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What would our infrastructure look like if we had stayed in the UK?

dublincc2

I recently made a thread about what Ireland would be like it we never left the UK or at the very least stayed in it for several more decades. One subject matter that people often being up in this alternate history scenario is how our infrastructure would have developed differently if we stayed in the Union.

Would Dublin have an underground metro system? IIRC this was proposed before independence in the Abercrombie plan with a tunnel from Harcourt St to Broadstone being one element. Retention of the DUTC trams is also a possibility although many such systems in GB cities were removed anyway.

I imagine that some of our railway lines would still be closed but as a result of Beeching's Axe rather than Todd Andrews. However, some lines would surely still be open, the Navan one being quite likely IMO. Perhaps some link to the northwest would remain with no partition. What other lines would likely have remained open?

How would Irish road infrastructure luck under the UK? Would the UK have chosen better routes, for example the M7 to Cork etc? I imagine some roads like the M3 or M9 would not be built in this scenario as the traffic levels did not justify them in our reality and they were really just the product of boomtime confidence.

As for rural electrification, would this still have been rolled out in the same way and on roughly the same timeline? I imagine Ardnacrusha would not be built, this was the jewel in the crown of Free State infrastructure, would there be a similar scheme elsewhere?

I'm not suggesting that we should have stayed in the UK for the benefit of better infrastructure just how it would look like if we had remained, aside from politics.

What are your ideas of how our infrastructure would have developed under Britain?

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Sam Russell

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120517281#Comment_120517281

We did have but we demolished them.

Anyone remember the Ballymun towers?

PolmacD

And we’d have taller buildings

PolmacD

Dublin might be a bit cleaner, have less clutter/crappy road signs and bollards and have an overall nicer public realm like most big cities in the UK.

Sam Russell

Remember, if we were still part of the UK, there would be no Stormont.

That would mean that the Stormont decisions to build motorways that did not go to Dublin would not have happened. The closure of the train service to nationalist areas, but keeping those to Unionist areas would have happened differently. As would most infrastructure questions for that part of Ireland - in particular Donegal and Derry.

How quiet would be those that favoured an independence agenda? Would they influence the provision of infrastructure (plus other matters)?

AAAAAAAAA

I actually think that the motorways in Dublin would have been much more developed, like in Belfast. That's not really a good thing though in my eyes. The rest of the country probably wouldn't see great investment, certainly there would be no M11, M2, maybe not even an M4/M6. One very good spine running from Belfast to Cork right through the middle of Dublin would probably be the bulk of the motorway network.

Maybe the Jack Lynch and Limerick Tunnels would have been bridges, they do love their bridges.

swampgas

We would most likely still be using miles instead of kilometers. Other than that, I would hesitate to hazard a guess!

Lewis_Benson

Oh I'd say we would have been driving about in gold carriages and living in palaces

Couple of points to keep in mind about Dublin getting a Metro if we were still in the UK. 1922 was 60 years after the opening of the first London Underground line and by 1922 there were 9 lines open in London and yet despite Dublin being the second city of the UK, there wasn’t even a plan or real suggestion of Dublin getting even one line.

Also worth noting that in London, while the Bakerloo and Piccadilly were opened in 1906, the next London Underground line, the Victoria line, didn’t open until 1968. This really shows what bad economic state Britain was in from the start of WW1 until well after WW2. If they weren’t building new lines during this period in London, they certainly weren’t going to be doing any in Dublin.

AnFearCeart

There are a few things to consider, especially with consideration to population numbers. While a decent amount of Irish men fought WW1 within the British Army, had we remained in the UK would similar or bigger Irish numbers have fought WW2? What kind of effect would this have had on our population numbers post WW2 which were already dropping towards 3m and even dropped to 2.8m in 1961. Would there be less Irish people heading into the 1960s owing to men killed in WW2? Or would our emigration levels to rebuild bombed England not have happened with said men and women staying in Ireland to rebuild here? Also, would immigration into Ireland have happened from UK colonies?

If IWUK (robbing that abbreviation used above!) being in WW2 how many of our towns and cities would have been bombed? Dublin, Wexford, Waterford and Cork most certainly would have been bombed by the Germans. Would Dublin have got an underground in the post-WW2 era as part of the rebuild? Cork probably not owing to the terrain and soils there.

Would a IWUK have seen much larger exploration for gas and oil off our coasts in the post WW2 era? Surely the British would have pushed for greater exploration, especially in the Celtic sea and possibly more of the Irish sea too. Would Waterford or Cork today be a centre for landing oil and gas to feed Ireland and GB.

