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DART+ (DART Expansion)

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Comments

  • Registered Users Posts: 1,512 ✭✭✭strassenwo!f


    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?

    Post edited by spacetweek on


  • Moderators, Computer Games Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators Posts: 10,395 Mod ✭✭✭✭CatInABox


    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.



  • Moderators, Computer Games Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators Posts: 10,395 Mod ✭✭✭✭CatInABox


    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.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,753 ✭✭✭cgcsb


    Any idea why ML is not yet approved by government and RO submitted?



  • Registered Users Posts: 1,512 ✭✭✭strassenwo!f




  • Moderators, Computer Games Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators Posts: 10,395 Mod ✭✭✭✭CatInABox


    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.



  • Moderators, Computer Games Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators Posts: 10,395 Mod ✭✭✭✭CatInABox




  • Registered Users Posts: 2,326 ✭✭✭crazy 88


    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



  • Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 19,862 Mod ✭✭✭✭Sam Russell


    @crazy 88

    That article is over 6 months old and relates to Limerick. It has little relevance to Dart + .



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,326 ✭✭✭crazy 88


    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??



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,946 ✭✭✭✭Zebra3


    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.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,818 ✭✭✭donvito99


    It's certainly better than not having built the station at all.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,946 ✭✭✭✭Zebra3


    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?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,037 ✭✭✭Pete_Cavan


    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.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 69,538 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    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



  • Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 19,862 Mod ✭✭✭✭Sam Russell


    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?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,818 ✭✭✭donvito99


    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.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,577 ✭✭✭lord lucan


    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.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,526 ✭✭✭dublinman1990


    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.



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  • Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 5,144 Mod ✭✭✭✭spacetweek


    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.



  • Moderators, Education Moderators Posts: 26,403 Mod ✭✭✭✭Peregrine


    The main story here is that Kishoge is finally opening. Hugh Creegan said last week that it's being progressed without any delays now. Once the final required works are identified, procurement for a contractor will begin soon followed by construction and opening next year.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,946 ✭✭✭✭Zebra3


    i would have thought the main story was the stunning incompetence and waste of taxpayers’ money.



  • Moderators, Education Moderators Posts: 26,403 Mod ✭✭✭✭Peregrine


    The €3.8m "refurbishment" figure is very misleading. Most of that would have had to be spent anyway. It was always the case that Kishoge would need multi-million euro works to complete the station access and car park. This article from 2017 says €2m:

    As for needing more money to meet present day accessibility requirements, this would have had to be spent to upgrade the station at some point anyway. The waste is really only the money that has to be spent to repair any broken or vandalised features. I've highlighted the cost from vandalism before to try and get it opened. It's a shame but it's nowhere close to €3.8m and was clear to anyone campaigning to get this opened. When it was closed with no prospect of opening, it was a struggle to get any news outlets to cover the fact that it's being left to rot and be vandalised but now that it's going to be fixed, it's the only thing they can talk about. Do I like having to spend more money? No but I'd much rather focus on the fact that it's being opened now.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,946 ✭✭✭✭Zebra3


    But there are also serious questions about how dysfunctional things work (or don’t) in Ireland.

    Prime land beside a train station undeveloped while land outside Dublin gets redeveloped for people who then have insane commutes.

    These issues need to be fixed or else they’ll happen again and again.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,753 ✭✭✭cgcsb


    Clonburris won't happen the state has too much involvement. We've seen with O'Deavany, the glass bottle site and the plauer Wilson site, government involvement holds back development, often indefinitely.

    Post edited by cgcsb on


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  • Registered Users Posts: 1,228 ✭✭✭gjim


    I didn't realise the surrounding lands were owned by the state? I agree with you though the local authorities have a woeful record in this regard. That a site like O'Deavany Gardens can lie mostly undeveloped for nearly 2 decades - as local councillors spend years bickering and chopping and changing their minds about what should be built - was a complete debacle.

