Re: Re: transport21
@ac1976 wrote:
It’s hard to believe that Metro ever got the go-ahead the cost benefit analysis seems to have been disregarded for some (political) reason.
Anyway, the whole transport 21 plan is based on the DTO “A Platform for Change” strategy and a heavy ammount of political influence.
The good news is that the DTO are reviewing this strategy and its progress and will publish a new strategy in about 6 months time. http://www.dto.ie/web2006/strategy2030.htm
In the meantime the Misister for Transport seems to be desperate to get the Metro North project up-and-running, (I believe they are currently working on the funding for this)The Metro and Interconnector and the transport21 strategy are all part of the current Program for Government, this is were the transport Minister draws his powers to force it through form.
The programme for Goverment was written in mid 2007 roughly 1 month before the sub-prime issue started to dent confidence in all forms of leverage. Also included in the programme for Government was one Western Rail Corridor. At that time it seemed that Ireland was on a never ending rising tide; anything was possible and International financiers were not only lauding Ireland as the model to be aspired to but NTMA could have raised any sum they wanted.
In the intervening period Ireland Inc. has had a torrid time going from hero to zero probably quite unfairly as the same workforce excluding real estate are pretty much still standing and in many sectors inovation continues unabated.
Unfortunately the tide going out has exposed a lot of issues that require restoration of the country’s reputation when it comes to delivering value for money. The public Sector earns almost 50% more than their private sector counterparts whilst enjoying better benefits and much better job security. The ability to buy industrial peace in the good times as fiscal surpluses grew non-stop was a poor choice in retrospect albeit very expedient politically at the time.
The ability to buy a €2bn link to the airport when a €400m option exists would equally be possible; however the fiscal position now cannot sustain such a decision as it is clear if this Metro is built it will be a stand alone Metro line for a couple of decades. It would be much better to redeploy the €1,600m saving with a little additional funding to deliver a number of bolt ons to the existing network such as:
1. A Dart spur for Swords c€200m
2. Luas for Ballymun c€350m
3. Dart spur for Tallaght c€200m
4. Dart upgrade to Maynooth c€200m??
5. Dart upgrade to Pace c€100m??
6. Dart spur to Portstown c€300m??
7. Dart upgrade to Balbriggan c€200??
8. Dart upgrade to Sallins and spur to Naas c€400m??
At the very least Metro North needs to be parked up until the DTO can establish not a generalised needs study as we all know enough of those have been carried out over the past 20 years. What the DTO need to do is conduct a ranking table of what projects can deliver the most passenger numbers per euro spent and clearly demonstrate how various options to Dublin Airport, Ballymun, Swords, Tallaght etc stack up in financial and user freindliness terms from a number of City origin points.