As for the roads system, would our network today more closely resemble the old Trunk and Links system that existed before the more modern N, R and L (Local) system we have today? The motorway network would surely have been built more as a bypass to bypass system of towns and villages along T and L routes. Our modern day M8 (T6) would probably be motorway to Kilkenny and then DC for much of the rest of the way down to Cork. I think modern day M1 and M11 would exist with motorway the whole spine of the east coast.

Peregrinus

In terms of infrastructure development in Ireland-within-the-UK, it should be born in mind that IWUK would likely be notably poorer than real-world Ireland, since we wouldn't have been free to pursue the economic policies that have served us so well over the past 60 or 70 years. (In speculating how IWUK would fare economically we have a useful real-world control: Northern Ireland.)

So, infrastructural development would have been dependent to a material extent on financial transfers from GB. Which would certainly have happened to some extent, but I suspect not to such an extent as would replicate what real-world independent Ireland has been able to finance.

At the risk of oversimplifying, probably the financing of infrastructure in IWUK would have been better during the first fifty years of independence, and worse in the second 50 years. So we might have had some advantage in the kinds of infrastructure that the UK government was financing in the period 1920-1970. But for much of that period the UK government wasn't financing a lot of infrastructure even in GB — they don't talk about "interwar stagnation" for nothing — and most of what they did finance would be now be in need of replacement, if not already replaced.

marno21

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120493667#Comment_120493667

100%. They are absolutely perfect for their use and are incredibly safe and do their job excellently (the odd junction being the exception).

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120493370#Comment_120493370

No, it is fair to say that there would probably be no motorway to either Cork or Limerick. Source, just look at Northern Ireland.

AnFearCeart

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120490113#Comment_120490113

True that. But most of these yellow pack motorways are perfect for purpose and quite an enjoyable drive.

dublincc2

Is it fair to say that under the UK the routing motorway to Limerick/Cork from Dublin would be different?

veryangryman

I really hope we build more motorways. Anyone who wishes we had less, i have to question the sanity of. Why have a 5 star life when you can have 2-star

marno21

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120487392#Comment_120487392

These roads are not "full blown motorways". A handful of "full blown motorways" were built in Ireland, namely the M1, the M7 to Portlaoise, the M4 to Kinnegad, the M50, short stretches of the M11 and a few isolated stretches around the country. The rest of the motorway network is a lower class dual carriageway with much narrower central medians, narrower lanes and hard shoulders, lower spec junctions and as a result less land take. Many of them actually opened as N road dual carriageways, but were later reclassified as motorways (motorway being a legal classification rather than a road standard in this country) to protect them from unauthorised development and make them safer.

This argument rears its head whenever a new road under motorway regulations is proposed to be built (the M20, M28, M21 etc). "Don't build a motorway build a dual carriageway instead". Little do they know that the difference between the two for all those motorways proposed would simply be the colour of the signs on the finished road.

dublincc2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120486241#Comment_120486241

I would disagree on motorways. Most of them are not justified by t he levels of traffic that use them and the routes are very insufficent, just look at the M7/M8 situation and how it could have been more sustainable to build a spur to Limerick on the Dublin-Cork motorway. Don't get me started on ridiculous and pointless wastes such as the M2 or M3 which should've just been DC bypasses around individual towns instead of a full blown motorway that isn't used that often and say over-spec, not to mention the heritage destruction of the M3.

Kaybaykwah

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120483579#Comment_120483579

Another corollary of the airline industry that the Irish have successfully developed is the duty free and other shops in Russian airports when the Iron Curtain fell. That expertise has also helped it make inroads in other markets worldwide.

I also think it was worth the wait for Ireland to get the motorways that it has Today. They are really state of the art and on average, smartly insulated from residential areas throughout the country.

Peregrinus

Yeah. It's absurd to think that if Ireland had remained in the UK it would have had similar infrastructure development to much more densely-populated England. It certainly would not.

I’d point out that many social services and payments are actually higher and better here than in the UK. The state pension is higher in Ireland than the UK and unemployment payments are over double what they are in the UK. Only €94 a week in the UK, versus €220 here!

The NHS is really the only area that the UK offers better than us. Though it seems to be deteriorating quickly, while ours is gradually improving (Free GP gradually being rolled out, etc.).

end of the road

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120484014#Comment_120484014

it's actually a good thing ireland has no local authority system like the UK.

not only is ireland a small country and does not need multiple layers of government and the associated expense like council tax etc, but we do not need the disaster of such councils being used as a way to make cuts to services to get central government off the hook.

that's exactly how the UK local authority system works and it's an abomination, and not to mention that it's a gravey train for some also.

any services that may be a bit better in the uk at the moment won't be so for long unless the nasty party are kicked out soon.