    If Kishoge were operating as a station, this location is surely one of the best in Dublin outside the M50 for high density development, under 30 minutes to Connolly by train. With nearly square km of land around this station - development could leverage a massive savings in terms of economies of scale. Allowing decent heights you could have nearly 10k people living here all within 5 minutes walk to the station. That sort of density is what makes rail PT viable and with DART+ and ML coming, you'd have great connectivity - the airport in 40 minutes, Stephen's Green in about the same, etc.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,760 ✭✭✭AngryLips


    Only in Ireland will people moan and gripe about good forward planning after years of moaning and griping about the complete absence of forward planning. Was the money even public funds or was it development levies?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,242 ✭✭✭p_haugh


    Iirc, the station was paid for by the developer when it was initially built - will they provide funds again for the works needed now? Or will it be the state/Irish rail that are providing the €3.8 million?



  • Moderators, Education Moderators Posts: 26,403 Mod ✭✭✭✭Peregrine


    It'll be the government. It was in this year's budget.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,653 ✭✭✭yer man!


    I was under the impression is was part of the Kildare Rail Project. This involved Quad Tracking Hazelhatch - Ballyfermot and a couple of stations along the stretch for Dart and Intercity rail.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,242 ✭✭✭p_haugh


    Ah right, thanks for the clarification!



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,946 ✭✭✭✭Zebra3


    How can it be good forward planning when after all these years the station is unopened and the land beside it undeveloped?

    Good forward planning would have been if the station had have opened in tandem with the land being developed.



  • Moderators, Computer Games Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators Posts: 10,395 Mod ✭✭✭✭CatInABox


    Just because it didn't work out perfectly doesn't mean it wasn't good planning. There was no way of knowing that there'd be a massive downturn, putting developers out of business and developments across the country on hold.



  • Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 19,862 Mod ✭✭✭✭Sam Russell


    Well, good planning would have stripped out the equipment and bricked up the openings to keep the vandals out.

    Well, vandalism is not just against stations.

    https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/more-than-500-000-of-graffiti-damage-done-to-dart-carriages-in-2021-1.4734653



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,326 ✭✭✭crazy 88


    There is no such thing as forward planning for public transport in this country. More likely there was serious lobbying or otherwise from the developer at the time who then bailed out. A train station nearby would add thousands to the value of a home after all.

    A logical alternative would have been to build the station on the Cork/Limerick line in somewhere that already has massive demand such as ballyfermot or inchicore. Or turn platform 10 in Heuston into a properly accessible station. But alas no developers around there on same scale as Lucan to "incentivise" the NTA.

    All three of those options should be in dart+ by the way but of course they are not.

    Post edited by crazy 88 on


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,037 ✭✭✭Pete_Cavan


    As it happens, two weeks ago SDCC started a public consultation on proposed Social and Affordable housing development comprising of 263 residential units on a site located on lands within Clonburris SDZ;

    Density is disappointing but that is probably due to the development surrounding the single storey traveller accommodation.

    You would hope that much more density is planned for the other side of R136. Really the station should have been the focal point of a village with shops and a public space. The car park is there now but the plan should be to eventually develop that space also.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,294 ✭✭✭D.L.R.


    Dublin's historically idiotic planners have actively avoided the railway lines for years.

    Take Blanch and Castleknock - two town centres about 1km from the railway line between them. Instead of a commercial centre being planned and encouraged around the station we've produced the opposite. Two town centres a good hike from the station, with light residential and fields beside the station itself. Its so stupid.

    Its even worse on the Heuston line out of Dublin - you have a rail corridor there within the M50 that has no stations at all between Heuston and Park West, and the whole southern side is just industrial. Bonkers.

    Not to mention the failure to protect the Northern line corridor for quad tracking.

    This totally brainless planning has left Dublin with a really difficult legacy of stupidity to overcome.



  • Registered Users Posts: 326 ✭✭MyLove4Satan


    You can directly blame Colm McCarthy and Sean Barrett raising several generations who were told 'rail has no future'...



  • Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 5,144 Mod ✭✭✭✭spacetweek


    Is there any chance, any chance at all, that the media in this country might occasionally provide some positive coverage of this project?

    Nope.

    The usual anti-spokesperson given a full 2 minutes to mouth off about wildlife and how you don't need to expand rail in the middle of a climate crisis, floating in her boat down the canal with not a care in the world. I'd say she never commutes anywhere.



