Latest position on the interconnector

[ThomasJ]

Full details here!
http://www.merrionstreet.ie/en/News-Room/Releases/Statement_by_Minister_Donohoe_on_Dart_Underground. html

Prepare to be confused!

Seem to be looking for it to blow away.

[Mark Gleeson]

More confused than we started

1. DART underground as approved, shelved

2. There is no allocated funding to any element of the DART expansion plan

Only reason for the statement today is Irish Rail needed to know by end of business today to be able to serve CPO notices before the 24th

[ThomasJ]

RTE take on it
http://m.rte.ie/news/2015/0922/729525-dart-underground/

The Government has decided not to go ahead with the DART Underground, however there are plans to extend the DART to Balbriggan by 2022.

Minister for Transport Paschal Donohoe said he reviewed the business case for DART Underground and recommended to Cabinet that the tunnel as currently designed does not meet current transport needs.

The underground system would have cost €3bn.

The minister said plans to extend the DART to Balbriggan will be in the forthcoming Capital Plan, as well as electrification of lines into Dublin.

[ThomasJ]

Business case can be found here
http://www.nationaltransport.ie/news...ject-proposed/

[Mark Gleeson]

No indication of any funding for DART to Balbriggan, its not in any of the statements so far issued.

Other journalists present do not recall this during the questioning of the minister

[Jamie2k9]

Only reason for the statement today is Irish Rail needed to know by end of business today to be able to serve CPO notices before the 24th

What sort of time frame will be on those now?

[ThomasJ]

The business plan from the NTA I've linked above contain plans (if the dart expansion plan goes ahead for

Will contain the following services

- Drogheda Inchicore (DART)
- Balbriggan Hazelhatch (DART)
- Clongriffin Hazelhatch (DART)

- Dundalk GCD (Commuter)*
Dundalk trains will no longer stop at portmarnock or howth junction

- Howth Howth Junction (DART shuttle)


- Maynooth Bray (DART)
- Maynooth Greystones (DART)
- Maynooth GCD (Commuter)
- Longford GCD (Commuter)
- M3 Parkway Clonsilla (Commuter shuttle)

- Newbridge Heuston* (Commuter)
- Portlaoise Heuston* (Commuter)
* both these services will no longer stop between Heuston and Hazelhatch

Both intercity and ESE services will not change from these plans

[Jamie2k9]

No indication of any funding for DART to Balbriggan, its not in any of the statements so far issued.

From RTE

The minister said plans to extend the DART to Balbriggan will be in the forthcoming Capital Plan, as well as electrification of lines into Dublin.

2022 has been set as a timeline for the completion of the DART to Balbriggan.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2015/0922/729...t-underground/

[ThomasJ]

Not just Balbriggan see my post above about proposed services from the NTA

[Mark Gleeson]

The documentation isn't relevant its what approved and that comes next week it appears.

So far there is no funding beyond that committed to the Phoenix Park tunnel

[ACustomer]

The NTA business case documentation reveals some stunning incompetence:

First, they consider the entire DART extension project, including the Underground part, as well as electrification to Maynooth, Balbriggan and associated rolling stock and maintenance costs. This yields a favourable ratio of costs to benefits of 1.4 to 1. They then consider the Underground section in isolation and come up with an unfavourable C/B ratio of 0.8 to 1.

This is crazy: the underground and underground bits are clearly complementary: each could well have a C/B ratio of <1, but taken together they would come out with a favourable evaluation . Considering the Underground bit on its own is nonsense: only a madman would want to build a tunnel from Inchicore to East Wall with no other supporting investments. The whole thing seems to be an exercise trying to weasel out of Dart Underground by constructing a straw man in the form of a stand-alone tunnel and surprise, surprise its not viable!

Other bits are just as bad. There are proposals for cheaper versions of Dart Underground. One would commence tunneling at Heuston rather than Inchicore: a much earlier proposal which was dropped, for very good technical and operational reasons as anyone familiar with the Heuston-Islandbridge rail layout would appreciate. Other versions include ending the Underground from Heuston at Pearse, so there would still be enormous tunneling costs with minimal extra connectivity, a truly daft suggestion.

I have seldom seen such an incompetent piece of work. Needless to say the media have proved to be useless a spotting the flaws in what has to be one of the worst transport documents ever produced.

[Jamie2k9]

Worst of all if media reports today are correct MN appear's to be considered, I guess the tunneling will be really cheap

[comcor]

I started my career in the consultancy business and I remember the first time I ever wrote a strategy document for a government body. I went and researched my subject area in depth; I looked at what was being done in other countries and what was regarded as best practice. I presented a draft to the head of the body for review and realised he wasn't happy. At first I doubted the quality of my work, but it became rapidly clear that what he wasn't happy about was my conclusions. What I hadn't realised was my remit was actually to produce a document that backed up a decision that had already been made.

We see all sorts of bizarre documents emerge that apparently ignore the blindingly obvious.

