DART+ (DART Expansion)

And, of course, I beg the pardon of other readers of the board. It was a stupid mistake, and my only defence is that there are quite a number of 'Parade's around that part of the city.:o

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

The Metro station is going to be at Glasnevin and that will have far better access to both DART lines and be infinitely easier and cheaper to construct than a DART station squeezed in along Whitworth Road and a Metro station which would have to be mined out under multiple roads and buildings.

You are certainly right that it would be much easier to construct a metro station at Glasnevin Junction. But a metro station at Drumcondra would really only need to be built under one road - Drumcondra Road Lower - with probably only peripheral work under other roads.

The number of cities which have built metro stations under roads must, at this stage, be in the hundreds. There should be considerable expertise about how to do something like this.

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

Any station along Whitworth Road would be 150m+ horizontally from Drumcondra station plus a significant vertical level difference, nobody in their right minds would choose that over putting the station which the tracks are practically side by side less than 1km away.

I make it that it is about 164 metres between the two outside 'DART' lines, in a situation where those lines were, say, at the current Drumcondra station and a station at Whitworth Place.

So it would almost certainly involve a longer walk to get between the metro and a DART: if a metro train is 60m long, then it should be about 50 m from the back or front of one to a 'DART' line, if a station were built at Drumcondra. Escalators between levels would also effectively reduce this, but it would not be a poor interchange by the standards of other cities.

A major flaw with the Glasnevin Junction plan - quite apart from my worry that it would eat into the catchment of the LUAS Green Line and whatever successors that line might have - is that the local population, and the population density, is much higher at Drumcondra than it is at Glasnevin Junction.

To illustrate this, if you take the 7 electoral districts broadly around Glasnevin Junction (Botanic A, B and C, Cabra East A and B, Cabra West B and Inns Quay A), these have a total area of 4.759 sq.km, the total population is 24,760 and the density is 5,203 people per sq.km. (2016 census figures).

Against this, if you take the 8 electoral districts broadly around a possible metro station at Drumcondra, with connections to both 'DART' lines (Drumcondra South A, B and C, Botanic B and C, Inns Quay A, Ballybough B and Mountjoy , these have a total area of 3.814 sq.km. (i.e. smaller than the above), a total population of 27,561 (i.e. higher than above) and a density of 7,226 per sq.km (i.e. around 40% higher than at Glasnevin Junction).

Somebody with greater technology would probably be able to come up with exact figures about the catchments within 5 minutes, 10 minutes walk, etc., of the two possible stations, but the basic message has, I hope, been outlined above: it is not only the people changing to and from the metro which should matter, but also those who would use it without changing.

I think a metro station under Drumcondra Road Lower could be very fine: connections at both ends to a 'DART', a much better local catchment, long -term, compared to Glasnevin Junction, and - since the metro would still have to go under the canal - the possibility for a mezzanine level with even more shops and other stuff in what is already a busy area. It could be great.

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

At Glasnevin Junction, CPOing a couple of parcels of land, when combined with IE lands there, creates a significant area to do the works entirely off public roads and minimal impact on the canal. A station along Whitworth Road will impact both public roads and canal and fcuk knows how you would build a metro station there linking existing Drumcondra and new stations. In any case, significant track reworkings are required at Glasnevin junction, it makes sense to incorporate the station as part of this rather than having multiple large work sites for different purposes and then trying to tie it all together.

Yes, it's easy to build all this at Glasnevin Junction. But if you're not going to significantly increase the population around that area - by around 40% or so - it's hard to see how the metrolink would be as effective (in terms of picking up and delivering people) as a metrolink through Drumcondra. Think of the above as a proposed tweaking of the original metronorth route, to take account of the new reality that Dublin now has trains running through both ends of Drumcondra Road Lower - which it didn't have when the RPA went for their railway order.

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

You seem to set yourself challenges of taking some illogical and impractical idea and desperately arguing for it.

My feeling would be that there is a point to short-term pain - in this case in Drumcondra - if there is to be a long-term gain in overall efficiency in passenger uptake and delivery.

donvito99 wrote: »

Can we set up another "I think this major piece of infrastructure should be built differently for no discernable benefit" thread for Strassenwolf please.

I was replying to a post on this thread. I can't really help it if you don't agree with my views, but I don't see how I could have done it any other way.