Clonlea House

I appreciate the tone of your comments and agree with the general applicability of your wisdom in relation to precedence as a general rule of thumb.

However this is not a Glen of the Downs situation where the choices were Bray Head, the Sugar Loaf or Glen of the Downs as route options. The route chosen is the most contrived routing I have seen and this route if chosen will represent a carbon copy of the Red line as opposed to a potential green line south of the Canal to Sandyford.

How the RPA can introduce a largely on street line which is over 1 kilometre longer when a fully segregated shorter route exists with only one plot to be acquired defies belief; to do so to serve an area with an average density of 16 per acre makes this an even more blatent waste of public funds.

To destroy Clonlea under these circumstances makes a complete mockery of architectural heritage protection and for me is a modern day ‘Frescati’

@a boyle wrote:

It’s a good idea to examine things in their entirety before mouthing off.

I agree that is why I spent a sunday afternoon walking the entire route and beyond to Shangannagh] The Harcourt line is a poor choice because:

Noone lives along it ( even if you think that ‘enough’ people live along it to justify the routing ). More people live along the proposed dodleg route. [/QUOTE]

Recent applications on the existing Green line in comparable areas have seen multiple applications for the sub-division of large properties and numerous units added. The existing dodleg [SIC] route comprises 3 bed semis thrown up during the period 1980-98 they are extremely low density.

It is also considered that Cherrywood will in itself provide a very high number of units; making these passengers stop at every low density housing estate will reduce capacity.
@a boyle wrote:

There is also some undevelopped land along this routing. This will allow for much higher density of housing, so the city as a whole wins. ( Do you want 5 acres tarmaced in meath , or one in Ballyogan? ).

Granted that government developments have a peculiar fetish of passing by, through and over our history, doesn’t mean that this route has no merit.

That routing has the density of a bus route which it currently has spare capacity upon; the creation of an extension over this route requiring multiple land acquisitions:

Clonlea House will cost in excess of €10m to acquire on an open market value basis on this basis the land cost will probably exceed €100m.

There will be in excess of 20 traffic lighted road crossings including ones at the entrance to the Sandyford Ind estate which will face an obstruction every 90 seconds at peak time.

AB you have hit the nail on the head the local tarmac situation will be a catastrophe

@a boyle wrote:

Again please examine the routing properly.This dogleg routing is in fact almost completely segregated. It is routed on a grass verge alongside a road. Where it does meet road junctions , stops are being put in, Thus like at beechwood it will have to stop anyway.

A disagree that it is almost completely segregated it crossess both Blackthorn Rd and Leopardstown Rd which are the principle arteries of the entire area. When operational its effects will be felt two junctions either side on the M50 as well as turning Brewery road into a carpark with knock on effects on the N11 at Whites Cross and north of Galloping Green.

To make comparison with a suburban backwater like Beechwood is extremely poor judgement.

@a boyle wrote:

In discussing the possible development along each route you have displayed further ignorance as to what is proposed.

You are right that this dogleg currently passes by low density housing. Every field between the ballyogan road ( dogleg route) and the sandyford road has already been prepared for high density housing. If you look at google map you clearly see there is much more scope for more high density housing along the dogleg than along the old harcourt route.

If you look at 95% of the Worlds landmass from Google Earth it is suitable for high density development] Which leads to the next point , you infer that the high density housing in cherrywood means there will be enough people using the harcourt route. This is plain daft. Every section of the tram’s routing should be used to it’s maximum potential. [/QUOTE]

The Luas is already using 80% of its capacity; the on street crossings prevent this ever becoming a metro as well as the angle of the huge concrete u-bend climbing frame proposed as a wrap around for the Vodafone block; put simply there won’t be a seat north of Ballaly.

@a boyle wrote:

The nail in the coffin is this.Look at the Harcourt Route between sandyford and where the two routes meet up just before cherrywood. It is sandwiched between private property and the racecourse , with no public access, leaving room for only two stops ,one at leapoarsdtown road , the other at the entrance to the driving range. Compare that with the dogleg which will have 5 at ‘central park’ , glencairn , the gallops,ballyogan,leopardstown valley, ballyogan wood.

I have hit the nail on the head. Do you want the area between ballyogan road and sandyford turned into high density res, or do you an area four/five times this tacked on to clonee, abbeyleix ( it’s near the motorway so hey its gotta be good ! ) , or ballbrigan ?

Please look again. If you want to see something daft look at the metro, 4/5billion for something irish rail could build for 1, leaving 1/2 billion left over to build maybe 4 new luas lines?

