[article] The Interconnector Reannouncement list

[PaulM]

Interesting, particularily how is shows the metro connections. I wonder if somethning has been agreed with the RPA...

[Kevin K Kelehan]

Both parties will have to meet and sort this out

IE's Barry Kenny was just on Newstalk. As Im sure a lot of people already know, the plan is essentially to run 2 Dart corridors from:

1: Bray/ Wicklow line - Pearse - Connolly - Maynooth

2: Howth/ Drogheda line - Docklands - Pearse - Heuston - Kildare line

Its certainly a step forward, but I cannot understand why the existing Phoenix Park tunnel isnt to be incorporated

Just think about it - if new junctions were put in at Heuston and Liffey Junction, you could have

1; A continious city-centre circle route, a la London or Paris. It being Ireland, lets call it "The Golden Circle"

2: The routes crossing each other twice, ie;

A) Bray - Pearse - Connolly - Heuston - Kildare line

B) Howth - Docklands - Pearse - Heuston - Maynooth

Any thoughts on this contribution from Arch Eire

[philip]

B) Howth - Docklands - Pearse - Heuston - Maynooth

You wouldn't be able to do that without reversing at Glasnevin Junction, or else CPOing a load of houses in Cabra!

My thoughts on those maps, well they're fine, but for the gaping hole where the Phoenix Park Tunnel should be

[James Shields]

http://www.iarnrodeireann.ie/images/upload/news/172.pdf

This map shows a station at Glasnevin with a Metro interchange indicated. As the Metro route is not yet finalised, I presume this is provisional.

The stops on the Kildate line seem rather widely spaced. Hopefully developers will be able to fill in some of the gaps. Wehere exactly is Park West in relation to the current Cherry Orcherd?

Depending on where the Interconnector surfaces, I think there would be a case for a sixth underground station to the west of Heuston.

[Kevin K Kelehan]

The old semperit fractory as far as the M50 on the South side of the line

[Mark]

The ball seems to be rolling. Great to see the actual progress and evidence of integration.

Circle line not needed in Dublin. Its an outdated measure and with the proper planning a one change network would negate the need for it.

Interesting to see how 'High Street is there'. After my Donaghmede venture I think Ill get on to IE again.

I think Marko will know what Im talking about when I say this but I feel vindicated today.

[Mark Gleeson]

I woke up this morning to the sensational news of this tunnel, yeah right its been on the table since 1975. Those of us on the inside have known about the consultancy contract for several months, I put 2 and 2 together and assumed the contract had appeared on etenders which it did.

I have a big smile on my face today despite all the nay sayers it has happened and its one hell of an impressive project and kicks the crap out of the others in capacity shifting terms, 100 million by rail in Dublin within the next 10 odd years thats 16 times what it was before the DART opened

My fav stats

Capacity Between
11,200 Bray and Pearse, Tara Street, Connolly
11,200 Maynooth / Dunboyne and Connolly, Tara Street, Pearse
8,400 Hazelhatch and Heuston, St. Stephen’s Green, Pearse, Spencer Dock
8,400 Balbriggan and Spencer Dock, Pearse, St. Stephen’s Green, Heuston
8,400 Howth and Spencer Dock, Pearse, St. Stephen’s Green, Heuston
2,400 Dundalk/Drogheda and Connolly
2,400 Longford / Mullingar and Spencer Dock
2,400 Navan and Spencer Dock
7,200 South of Kildare and Heuston / Spencer Dock
1,200 Gorey and Pearse
Total in one direction alone per hour is 63,200

Platform 11 stood by this even when it wasn't sexy enough, when Irish Rail where gagged by the DoT, we lit the match under the metro and got the ultimate result of both.

Pity Irish Rail won't be allowed build it per the possible date of 2012/13 which they have quoted, it could be done sooner and its the government holding it up

There are those here who hand hands in the project, the Maynooth Bray solution, they know who they are

[Peter Turner]

I am really glad that the Interconnector which I first heard of from P11 will be built. I arrived in Dublin in 1996 and I remember looking at the map and noting that the two major stations were not linked by rail (unaware as I was of the Phoenix tunnel at the time) and I thought well it's obvious a rail connection should be built between them. Then when the Luas came along I thought well that's great but what you really need is a south of the river connection.

I mean there is and still won't be for another 6-10 years a way to get from Heuston to Stephen's Green that is quicker than walking it on foot other than a taxi. Why Dublin Bus has never had a route that brings people from Heuston to Stephen's Green via Thomas St I will never know. There must be thousands upon thousands of people that would want this to happen either for work, for shopping, for connection to other places like the Luas. There is the 92 but it takes so long I would rather walk. Anyhow bus routes is the subject of another forum.

[Thomas J Stamp]

Hey Mark, time to update the Success Stories section on the main site!

All good news for once, and its Friday and the sun is shining.

[Mark]

Some much has been achieved since we met first. Calls for a good few pints come AGM time... the long time on-hold 'interconnector partay' is back.

[Donal Quinn]

phew!
you lot were so negative this morning -glad you are all so positive now!!!

that little (M) beside the glasnevin station on the (badly designed) IE map alone justifies much of the work put in by all the P11 crew

well done all

[Mark]

Stations

Shanganagh is in there but expect it to be called something else like Woodbrook. Grange Road will probably be changed as well to reflect the nearby north fringe developments.

Funny to see Liffey Junction and Glasnevin in there, they werent costed for originally.

No metro sign beside Tara Street - woopee!

Im curious why park west has a Luas sign..pondering. Lucan luas line via Nangor Road perhaps?

Pelletstown - SLASH - Broombridge anyone?

