LUAS Network + Future Expansion

spacetweek · 30-11-2025 07:47PM

I'm confused by the Revised NDP document. Cork Luas isn't listed in it in the project list on page 23 though it is mentioned in the text on page 22:

"On light rail, construction will commence on Luas Finglas, with a Railway Order application expected to belodged in respect of Luas Cork."

Instead, in the public transport project list on page 23 the first two schemes are Cork Area Commuter Rail and Cork Northern Distributor Road. I assume the latter is a typo (since it's a road not a public transport project) and should say Cork Luas.

Appendix A also has "Cork City Northern Transport Project" which is probably the Cork Northern Ring Road.

KrisW1001 · 01-12-2025 10:23AM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124031937#Comment_124031937

Yes. N40 North Ring, plus additional public and active transport measures - similar to how N/M20 was widened to support PT and active travel. There’s a website, with not a whole lot of information, here: Cork City Council Consultation | FAQ

tom1ie · 02-12-2025 06:08PM

ok alternative Luas route branching from the red line before the red cow marked in purple below:

after the kingswood RL stop the new line continues:

over the M50

into calmount industrial estate- rife for redevelopment to housing

onto greenhills road

bridge over the walkinstown roundabout as its an absolute shite show

on up bunting road towards crumlin village and the childrens hospital.

now we stay on crumlin road up to Dolphins barn then

swing a right onto the canal and go as far as Harold cross where you swing left

and head up to st patricks cathedral

next we go on up to christ church

swing a right and head towrds dame street

terminate on westmoreland street across the road from westmoreland street GL luas stop- no track sharing with the GL.

OisinCooke · 02-12-2025 11:35PM

I like the routing there actually. Walkinstown could possibly be easier as a cut and cover tunnel, or at least easier to pass through ABP in terms of sight lines and the generally low-lying suburbs.

Then again though, the works required for a tunnel would require almost full closure of the roundabout and the access road that the line would take either side, so maybe not a runner either.

Luas would be a good chance to somehow try and reorganise the mess that is the roundabout currently, although I’m really not sure how that would be done…

I think though that due to the development potential on the line, as well as in Tallaght, this route would probably be preferable as a second metro line - if such a thing was to ever happen - rather than a Luas, extending into the northside towards Coolock and Howth Jnct, opening the two industrial estates there for development similarly.

This would help with modal spacing - not having two heavy rail or two light rail lines side by side, but rather one beside the other - DART SW (heavy), Luas Red (light) Metro 2 (heavy) Luas Terneure/Knocklyon (light) Metrolink (heavy), Luas N11 (light) and DART S (heavy) with orbital busses and tram lines bringing people between each.

Just my personal thoughts on the matter though, obviously I’m not a professional, so take with a pinch of salt. Otherwise though I quite like the routing you’ve suggested.

spark23 · 03-12-2025 12:57AM

I like this would love to see it and fits into other Red line extensions to Lucan and towards Charlemont and hopefully towards Grand canal Dock area

OisinCooke · 03-12-2025 10:27AM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124037762#Comment_124037762

To be clear I wasn’t personally agreeing to @tom1ie’s Crumlin route as a ‘Red Line extension’ nor do I think Lucan should be done as such.

Lucan should be a separate routing that maybe shares tracks with the Red Line on its segregated canal section, but it should then split off again to run into the city centre as a separate line.

Also, the routing down to Charlemont is a terrible routing for the Lucan Line, and honestly if they go with that route, I hope to god they don’t bother building the thing, certainly not ahead of other much not important projects anyway.

The main advantage of Luas Lucan from a network standpoint is it takes enormous pressure off the Red Line as an east-west city centre line. Charlemont and the canal routing is too far south and too far away from the city and the existing Red Line to be useful to commuters and will result in most Lucan passengers transferring to already packed Red Line trams at Blackhorse to actually get into the city centre.

Luas Lucan would be made worthwhile as a project, by providing a relief second east-west Luas alignment through the city, either down High Street/Dame Street or Cork Street/Cuffe Street.

In a perfect world the line would run along the canal between the Kylemore Road and Blackhorse where it would have a separate interchange station with the Red Line, run up the Tyrconnel Road into and through Inchicore, before crossing the Red Line at grade only once at James’s before heading down Thomas Street and into College Green (DART and Metro), on to Townsend Street (Tara DART and Metro) and through to Ringsend.