Guildenstern

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120483873#Comment_120483873

Agree with the privatisation over the last 20 years or so. And not exclusively the Tories either but they have continued with it. When last I checked even many natural conservative voters would prefer to see a re-nationalisation of transport, and that's saying something.

That said, it's probably more accurate to compare is with Scotland, similar population figures. Denmark as well, although it can get very difficult making these comparisons.

Guildenstern

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120483782#Comment_120483782

I was alluding to the UK social services structure set up from the post war period onwards. Yes, certainly they have been decimated this last decade, of that there is no doubt, but a direct comparison across both countries over the years, the UK is a country mile ahead. Health, housing, local authority set up. If you've no experience of both jurisdictions, I would offer the direct experiences of examples in Ireland with families with disabled members, and the direct experiences of their equivalents in the UK.

breezy1985

I think too many people compare their small little part of Ireland to London, Liverpool, Leeds etc.

My experience of England outside London was all roughly 90k cities which ironically is exactly the size of my home city Limerick.

Comparing the 2 I am very thankful for independence even if it took a bit of time to get there. We go on about their better public transport but again in those cities it's crap and a privatized mess. Cars are felt to be required same as here.

Certain things are better like I'de rather spend my money on council tax over private health insurance and GPs but their overly planned cities have been franchised into oblivion.

CrabRevolution

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120483665#Comment_120483665

There's no guarantee our motorways would have arrived at all, never mind quicker. Look at a map of the UK motorway network; Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland are pretty sparsely covered with motorways. Waterford (pop 82,000) has a Motorway connection but Aberdeen (pop 400'000) and Derry (pop 200'000) don't.

The map on wikipedia for UK motorways actually has most of Scotland and Northern Ireland cropped out because there's simply no motorways to show there: List of motorways in the United Kingdom - Wikipedia

Podge_irl

UK social services are absolutely falling apart and they rely on an absolute legion of charity run food banks among other charity driven programmes. That is just incredibly wrong.

Guildenstern

Motorways would have arrived a lot quicker, and you'd think more urbanisation. Think Sligo, with a population of 19,000 probably would be double that.

Not just physical infrastructure but social services structure and that includes a proper local authority and social service structure. Less reliance on charities run by volunteers which have developed from the 1940s or so onwards, and more professional state support services. You'd see that in the UK and Europe whereas Ireland seems very much a poor relation in that area.

I think an important point that the OP misses, is just how broke Britain has been over the last 100 years.

Sure the 1700’s and 1800’s we a great time of growth for the British, with the Industrial Revolution and the empire, but the last 100 years have largely been an economic disaster for them, with them mostly coasting on what they gained from the centuries before.

Think about it, we start in 1922, the interwar years, Britain is recovering after the horrors of WW1, the British empire is collapsing and The Great Recession is happening. Very little money available to invest in infrastructure in England, never mind Ireland.

WW2 happens and obviously any infrastructure plans are cancelled and all investment goes into the war.

Post WW2, the British empire has totally collapsed and they are dealing with the horrors of WW2, many dead and disabled. Many of their cities destroyed. Through the 50’s and 60’s what little money is left, goes into rebuilding destroyed British cities, just basic housing. But more emphasis is rightfully given to supporting the survivors of the war, creating the NHS, social housing, etc.

Only in the 70’s do things start to look up, when they find oil and gas in the North Sea, but unlike Norway, the Tories waste it mostly lining their own pockets, rather then investing it in the country. What little investment happens, is mostly directed at the South of England. Very little makes its way to the rest of the union. And then you have the likes of the coal miner strikes, etc.

The UK literally only made the last payment for its WW2 loans to the US in 2006!

The last 100 years really haven’t been economically kind to the British and now they have gone and done Brexit. While the first few decades certainly weren’t great for us, I think we can easily now see that we very much dodged a bullet by not being part of the UK. We now have the fastest growing economy in Europe, while the British Economy is actually shrinking!

“We'd have what Belfast has - a 100% privately owned shed as a main airport. No Aer Lingus, No Ryanair blah blah”

Also Ireland as a world leader in aircraft leasing. This is a very large and profitable industry for Ireland, that many people aren’t aware of. It would never have been allowed to happen under British rule.

Franky a lot of the very smart, pro business moves that the Irish government made over the last decades, would likely never have been allowed, Shannon economic zone, Duty free shopping, IFSC, low corporate tax rates, etc.

Peregrinus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120479763#Comment_120479763

There was lots of publicly-funded rural housing built in in Ireland in the last few decades of British rule, and most of it was isolated houses, each associated with its own farm, rather than housing clustered in villages and towns. This was regarded as more efficient (each farmer on his own land), given the model of land purchase and distribution the Land Commission was following. Housing for landless farm labourers was similarly scattered.

This policy might have changed in later years if British rule had continued. On the other hand, it might not.