchange.
It seems possible that the scale of such development could have accomodated perhaps both the proposed metrolink, and a possible future DART Underground station.
Has that chance been squandered?
Considering that those sites were ready to go years before Metrolink and Dart Underground were ready for planning, no, it's not really a lost opportunity. No real way of stopping those developers of continuing with these sites while the NTA slowly grinds the Metrolink and Dart Underground through the planning system.
Dart Underground also couldn't go in there, didn't Irish Rail or the NTA recently detail how the Irish Water sewage trunk going through there scupper any hope of a DU station there? It caused difficulty for the Metrolink station, and that's got a significantly smaller footprint than a Dart station.
Gadra had their fourth meeting with the independent expect, RINA. Nothing new or too interesting this time around, mainly focused on questions surrounding the dual bore / single bore debate, along with (of course) the location of the intervention shaft.
Any idea why ML is not yet approved by government and RO submitted?
Did they?
What were these people thinking when they tried to reorganise this fine website?
Scheduled for sometime in May. Pretty sure that they've got no problem with it, and that it's just been delayed into May so that they space out the good news announcements.
They did. There's a thread on it here.
Why are they so reluctant to build more stations as part of this? Instead Eamonn Ryan comes up with daft ideas like this where none of the stations go through major population areas in Limerick.
A station in ballyfermot and/or inchicore would get 1000s of passengers a day
@crazy 88
That article is over 6 months old and relates to Limerick. It has little relevance to Dart + .
6 months 6 years does it matter? It's still being planned.
I was asking why they can't build more dart+ stations instead of the Limerick project, hence the relevance??
Not sure if this is the best place for it, but anyway…
It’s behind a paywall, but shows you the absolute lack of joined up thinking in this country. Embarrassing beyond belief.
It's certainly better than not having built the station at all.
Is it?
The money could have been spent elsewhere providing an actual service.
And it begs the question, why it hasn’t been opened? Land not developed when land for people working in Dublin is being rezoned 50 miles away?
Is there any info on what the costs of opening now are? Presumably there will be TVMs, passenger information displays, lifts, car park lighting, etc. which didn't make sense to have there before the station opens.
I'd expect that if there were lifts in, they were not maintained and are not salvageable
Everything will have to meet specs for a 2022/3 build station
Is the new spend for things that were installed originally? Perhaps they were omitted from the original build because they could be either stolen or vandalised?
Why was the nearby land not built on?
Had they not built a station and had the development gone ahead (as planned), there would be complaints of no forward thinking/planning and increased costs of building a station at greater expense (on top of the active railway) as opposed to as part of the KRRP.
I believe it was originally kitted out with barriers and TVMs but they've all been wrecked over the years and have to be completely replaced,most of the interior has been trashed.
Kishoge should have opened a long time ago to allow passengers connect to Dublin & to other rail destinations on the network. There is also the added expense to include any of the BusConnects routes that were introduced under the Spine C rollout as well to give more benefits to people who live in the surrounding areas. Think of the potential when if any new housing gets built there; a P&R facility would give numerous other benefits to the station which would be nearly the same facilities as that new station will be built at that golf club between Shankill & Bray.
EDIT: The name that escaped me is Woodbrook.
Shocking the damage vandals/teens having a rave will do but they might have been naive to kit the station out when they didn't know when they were opening it. Should have been emptied and bricked up.
I think Kishogue is a good (rare?) example of forward planning in Ireland. The reason it ended up never opening is because the plan was to build Adamstown suburb from 2005-2015 and start on Kishogue suburb after. The 2008 crisis delayed Adamstown so much that it's 2022 and it's still years away from being completed. So the housing at Kishogue is a decade away from substantial completion and there's no point opening the station until then. They could open it now but it'd have issues with passive security having nothing around it. I'd be afraid to leave my car parked there all day.
