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DART+ (DART Expansion)

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Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,030 ✭✭✭✭murphaph


    Well, in a similar vein, if DU was built before FN then you wouldn't have to run all trains through from Hazelhatch to Drogheda. You could design the Docklands/Fairview/wherever station with a centre bay turnback platform (useful for operational flexibility anyway) and run the remainder of trains short between Hazelhatch and Docklands. 90% of passengers boarding between Hazelhatch and Heuston would probably be alighting at or before Docklands anyway. You'd still get most of the benefit out of the tunnel even if you could "only" run 9tph through to Drogheda.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,030 ✭✭✭✭murphaph


    Personally I'd like to see Sligo trains terminate as soon as possible and not sent out to Dún Laoghaire where hardly any passengers would be heading. I think IE could do worse than retain the existing Docklands station for exactly this purpose. Most people would probably alight a Sligo IC train at Glasnevin and take ML to the city centre or a DART towards GCD/Bray but anyone going to the Docklands would be well served by the existing Docklands station. It's close enough to the Red Line too, at least for an Intercity connection.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,968 ✭✭✭GerardKeating


    Only time i ever remember them used was for a south bound train, terminating at Pearse and the now out of service train going into the siding and reversing out of the way of a wexford train.

    Never remember the two bay platforms on the other side used, apart from when the filmed the Michael Collins movie there.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 187 ✭✭OisinCooke


    Had the pleasure recently on riding a few Italian trains and the thought has crossed my mind that Irish Rail really has shocking passenger information. On all of the Italian commuter trains there are screens which tell you the destination (and live-updating ETA) and origin of the train, a scrolling list of the stations on the route along with arrival times, a map of the route and the trains location, a train diagram, carriage capacity info and location of toilets and even a list of the next few departing trains and their platform number from the station you’re arriving onto.

    I know the new DART trains have a pretty good looking PIS screen with the current time, the next station, the destination, and helpfully, what sides the door will open on, but does anyone else know what other features they’ll have? I know a lot of newer UK trains have that train diagram showing what parts are more crowded, do the 8/90000s have these?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 21 BestWestern


    I wouldn't wrote off the south Dublin passenger base either for Sligo or Belfast services. Starting in Dunlaoghaire could increase the passenger numbers quite a bit.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 18,907 ✭✭✭✭LXFlyer


    That is not going to happen - you’d be using up valuable paths and eating into turnaround times - plus trains need to be serviced.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 27 thosewhoknow


    Probably a non-runner due to the logistics of removing spoil and access but is there a possibility of locating the TBM in this area where the maintenance shed is and relocating the maintenance area to the sidings west of the NTCC? It won’t have a sharp curve at least but would likely require a steep incline, although there’ll only be electric trains using it anyways. If they wanted a larger area they could move the tracks south of the area down a bit as well.

    IMG_1699.png


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 73,257 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    That's the old carriage valeting shed, I believe its completely unused now; having last been used by Hyundai Rotem during the initial 22000 deliveries.

    If it is in use, someone with more recent info will post shortly!

    It's still a constrained, hard to access (being in the middle of active rail lines) site.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,962 ✭✭✭Glaceon


    It is currently being used for the 29000 PIS refit.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,030 ✭✭✭✭murphaph


    If DU isn't built until after all these Luas lines, metrolink, DART+ and BusConnects then there is no excuse for not simply temporarily closing St. John's Road to traffic and building the DU station under that using cut and cover. The "but you can't close roads because public transport is so bad" won't really fly after all that stuff has been delivered. The car lobby can take one for the team at that stage! You could even make an argument for closing it permanently and widening the Heuston surface station to add a few more terminating platforms.

    Edit: A more ambitious alternative would be to put both DU and St. John's Road underground and widen Heuston mainline station above ground.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 73,257 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    Was exceptionally rat infested ~10 years ago, so I hope they've got that sorted for that use



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,454 ✭✭✭gjim


    Your objections are all over the shop and getting flimsier. First it was "grade separation would be a nightmare" - which made no sense given the tracks would already be completely separated from to the IC tracks, then it was the gradient (which involves a gentler incline than the original plan) and now you'r claiming there isn't enough space?

    heuston_works_area.jpg


    It's a deceptively huge site - the back of it where the PPT starts is over half a km from the front of the station. The box bounded by the yellow lines above is nearly 10 acres of staff car parking and brownfield. We're talking about building a rail tunnel entrance - not a space satellite launch site - 10 acres is absolutely loads. There's hardly a better site within the M50 for such works.