Even more ideally, the Red Line would actually take over this new city centre section for services from Tallaght (more useful connections), which could be built with 50-metre platforms to extend the Red Line trams, and have the Lucan Line operate on the more constrained 40-metre northside routing to the Point. This would leave the Lucan Line and the Red Line completely grade separated from one another with no at-grade crossings despite two interchanges.

We need to be a bit more glic with how we use our existing and future tram infrastructure and not be afraid to re-route some of our lines, as is quite common on the continent. Lucan could end up being one of the best Luas projects we could build in the next little while from a general network standpoint if it is done right and could be enormous for freeing up city centre and Red Line capacity.

cgcsb · 03-12-2025 10:54AM

I'd prefer a luas route that left college green alone, turning onto George's st, south Stephens Green and out to ballsbridge or donnynrook with the existing red line extended to sandymount

loyatemu · 03-12-2025 11:18AM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124038220#Comment_124038220

I had a look at Sandymount before but couldn't see any realistic way of getting there from the Glass Bottle site which is where the planned extension ends. It's all narrow roads and the chance of running a line along Strand Road is zero if they can't even install cycle lane there.

cgcsb · 03-12-2025 11:24AM

An excellent point i wouldn't like to see an anti social area like that get the service anyway best let them walk to the glass bottle of they want

JohnDoe2025 · 03-12-2025 11:30AM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124038139#Comment_124038139

Agree that there is no utility to a Lucan line unless it takes pressure off the east-west route. Given that the Heuston-Connolly piece must be running close to capacity, a business case for Lucan might need a second east-west alignment.

spillit67 · 03-12-2025 12:11PM

Interlining is a must for me with the Luas. The fact it isn’t discussed properly I feel is that the “sell” is always feeding some suburb (and a local politician) & that our core infrastructure (since both MetroLink and DART+ allow for) can’t afford to consider not having the same Luas lines running the same routes always.

With the exception of the Red Line proposal for the Lucan Luas (which would be insanity and frankly disastrous), I think all the proposals for the city centre Lucan line have merit.

bk · 03-12-2025 01:04PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124038482#Comment_124038482

Interlining tends to not work well with high frequency, high capacity services. It tends to add complexity which slows things down and thus impacts frequency and capacity of a line.

It can work okay if you have a bunch of low frequency lines that might share track in the city centre, but even then, that can quickly become a bottleneck to service.

That is why most high capacity services like Metros and LRT typically avoid it and prefer having people interchange between lines, rather then interline.

I feel that we are trying to carry so many people with our Luas lines, like Metro level numbers, that it is better to keep services simple and focused on capacity and instead add more lines in the city center.

spillit67 · 03-12-2025 01:12PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124038631#Comment_124038631

I’m aware. Again though the needs of Dublin are changing. MetroLink is not a replacement for all of the Green Line through the city centre but it absolutely is as the workhorse spine.

bk · 03-12-2025 01:25PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124038649#Comment_124038649

Ah, I thought we were talking about the red line and Lucan, the east west axis.

Yes with Metrolink there might be some possibility to do something with the Green line north of Charlemont. Perhaps the proposed Balgriffin line could feed into it at Parnell Square.

Though even then, with the Tyrellstown line and Luas Finglas extension also feeding into it, it all might be a bit of a stretch for even that section of the Green line.

For the Red line, I think we need to add more east - west lines. The Luas 2050 vision looks like it has the Clongriffin, Blanchardstown, Clondalkin and Kimmage lines all feeding into it, I really can’t see how that would work at all!

OisinCooke · 03-12-2025 02:27PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124038678#Comment_124038678

I think if Tyrrelstown uses the Green Line between Broombridge and Broadstone (ie. the grade-separated section) and then peels off down Constitution Hill for the Liffey, the line from Blanchardstown could join it to cross the Liffey, go up Bridge Street to Christchurch and then continue south to Terneure/Knocklyon.

This would mean the Green Line’s segregated section would have its capacity maximised while not impacting the following street-running sections.

Not a solid plan obviously, but just an idea potentially.

tom1ie · 03-12-2025 03:13PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124037647#Comment_124037647

The other benifits to this routing are:

More trams can be run on the RL as trams coming from Tallaght can be sent onto the purple line or RL as they both will end up in the CC anyway, if that where people ultimately need to get to, ie its another east west alignment which is badly needed.
Due to the extra capacity that is now created on the RL a spur from the red cow stop to Clondalkin could be looked at also.
This allows for the redevelopment of Ballymount industrial estate for housing thus creating a TOD within the M50 city area.