In the rail area, my favourite was the one a few years back that looked at proposed reopenings and concluded that Athenry-Tuam was the best option (needless to say none of the options actually got built). This was largely because of two factors; one was the lack of road competition and the other was because Tuam was designated as a hub in the National Spatial Strategy. Of course this ignored that there was a motorway planned but not built on the route and that the selection of hubs itself didn't show any real logic (e.g. Port Laoise, which was much larger and located on a critical point in the country's communication infrastructure was not a hub). So even though it was ranked 4 of 8 for population served and 6 of 8 for public transport competition, it jumped to the top of the list .

There were other joys in that report, like only looking at the population at one end of the line, so the fact that Tuam would be linked to a junction at Athenry, while Youghal would link to the large city of Cork didn't matter.

IIRC When they looked at possible lines for closure, they only looked at population on the line and ignored that the ferryport in Rosslare could provide a source of passengers for the South Wexford line and also ignored that the terminus could be switched to Wexford, providing for far more passengers. Mind you, it still concluded that Limerick-Ballybrophy was a stronger candidate for closure and we all know which one actually closed.

[ACustomer]

comcor, you are so right. Far too many Irish public servants are incapable of deciding what to have for lunch without having a "consultant" to ratify things.

Its the job of journalists and opposition politicians to tear to shreds incompetent documents like the one under discussion. What are the chances of an intelligent hatchet job?

Virtually zilch.

[Thomas J Stamp]

if the case for DART underground was there 4 years ago, it is there today.

from my few journeys to dublin these days I have noticed the tower cranes are coming back, there are more people about, and the trains/luas are more packed.

given that the recovery is mostly based in dublin right now to do anything which can hamper that recovery is astoundingly short sighted.

It is not as if there is NO money to get things started (and that is all that is needed), the Government is going to blast out €1.5 billion next month and plans to do the same this time next year - theres your DART underground paid for in full.

Of course, politically they cannot do that, but a small part of that €1.5 billion would have tided this over. As it is, it is the failure to link the Luas again. It will have to happen, because it must happen, and now when it does it will cost a lot more than €3 billion.

[James Howard]

This situation is beyond a joke at this point. It is utterly absurd for the Government to be passing out tax cuts at this point in the recovery when we've gone five years without any significant infrastructure investment. Dublin and Lisbon are almost exactly the same population - is it a co-incidence that the WebSummit is just buggering off to the city with a proper transport infrastructure?

I really dread to think what state the city is going to be in after a couple more years of growth. I seriously think we can forget about the further development of the "Silicon Docks" area given how difficult it is to get in and out of the eastern side of the city centre by any means other than rail. With the proposed closure to traffic of parts of the quays it will become all but impossible to access the eastern city centre by car from the west.

While we might be pleasantly surprised at the outcome of the PPT opening to traffic, I have serious doubts about Irish Rail's ability to keep the loop line rolling at 20 trains each way per hour - new signalling system or not.

[ACustomer]

James Howard: actually one of the points made in the documents under discussion here is an admission that the capacity of the Loop Line following resignalling will effectively be more like 15 to 17 TPH rather than the promised 20. This apparently is because of (a) limitations arising from turnback activity at GCD and (b) the plethora of level crossings between Lansdowne Road and Merrion which would be a constraint even in the absence of turnbacks.

[Jamie2k9]

This situation is beyond a joke at this point. It is utterly absurd for the Government to be passing out tax cuts at this point in the recovery when we've gone five years without any significant infrastructure investment. Dublin and Lisbon are almost exactly the same population - is it a co-incidence that the WebSummit is just buggering off to the city with a proper transport infrastructure?

While slightly off topic I fully believe it would of moved at some stage, and as they are refused to say if they have been given money to move it speak a lot.

Infrastructure wise in Dublin it's a joke, always has been, always will be.

[Mark Gleeson]

Lisbon also has a metro to its Airport

We have a major infrastructure deficit and we are going to lose much bigger fish than the Web Summit in years to come

We have no office space in the city left
We have no houses or apartments

Stacks of zoned green land along the railway lines, hello Adamstown, Kishogue but since the rail service is crap they are not developed

[ACustomer]

Mark: I doubt that the Lisbon Airport Metro connection has all that much direct relevance for Dublin.

The Airport Metro connects into a fairly comprehensive Metro system, and is not just an isolated line to the equivalent of Stephens Green. And because Lisbon is very high density, it is suited to a heavy Metro system in a way that low-density Dublin will never be.

Furthermore the link to Lisbon Airport involved a short 3-station section of about 3 km to the Airport, which is virtually in the city suburbs anyhow, and the short connection was straight to the nearby mainline train station (Oriente).

But basically you are right to say that Dublin's public transport is terrible. And what is worse it is truly terrible when comparing it with the poorest country in Western Europe (Portugal). Comparisons with other cities can be problematic, but in terms of overall quality of service and lack of consistent planning Dublin comes out badly in comparison with just about everywhere in Europe