    None of the construction would go anywhere near any running trains, tracks or passengers or even the NTCC, so there would be no disruption to Hueston operations.

    "Inchicore won" because before DART+ the Kildare 4 tracking ended there. DART+ brings fully grade separated electrified DART tracks to the end of the black line above.

    "Penny pinching around the edges"? The biggest expense is not the tunnel, it's the underground stations as the ML design team realized so replacing a mined out stations with cut n' cover isn't "penny pinching" - it's sensible engineering.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 73,257 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    The CIE IT department is within your yellow area there… I don't think they want to move again. As are some protected structures. And its primarily public car parking.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,593 ✭✭✭KrisW1001


    You're taking this very personally. All I've done is repeated the reasons why things were decided the way they were. That isn't an attack on you as a person, and I wasn't involved in these decisions.. I just read the reports, and the reports ruled out this idea.

    If you really think you've got a better answer than the people who spent two years investigating it, go write to them. Give them your plan. Personally, I see it as a "what if", but that's all given the minimal detail you've given. It just looks like an idea to try save a little bit on building one station by disrupting the operation of Heuson station and falling short on utility to passengers: it's not clear where you intend to place the actual station box. Access from outside the main station building was seen as a desirable feature (to allow late DART services without needing to keep the whole Heuston building open) ... how do you achieve this? The ideal is access from the front, where the Luas stops are, and that's what the last DU plan had.

    Regarding feasibility of a tunnel launch at Heuston, it has been stated more than once that it is no longer a viable option.. If you are confident that you know much better than the people whose job it was to find out, I suggest sending them your CV, rather than arguing with me.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 773 ✭✭✭loco_scolo


    The most recent Jacobs report on Dart+ Tunnel from 2021 only considered Inchicore as the western tie-in. It doesn't say why. It was a glorified copy and paste of previous works and doesn't consider the massively changed landscape since DU plans were originally drawn up.

    These changes/considerations include planning difficulties, increased cost estimates, Dart+ plans, PPT reopening, revised Metrolink route, new Spencer Dock station, Bus Connects, 2050 Luas network, reduced car access in the city, pedestrianization.

    The only conclusion that can really be made is a completely new route options and feasibility assessment will need to be completed.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,436 ✭✭✭Pete_Cavan


    I'm pretty sure the last DART+ Tunnel report suggested using the grassed area beside Good Counsel Liffey Gaels GAA Club for the tunnel western portal.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 773 ✭✭✭loco_scolo


    Tunnels tunnels blah. Here's an actual update. Great to see some progress.

    VERY EXCITING



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,030 ✭✭✭✭murphaph


    My gut feeling says in a world where we have quad tracked in as far as Heuston, the tunnel portal(s) will be around there somewhere. There is plenty of space to launch a TBM and build a station box using cut & cover. Take a look at some of the very tight spaces European underground systems manage to work within. They would probably chuckle at us saying there's not enough space around Heuston. I would be amazed if the only reason the tunnel was originally planned to start at the works was because it would have avoided major engineering works required to widen the gullet from 3 to 4 tracks. Those works are now going ahead anyway because we have delayed DU and they have become essential to make D+ South West function. Not using those expensively won tracks would be folly on two counts: You'd effectively mothball the tracks you've spent a lot of money building and you'd then double down by building them again, except in a tunnel!

    Easy option post Luas 2050 etc: Close St. John's Road and build a nice straight cut and cover station. Divert buses onto a temporary road using the front lawn of Dr. Steeven's Hospital, the car park behind the Garda/Revenue offices and through the grounds of the Royal Hospital for a couple of years. Private cars should be the exception within the canal rings at that stage, not the norm. We shouldn't plan the works like it's 2005 and nothing has been done to improve PT in the city.



  • Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 5,417 Mod ✭✭✭✭spacetweek


    I've worked out the approx lengths of tunnel that would be needed and it's not looking good in terms of cost and scale.

    Portal at Inchicore: 8.6 km

    Portal at Heuston: 6.2 km

    By comparison, Metrolink is 8.6+2.9 km (CC-Northwood and Airport parts). So if we put the portal at Inchicore we're basically building a tunnel as long as CC-Northwood which is just crazy considering how expensive and difficult it has been to get ML through planning. Albeit that Dart+Tunnel wouldn't have anywhere near as many stations.

    I think from a cost and scale perspective Heuston is gonna have to be our portal if we're to prevent this turning into another multi-decade 10 Billion+ megaproject.