Ideally if metro and LUAS were interchangeable, you could have metro trains running from Tallaght on the RL routing as far as the RL split after Kingswood stop, then running on the purple line through Ballymount industrial estate and then the tunnel portal will run underneath Greenhills road into the CC along the route i have identified, but obviously not terminate at Westmoreland street and continue on out towards Coolock and Howth Junction.

Chris_5339762 · 03-12-2025 03:43PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124031937#Comment_124031937

Just to clear this up a little for everyone -

"Luas Cork" = Luas Cork, simple one there

Cork Area Commuter Rail - Doubletracking to Midleton is the first step, then new stations from Mallow down to Cobh with through running through Kent.

Cork Northern Distributor Road = Bus/one traffic lane northern suburban style road with traffic lights between Glanmire and the Carrigrohane Road. A Southern Distributor Road is also in thinking but will be much harder to get built. The Northern Distributor will be swamped from Day 1 as it will function as a bypass, despite not being built as one.

Cork Northern City Transport Project = What we know as the Cork North Ring, motorway standard from the M8 to the M20 and the N22.

The renaming is just a bit messy, but there is always confusion between the Cork Northern Distributor and the Cork Northern City Transport Project

KrisW1001 · 03-12-2025 08:31PM

Regarding Cork, the track doubling to Midleton is already about half done, but I accept that such a minor detail as this wouldn't be reason enough for the Government to exclude it from its "upcoming" spending promises :D. Re-signalling of the whole to line Mallow with ETCS is also underway. That alone won't make a lot of difference except on the Glounthaune-Midleton branch.

What I hope is in the NDP is the next phase of CACR, which is the new stations, plus electrification and new trains (25 kV version of the DART+ BEMUs).. hence the €2+ billion pricetag.

spacetweek · 03-12-2025 11:43PM

Phase 2 is indeed in the NDP, listed as construction from 2026 to 2030+.

JohnDoe2025 · 04-12-2025 06:04PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124038678#Comment_124038678

You could double-track both Marlborough Street and O'Connell Street and have the Balgriffin line use the Marlborough Street alignment and terminate at TCD, with the Green line using O'Connell Street/Westmoreland Street to continue to Stephen's Green.

bk · 04-12-2025 10:02PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124042326#Comment_124042326

Yes, I was thinking the same, though I wonder if it would make sense to have it turn onto Townsend St and head into the South Docks, could even possibly have it link up with the Poolbeg Luas.

JohnDoe2025 · 04-12-2025 10:03PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124043073#Comment_124043073

Would taking it down Pearse Street not make more sense?

bk · 04-12-2025 10:11PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124043079#Comment_124043079

Yes, true enough, that would make more sense, specially with linking up with the poolbeg Luas.

OisinCooke · 04-12-2025 11:21PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124043104#Comment_124043104

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124043079#Comment_124043079

I think Townsend Street might make more sense given a potential link with the Metro and the DART at Tara Street station. It might be a tight corner coming from Hawkins Street is the only thing, and I’m not sure if the fire station entrance would have any impact on this… probably no more than it does on cars and busses as things stand to be fair.

Rodonmac · 05-12-2025 10:43AM

what about Lucan Luas via Cork St - cuffe St - SSG south. With a view to later through-running to Donnybrook - Stillorgan - Sandyford via N11.

Admittedly Leeson St is tight at the SSG end but there is already a contra-flow bus lane. And they plan to re-route car traffic via Earlsfort Terrace and Hatch Street as part of CBC construction.

bk · 05-12-2025 11:37AM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124043376#Comment_124043376

yes, that is why I initially thought of Townsend street, the connection with Tara, but then if you were to put Luas stops on Hawkin St, you are just 190m from Tara St Station. An easy 2 minute walk or less. Then if you head down Pearse Street, you have a nice connection to Pearse station in addition to Tara and the back area of Trinity.

Hawkin St would also be a good location due to the short walk to the green line stops on Westmoreland street.

I suppose you could head down Townsend Street and then turn towards Pearse Station anyway.

The bit I was more thinking about are east of those streets, are you continuing down Hanover Quay and cross the Dodder there or instead over the bridge by Bollands. The latter probably makes more sense to link up with Poolbeg Luas and would be cheaper.

What is great, is there are a couple of good options here, I think the overall idea would make a lot of sense.