Why 'Docklands' and not 'Spencer Dock'?

By the way I was told today that the reason that Kildare and Drogheda were dropped from electrification was not down to the DTO but rather because of capacity issues.

Its still a pity that they havent coordinated with the RPA re: line colours. Two differnt shades of green?

[James Shields]

that little (M) beside the glasnevin station on the (badly designed) IE map alone justifies much of the work put in by all the P11 crew

I'm inclined to agree, though I'm not convinced a 400m walk counts as integration. I think most of us would now like to see that M moved to Drumcondra, with a proper integrated station.

At least both IE and the RPA seem to acknowledge that Drumcondra/Glasnevin/Botonic is the place for an integrated station, not a silly walkway to Tara St.

[Mark Gleeson]

It was carried on the 1, 6 and 9 news.

Loads of horribly out of date footage of DART units in the old livery

As always the IE PR man was out in force nice piece to camera around 12:30, it sounded as if I wrote the script. We need to buy Barry a new jacket

Heavy emphasis on the 4 fold increase in passengers

Gareth Fitzgerald gave a nice pitch about the fact IE want it done earlier but its government stalling on funding

Its incredible how excited the media becomes when IE issue a tender for consultants for a 6 month job

No one picked up on the infinitely more important 300 million tender for DART coaches

[Mark Gleeson]

Have to say thumbs up to Emmet and Ruadhán of the Irish Times, they did there homework, and I know you know about us

Originally Posted by Irish Times

Irish Rail announces underground Dart link and expansion
Emmet Oliver and Ruadhán Mac Cormaic

Iarnród Éireann, which said yesterday that work was to begin on an underground rail link from Dublin's docklands to Heuston station, is considering spending up to €300 million on new train carriages as the number of passengers using the railways rises.

The company, which is part of the CÍE group, has circulated tender documents to railway carriage manufacturers as part of an exercise to see what is available in the current market.

A spokesman said the money was likely to be spent on new commuter and Dart carriages. The company could spend anything from between €60 million and €300 million.

Up to 200 carriages may be ordered, according to the tender documentation. It is likely, if a deal goes ahead, they will be ordered over a four-year period. The applicants for any Iarnród Éireann contracts are likely to come from across Europe.

The company is in a major expansionary phase and yesterday announced that work is to begin on a major infrastructural project in Dublin - an underground rail link from the docklands to Heuston station.

The company claimed that the new Dart line, which is due to be completed in 2015, will quadruple the number of commuter rail journeys in the capital from the current 25 million to 100 million.

Advertisements were placed this week for specialists to help devise the scheme.

They will develop plans for five stations, carry out geotechnical ground studies, establish cost estimates and liaise with landowners and local authorities. Construction work is due to begin in 2009.

A spokesman said the underground Dart is intended to increase frequency and capacity for commuters on Dart, Northern, Maynooth and Kildare lines, while development plans also include the extension of the Dart network to Maynooth, Hazelhatch and Balbriggan.

"The interconnector will be the single most important piece of infrastructure in the State to ensure a modal shift from private to public transport, and free future generations from the gridlock which cripples the Greater Dublin area today," said the spokesman.

The State's rail sector is growing at a faster rate than that of any other EU state. After years of low investment, improved Government funding appears to have given the sector a considerable boost.

A recent survey showed the number of passenger journeys on Irish trains rose from 34.5 million in 2004 to 37.6 million in 2005, a jump of 9 per cent.

This was significantly higher than increases in the UK, France and Germany.

© The Irish Times 2006
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/ire...3RAILWAYS.html

[Derek Wheeler]

Mark

Would you care to enlighten us on the capacity issues you heard about and why they caused the dropping of Drogheda and Kildare from the DRP DART plans.

The DTO feared more sprawl and favoured Balbriggan and Hazelhatch as they were the outer limits of the short hop zone. Essentially the DART will not run beyond the Dublin border area. (Greystones excepted. But thats a completely different tale of hysterics.)

[philip]

Just looking at that IE map again........

It seems to be highly indicative (forgetting bout external operator connections) of the future network if you ask me. For example, surely the interchange from commuter to DART at Clonsilla is silly, given a metro station is going in at Porterstown just 1 min up the line. I would have thought they'll put all connections at Porterstown, possibly including Inter City to allow sligo pax to change to the Airport.

And surely maynooth will still be an IC station post T21, which is not indicated on the map either.

You'd also imagine that Glasnevin/Drumcondra would allow interchange from commuter (and possibly IC).

Same goes for commuter trains interchanging with metroWest on the Kildare line and indeed as the RPA are talking full delta junction at Ballymun (read:metro direct to the Airport from Tallaght) you should really be able to change from IC trains to access Dublin Airport without having to trek into heuston before changing to DART before changing to metroNorth.

I know the map is only really there to emphasise the DART routes but it'd be nice if it were a bit more comprehensive.

Still though, who'd have thought we'd be looking at an official map like this just a few months ago? The more publicity IE give this (should be posted all over the trains and stations!) the more difficult it would be for any government to change their minds on it all.

[Kevin K Kelehan]

I totally agree,

there has been a real shift in the focus over 12 months with the campaign focussed on having the different networks sanctioned a year ago. 12 months later almost all elements sought have been sanctioned and much of the technical work done by the two Marks is proiving very useful to both IE and the RPA.

Platform 11 has more relevance in a set up with two competing networks than ever would have under a single agency framework. The integration of Metro North and the Midland Line probably will prove a real acid test of how far the group has come or not.

[Mark Gleeson]

Lookie what I got today

[Mark]

Wow, whered you get that?