    Regarding stations, we could open it bare bones stationwise:

    Heuston - Cut+Cover

    Clontarf Road - Surface

    Pearse - Cut+Cover (not sure if any suitable sites left though - might need to be underneath Sandwith St Upper)

    Stephen's Green - Cut and Cover along northside of the park

    At a future date:

    North Docklands

    Christchurch



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,593 ✭✭✭KrisW1001


    The stations are the big cost, and with DU most will have to be mined... you can't cross the Metro (at -22 m... the closest to surface it was possible to go) and then get close enough to the surface to do a cut/cover at Pearse, similarly to get under the Liffey, and also the M50 if your northern exit isn't closer to the docks It's not impossible to do deep stations with cut/cover:Rome is doing deep cut and cover on its central Line C stations, but this is not by choice: mining is the cheaper option when you're deep underground.

    Tunnelling has a very high fixed setup and teardown cost, but the per km cost isn't huge. Paradoxically, the most expensive kind of tunnel to build with a TBM is a short one.



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  • Moderators, Computer Games Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators Posts: 10,901 Mod ✭✭✭✭CatInABox


    SSG will be too deep for cut and cover, as the line will have to be under the Metrolink line.

    If it's too deep for cut and cover there, it raises the prospect of doing a Tara street station instead, turning two stations into one



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,436 ✭✭✭Pete_Cavan


    Lads, forget SSG, that won't happen. The original proposed location won't even link with Metrolink and there's no space to build next to the Metrolink station. Pearse doesn't make sense either now, the sites where the DU station box was to go have been developed already.

    The DU two interchange thing was a crap idea, Tara will offer a single interchange with everything. Even if Tara costs more, it's still one station instead of two. A straight line from Heuston to Tara significantly reduces the tunnel length, it is the only sensible option.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 187 ✭✭OisinCooke


    It’s funny I never realised how much taller the new DARTs are compared with the old ones, they’re a good bit above the old roof height. I wonder will it be felt internally?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 187 ✭✭OisinCooke


    It was looked at to do a stop at Tara, but I think it was judged that the curvature would be too tight to then reemerge at the docks. It also fell short on a few counts, environmental, cost/value for money etc.

    I overall think that a version of the original plan is the best way to build this tunnel, and whether it’s been mentioned or not, a lot of the in-panning or near-construction-ready transport projects in the city have subconsciously taken that DU routing into account.

    Somewhere outside Heuston-Heuston-Christchurch-Stephen’s Green-Pearse-Spencer Dock-Clontarf Golf Club is an ideal routing for the line. I also think that all stations on the line should be built from the start. It will be far more expensive and disruptive to add them in later, and besides a project like this should all be done in one fell swoop, despite the potential costs.

    With regards to a Heuston situation I like the idea of cut and cover beneath St John’s Road with a temporary smaller road for busses. This would save costs elsewhere in the project, making up slightly for the longer tunnel needed on the northside, or the mined stations.

    The TBM could be launched from the Irish Museum of Modern Art gardens and the portals built in the actual gullet. Realign the Con Colbert Road slightly (make the northern lane the southern one and build a new northern lane) and you can have the tracks rise up and join the slow lines here. Is this something that could feasibly work? It certainly seems less difficult than working in the confines of Heuston Yard and definitely gets the most bang for buck on the quad tracking.

    IMG_1470.jpeg

    Complete crayon job there, blue are the intercity fast lines, green the DART slow lines to the PPT, and red the potential alignment of the tunnel with black marking out the five box. I do think it sounds like something that could work, let me know if I’ve missed something glaringly obvious but is this something that could work?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 73,257 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    Some of the roof height is going to be the aircon handlers. The 8520s are taller than the 8500s for that reason too I think.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,454 ✭✭✭gjim


    You're taking this very personally. All I've done is repeated the reasons why things were decided the way they were. That isn't an attack on you as a person, and I wasn't involved in these decisions.. I just read the reports, and the reports ruled out this idea.

    I'm not taking it personally but I am finding your style of presenting arguments frustrating. I normally enjoy your contributions on this forum Kris, but in this case, likely without being conscious of it, you're employing the classic "gish gallop" here.

    This is where you swamp the discussion with a large number of objections/points, none of which stand up to close scrutiny but are incredibly tiring and time-consuming to respond to and try to filter. When someone takes the time and effort to respond, you shift to another bunch of objections without ever really withdrawing any of the first bunch.

    And since responding takes time and effort, the effect is to drive people out of the discussion and killing the conversation.

