Re: Re: Convention centre

@Peter FitzPatrick wrote:

IE maintain that Connolly does not have the capacity for the additional traffic the interconnector would bring & so are routing it through Spencer Dock which given the expansion of the city to the east & now the go ahead for the conference centre seems like an ok decision to me…

Connolly in its current guise, with only overground services possible, would not enable the capacity increase which the interconnector would bring. IE are correct about that.

But they originally proposed an underground line which would have gone under Amiens Street, through Temple Bar and on to Heuston. This was proposed in the 1970’s, so with improved tunnelling techniques such a line should be a doddle in the modern day. That could connect rather nicely with the LUAS link-up/the Metro somewhere around Westmoreland Street. And given that the proposed tunnel is, apparently to be built to accomodate 12-carriage trains, a connection with Tara Street should also be very feasible.

It’s true that there is a certain amount of development going on in the east of the city. But the current centre of the city is already developed, and is always going to be a more popular destination than Spencer Dock or the area around it. Yet the proposed route will make this area more difficult to get to, for people who can currently travel on the northern DART line to Tara Street.

The solution, as far as I can see, is to build the line along the originally proposed route. That way:

1) you bring people directly to Connolly, and those who wish to go to Spencer Dock change onto the LUAS. I suggest that this would suit more people than the proposal that the line gets built to Spencer Dock and those who wish to go to the area around Connolly have to change onto the LUAS. The relative popularity of the two locations should become clear once the red line is extended to the Point. And apparently, because of the gradients involved in going under the river close to Spencer Dock, it looks like there will be a not inconsiderable walk to get from train to tram at the location, making it quite difficult to get to Connolly. On the other hand, this need not be the case at Connolly, as the underground station could be below the level of the river some considerable distance before even arriving at Connolly, so changing to get to Spencer Dock (or Abbey/O’Connell Street) should be quite easy.

2) Tara Street is currently a busier station than Pearse Station, indicating greater popularity. By building the line along the originally proposed route, people could go directly to Tara Street, as they currently can (though they would be doing so underground). That way, you bring people to Tara Street and those who wish to travel to Pearse would change. This is a better arrangement than one where people who wish to get to Tara Street would have to change at Pearse.

3) I believe that the link-up will show that the LUAS stations in and around Westmoreland Street will be more popular (i.e. greater passenger numbers getting on or off) than the station at St. Stephen’s Green. If the line were built as originally proposed, this could be catered for by bringing people directly to the Westmoreland Street area, and those who wish to go to St. Stephen’s Green would change. In my opinion, this would be better than the currently proposed arrangement where the line goes to St. Stephen’s Green and people who want to go to the Westmoreland Street area would have to change.

The originally proposed line would be some distance shorter than the current proposal, so you’d expect that it would be cheaper to build. And it looks to me like it would suit more people – though perhaps not Treasury Holdings. I’m interested to see than IE still have an interest in Spencer Dock – I thought they had sold the whole site to Treasury. But it might help explain why they ditched the original plan.