M6 - Galway City Ring Road [planning decision pending]

Don't forget the bat surveys!

he is a serial rereg who wastes everyones time. I would just ignore

There is not a single country in Europe going to be paying any such fines.

But how is it such a bad design, and let's be honest the majority of objectors to such projects, are dyed in the wool serial objectors, who will always oppose any sort of progress. There were major objections to the upgrade of the N11, the Carrickmines stretch of the M50, the Kildare bypass was held up for years over a snail, the M3 through Tara, there are major objections to the M20 Cork - Limerick road, with the usual reasons of the environment, wildlife etc., been dragged out by these people. However with the exception of the M20 which has yet to be hopefully built, all of these roads were built, nobody died, the environment and wildlife survived, farmers got richer, and we all got to our destinations a lot quicker. The problem with this country, is that unlike the UK and most major European nations, they all built their motorways in the 60s and 70s, while we were very late coming to the party, with all of our motorways built in the 2000s. Added to the fact that we have an extremely unpredictable and slow planning system which allows serial objectors to thrive, hence why our infrastructure in this country is so far behind a lot of our European neighbours. I like most people have given up on a ring road ever been built around Galway, and that in itself is a shocking indictment of successive governments, Galway City Council, our planning process, and of course those who will care least, the serial objectors. At the end of the day we need to reduce the likelihood of judicial reviews of all proposed projects, by having a new planning and regulatory environment that can deliver faster decisions and a higher thresholds for rejection of major plans. Sadly it probably won't happen, and Galway will continue to suffer for decades with almost total gridlock, and a completely inadequate public transport system.

My lack of understanding of previous projects, do you always maintain such a condescending, pompous attitude, and that you are far more knowledgeable than us mere mortals, bowing to your vastly superior knowledge on such projects. I don't for one second claim to be an expert on any road building project,but I'm still thankful that most of them were built, and let's be honest had the Galway ring road been built 20 or 30 years ago, there wouldn't be a word about it today. The M50 is a prime example of how not to build a major road, poorly designed, poor junctions, built in a piecemeal fashion, but lets be honest thank f**k it was still built, otherwise bad and all as Dublin traffic can be, it would be carnage if the M50 didn't exist. The Galway ring road should have been built a long time ago, and still should be built, end of!!

OK.

Whatabout.

Would you call it a bad design and, if not, why not?

Xenophobia and fear of green boogeymen seem to be the only reason to build this road.

OK.

Would you call it a bad design and, if not, why not?

Well what do you suggest, do what they have done for the last 30 years which is absolutely nothing, and watch while the traffic in Galway gets worse and worse if that's even possible. Too many people on here banging on about what a poor design the proposed ring road is, so what do you all suggest then instead. The City Council have done nothing for decades to alleviate Galway's chronic traffic problems, and yeah even if it is a bad design, I am so sick of the traffic in Galway and it's rubbish public transport, that I would be of the opinion to just build the bloody thing!!

Well, over the last 30 years GCC have had a few attempts at submitting plans for the Ring Road, so its not fair to say they have done nothing. When they first submitted plans I was all in favour - because way back then we were of the understanding that the way to ease traffic congestion was by building more roads. We now know that does not work - the unfortunate part is that GCC persisted with roughly the same plan, and now are in the position where their own data shows it will make things worse in the long term.

As for suggestions - plan the transport needs of the city around people (not private cars) and then build roads where there is a need. Those roads will mainly be distributor roads well outside the city that would move traffic to it that does not need to be near the city.

Well what do you suggest, do what they have done for the last 30 years

It is the lads desperately defending the GCRR who want to continue to do what we have done for the last 30 years! Others want an integrated approach which is more likely to be delivered.

I have to laugh at this strategy of presenting the last 30 years as some sort of alternative approach which has failed so now it's time to build the road. In reality, we have spent the last 30 years trying only to build a road, maybe we could try a slightly different approach and broaden our gaze somewhat (which I think would still involve a new bridge across the Corrib, less the "degrowth" nonsense gets rolled out again)?