T21 Parliamentary Debates

Seanad Debate
http://debates.oireachtas.ie/DDebate...xml&Node=H5#H5
Transport Policy: Statements.

Minister for Transport (Mr. Cullen):

The considerable investment in Dublin is not simply for the benefit of the people living there. Every country must have a thriving capital city which leads economic activity and remains competitive. If Dublin does not maintain this focus and position, the rest of the country will suffer. The investment in Dublin benefits everyone in the country, not merely in transport terms, and we must focus on maintaining the city’s position as the country’s key successful economic driver, as all capital cities are in successful countries. I am delighted that the Seanad organised this debate, in which I was pleased to participate.

full debate on website

Dublin Metro System: Presentation.
JOINT COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORT
http://debates.oireachtas.ie/DDebate...xml&Node=H2#H2

Mr. Rory O’Connor: With regard to capacity of Luas versus metro, we considered a Luas route to Swords and its capacity capability. The capacity of the Luas system is limited to between 10,000 and 11,000 passengers per hour due to constraints in crossing road junctions and so on. That would be sufficient for the Dublin Airport-Swords corridor for a number of years but, ultimately, a higher capacity would be needed. The metro would be capable of being extended to carry 20,000 passengers per hour per direction. To put the matter in context, following enhancement, the DART now carries 11,000 passengers per hour whereas the metro would carry almost twice that number. This would involve 90 metre trains, for which we propose the infrastructure should be developed. However, the service would begin with shorter trains to meet the existing level of demand.

Deputy Shortall: Information Zoom What about Ballymun?

Mr. Allen: Our proposal includes an elevated station at Ballymun. The precise location and specifications are to be refined. It is a question of cost and it is considerably less expensive to have an elevated station there rather than to continue to tunnel to a point north of Ballymun.

Mr. O’Connor: It is worth pointing out that the World Bank did a report in 2000 which compared the cost of metros around the world. It concluded that one of the dominant factors in the cost of metro projects is vertical alignment. If one examines the difference between at grade, elevated and underground, if an at grade metro costs €1, an elevated will cost €2 and an underground will cost €5 or €6. It is a considerable difference.

Deputy Shortall: Information Zoom Does the RPA accept the point that a major new town will be built there? It simply does not make sense to run either an at ground or an elevated train through the main street. When we were in Madrid we were shown areas where a ground level train service had previously run until a decision was made to invest in making the service underground. It opened up new civic space. A large amount of money is spent on creating acceptable and environmental civil spaces in the new Ballymun town. It seems outrageous to consider running a train through the main street.

Mr. Allen: If one examines Madrid, on the three lines that run through Madrid, in areas of a similar distance from the city centre as Ballymun the stations are elevated. When we went through the line with Professor Melis he strongly endorsed that approach. If one examines how it compares internationally, I can think of many examples where, for obvious reasons, a tunnel runs through the city centre but outside of that is it at grade or elevated. I understand that some people view a railway line as creating a division between one side and the other. That is a consideration on a segregated line. On lines that are not segregated it tends to bring the two sides on the line together. People argue about the merits of light rail versus those of a metro. A metro gives high capacity with a degree of segregation. Light rail has less capacity with a degree of integration. The outline business case has not finalised the precise locations of all of the stops, however, the tunnel portal is south of Ballymun.

full debate on website

[PaulM]

They just don't get it...

If one examines Madrid, on the three lines that run through Madrid, in areas of a similar distance from the city centre as Ballymun the stations are elevated.

Well guess what? This isn't Madrid, we have a different "planning" approach to Madrid and probably a different population distribution.

I wish they would stop looking at other cities and think, with a little bit of sense, what would be best for Dublin.

[Thomas J Stamp]

as someone who was born and reared there I go back every so often to have a look at what they're building and it really is amazing. In fact the new main street is crying out for a metro along it. It is wide enough and used to be a dual carriageway with a very wide central reservation. There is a huge new civic plaza being built beside the civic centre/axis which would make for an ideal stop.

And why does Rosin Shortall start all of her questions with "Information Zoom"? Is it her new election slogan? It'll look good on the posters!

[Mark Gleeson]

The Madrid Metro is a circle line and thus hasn't got the same demand problems the core route the Dublin metro will have

This ain't Madrid, we have laws to follow, much of what was done in Madrid could be done here in terms of contracting. In terms of spec we need a big system not some cut down rubbish the RPA wanted to push

The Madrid 3 car concept is useless here and the numbers show that, that means bigger stations and costs tend to grow massively when you are playing with anything underground

And to correct Rory O'Connor's numbers the DART shifts 14,000 an hour in a heavily restricted network it is planned to move to 22,400, the orignal metro plan couldn't even break 19,000 I got them good there http://www.platform11.org/reports/20...o_eng_eval.pdf