  • Registered Users Posts: 1,228 ✭✭✭gjim


    As a curiosity, with regards to Blanch, in the 1970s rail plan, it was intended to run a spur into to a terminus located where the centre is now. You can still make out parts of the "alignment" with the satellite view on google maps. Still fairly idiotic compared to developing the land directly around the train line.

    Also it wasn't just planners - the old CIE did itself no favours at all in terms of encouraging investment or increasing usage/dependency on rail. It was (somewhat justifiably) seen an an incorrigible, unreformable, union-dominated organisation that existed to benefit the employees and where providing a service to the public was viewed as unfortunate inconvenience.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 28,304 ✭✭✭✭blanch152


    I think that spur remains, and was part of the Metro West plan.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,753 ✭✭✭cgcsb


    A frankly bizarre piece of journalism. If you didn't know the project you would think from that interview that the canal was to be permanently removed. She claims that construction can make animals leave, ok so we'll just all live in tents and never build or renovate anything again. Animals leave areas and return to them all the time

    And sure why not just let cars pass through the level crossing after midnight. No interviews with normal folk who want to get to work and get home, only fruit cakes on canal barges get air time. I wonder has she carried out a study on the health impacts for the canal wild life generated by the NOx, PM10 and PM2.5 particulate emissions from her diesel powered canal barge.



  • Registered Users Posts: 326 ✭✭MyLove4Satan


    A pair of wealthy wagons with a barge demanding the nation's infrastructure serves them personally. You could not make these types up!



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,526 ✭✭✭dublinman1990


    I don't really see the issue why the canal would be a big problem in providing train services to the Ashtown area.

    The amount of construction work to actually build the underpass to let cars, cyclists and pedestrians to use it would be very minimal. The rail line would still remain above ground. You would swear, going from the woman owning the barge along the canal, that the that the whole rail system would go underground in places like Ashtown.

    I also wouldn't think the trains passing by the canal would be an issue at all. If IÉ had built the OHLE for Dart+ West. The new hybrid Dart trains that are going to be coming into service will eventually replace most of the current commuter rail stock which effectively runs on pure diesel. This would mean that tere would be way less emissions coming out from most of the rolling stock at that point.

    The intercity railcar stock would still be running train services to Sligo at that point on that line as well. This would mean that a small amount of the emissions would still be present from that rail stock unless IÉ had plans to make them run on biofuels in the future which would get rid of the emissions issue.

    Post edited by dublinman1990 on


  • Registered Users Posts: 15 Brosna1999


    It's just textbook NIMBYism plain and simple - I wouldn't worry about it too much though as they have the most comical and unconvincing arguments one could think of. Does anyone know when the Dart+ West RO is to be submitted?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,753 ✭✭✭cgcsb




  • Registered Users Posts: 15 Brosna1999


    Spencer Dock Station from ROD's website (This is the only indicative image they have).



  • Registered Users Posts: 1,228 ✭✭✭gjim


    At best, biofuels might lower a train's carbon footprint (and that's debatable - they certainly don't as a mandated additive to US petrol), but they don't reduce local emissions.

    But even talk of biofuels irritates me. I wish they'd just stop fannying around with commissioning battery trains and other work-arounds just commit to rolling out OHLE for the main parts of the national network. This graph shows how backward Ireland is in that regard - not only has Ireland the lowest level of rail electrification in Europe by a long shot, it's about a tenth of the European average in percentage terms. Even among the countries known to have a crap rail service, Ireland stands out as an outlier in its dependence on diesel for trains.



  • Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 19,862 Mod ✭✭✭✭Sam Russell



    In 1967, Cork had its last day of the horse drawn CIE dray delivering messages. I think it might have been earlier in Dublin. That is a lot later than I thought. Diesels replaced steam in the 1960s. Neither of these were ahead of anyone else.

    Do not expect CIE to be ahead of anyone in new advances in technology or engineering. They were not called the Flying Snail for nothing.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 69,538 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    The GNRB split and merger with CIE held the dieselisation programme back significantly I believe.



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