    Here is a list of your objections to a Heuston portal form just 3 of your comments:

    - The place where the tracks to the tunnel would start is a particuarly bad pinch point - false, there's no "pinch point" - it's the furthest point away from operations in Heuston yards

    - Trying put a proper grade-separation would be hugely disruptive - false as the start of such a DU line is already fully grade separated (after DART+)

    - There would be "operational headaches during construction" - nope except for car parking

    - The gradient would be too steep - false, you have over 400m to drop 8m

    - When they looked at it, there are good reasons for going to Inchicore and mining out a deep station under the Hueston platforms - that was plan drawn up 20 years ago, pre-metrolink, pre-DART+ and pre-modern thinking of avoiding mined underground stations unless absolutely necessary.

    - There really isn't space on site to build this unless you close lines - false, even leaving a large area around the NTCC leaves you with about 9 acres/3.5 hectares - an absolutely massive site

    - It would massively disrupt the operations of Heuston for the long construction period - the proposed construction site is nowhere near Hueston tracks or platforms or the station buildings

    - The idea of a portal at Heuston is dead ever since they built the train control centre - the footprint of the NTCC is absolutely tiny and is positioned away from the path for a DU portal

    - Inchicore won because it wouldn't disrupt revenue service - no: inchicore won 20 years ago because DART+ didn't exist at the time and if you had a TBM in the ground you could just avoid dealing with the "gullet".  DART+ takes care of it

    - It would constitue penny pinching around the edges won't save much, but will reduce the value of the final project - it would constitute replacing a deep mined stations directly under the platforms and concourse of the busiest IC station in the country with a simple cut 'n cover station away from the station and tracks

    - It is risky digging the necessary deep pit near the river - non-issue, e.g. far bigger pits have been dug for offices along the north quays.

    As for

    If you are confident that you know much better than the people whose job it was to find out, I suggest sending them your CV, rather than arguing with me.

    Well now YOU are trying to make it personal by throwing this sort of passive-aggressive shade.

    Your opinions are no more valid than mine on this forum and neither of us are more qualified than the other - so present your best arguments. Your resorting to this because you don't have any good arguments - every single argument you have made has been flimsy and has collapsed under the slightest scrutiny and so as an appeal to "authority" you're trying to suggest we accept a 20 year-old design as the be-all and end-all.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,030 ✭✭✭✭murphaph


    I tend to agree. Two mined stations in such close proximity would be madness. Far better to go for a single interchange mega hub at Tara Street nowadays.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,246 ✭✭✭Citizen  Six


    Used for storage of MK4 carriages a long time ago. Then used more recently with the introduction of the new ICR B2 cars. As already posted, currently used for the 29000 PIS upgrade, as well as installing the new bike area.

    IMG_7266.jpeg


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,593 ✭✭✭KrisW1001


    First off, apologies for the CV quip. It was out of order, and I shouldn't have said it. Late night, a frustrating day, but still, my error.

    Fundamentally, we disagree on this, so I'm not going to argue it further than this post, but I really am not throwing random things out there: the objections I've mentioned are all genuine, and not baseless: you can argue about how much they should sway a decision, but they are real. There are certainly advantages to Heuston, but you already presented them; I was presenting the disadvantages so that we could understand why certain decisions were made.

    Whatever the benefits of starting a tunnel at Heuston, IÉ have been consistently acting like they are not going to do it, so it makes the argument moot. They built the train control centre right where the most logical place to dig was: there was no reason to build it exactly there, and if there was a plan to tunnel from Heuston, they would have moved it elsewhere on site. Maybe this is a way of forcing the government to pay for their preferred option, maybe it was a way to scupper DU so that they could get the money for other purposes, maybe it was simply left hand not talking to right, but whatever the reason, there is now a major obstacle to using Heuston as any kind of launching site.

    An Inchicore portal means a longer tunnel, but allows a more gradual descent/ascent, with a more open curve: that means faster travel into and out of the tunnelled section.

    My position is that starting at Heuston would have made sense until IÉ sabotaged the most convenient part of the site, and now it's got enough challenges that Inchicore starts to look like a better option.

    But, as I said, we disagree on this. I'll leave it there, as it's just causing friction at this point.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,593 ✭✭✭KrisW1001


    Tara steet station is tiny as it is.. I suspect the Metro was kept a little further away so that it couldn't overload what is a very small station, so don't know how you could add a second DART line into the mix.

    Pearse is the logical interchange point as it is a decent size station.

    I had thought that if a station were to be dropped, then SSG should be the one to go, and the Pearse interchage could be moved down to Merrion Square. The two ends of Merrion Square are 250 and 200 m from the St Stephen's Green metro and the Pearse station entrance.



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