That particular domestic extension is south of Glenamuck Road some 600m south of where the routes merge; the main house is an old railway building and the extension will go under whichever route is selected.

I admire your mercenary attitude in defending a 1970’s extension whilst forgetting the sublime quality of a Georgian pile such as Clonlea

@a boyle wrote:

1 The tram will rise over the roundabout with brewery road , so it’s not stopping traffic there.

That it will on big stilts made of a glutonous quantity of concrete as the u-bend embelishes the Vodafone building] 2. There is already at junction at the southern entrance to the industrial estate/end of blackthorn drive. So there is already time put in place for the trams to pass in front of traffic at the level crossing. [/QUOTE]

Ever heard of Rail safety legislation? there are defined clearance periods which will render the main entrance to two of the biggest business parks in the country secondary to the tram system. Whilst a simple bridge over Brewery Road could have prevented the entire mess.

@a boyle wrote:

3. You are using the same flawed argument that was used to spell ‘chaos’ at the mad cow roundabout. The trams will be passing traffic that is already stopped and so won’t be affecting the flow of traffic at all. Period . It is simply a matter of fact. I cannot convince you otherwise except to go the red cow and observe that the trams only cross traffic which is already stopped to allow other traffic to proceed.

I’d like Peter Fitzpatricks opinion on this, but in the interim contend that if level crossings were preferred why is the Red Luas going to be taken out of operation to be raised onto concrete stilts. Hardly aesthetics

@a boyle wrote:

Again you display ignorance of the facts: planning permission or outline planning permission, or zoning has already taken place in the entire swath of land between ballyogan road and sandyford road. Having started from scratch all of the developpments interconnect to allow everybody easy access to the tram stops. Even if there are future high density applications they will not be thwarted by Nimbyism , as you can clearly see from the developpments occuring at the other end of the industrial estate.

The industrial estate is already served by Luas there is no gain here] Wrong. Plain wrong. You appear not to know that the current system can operate to a frequency of 3 minutes between trams without upgrading.The trams use a sophisticated method of communicating to a central control point which can then changes traffic lights at will. This means the increase in trams has a minimal affect on traffic. Instead of each one tram crossing at each stop in traffic , two can cross. [/QUOTE]

Until a motorist edges there way onto the yellow box on a wet rush hour evening; I suggest you visit Beresford Place some evening. However all of this is academic in the context of the existence of a fully segregated alignment requiring one acquisition.

@a boyle wrote:

The fact that 95% of the world is ripe for high rise reinforces the correctness of the dogleg route. It allows for a substantial area of mid to high rise development, reducing pressure on what is left of the agricultural land in neighbouring counties. The other routing does not allow for as much high density housing , no question about it. Consider that dublin is three times bigger than brussels or amsterdam , which both have the same population.

What I said was that from Google Earth 95% of the worlds landmass is suitable, however the picture on the ground is almost always different. I find it interesting that you state that Dublin is three times the size of Amsterdam and yet in the absence of ‘High Density’ deveolpment in existing and established residential areas the only alternative is agricultural land.

I suggest you study some of the more recent Bord Pleanala decsions for the region before adopting such a scatter gun approach.

@a boyle wrote:

So there is already time put in place for the trams to pass in front of traffic at the level crossing. 3. You are using the same flawed argument that was used to spell ‘chaos’ at the mad cow roundabout. The trams will be passing traffic that is already stopped and so won’t be affecting the flow of traffic at all. Period .

If at all possible, luas should be provided with segregated space & avoid major junctions – the green line has a higher degree of segregation than the red line & consequently functions better, i.e the green line achieved its journey target of 22 minutes where the red line had to be revised upwards from 37 to 43, even that is difficult to achieve.

There’s no doubt that the weak links in the red line are where it crosses the red cow & parts of its city centre stretch. You are right to an extent a boyle in that it doesn’t contribute much to the chaos at the red cow – because it is often forced to wait & sometimes up to 4 minutes between the 3 individual crossings at that junction.

At off-peak times the control centre can sufficiently time crossings so that the delay to luas is minimal but this goes out the window at rush hour(s), its just not possible, infact its not possible ‘period’ to afford luas priority at the red cow under its current set up, surely thats what we should be trying to do with any new alignment or luas overall extension of the luas system ?

Shorter journey times are the real incentive to get people out of their cars. Now the M50 upgrade will eliminate two junctions for luas from the red cow, however unfortunately not the third as far as i can see.
The freeflow junction currently being built at the red cow appears to be a bit of a financial fudge, with the NRA claiming they just dont have the space to make it entirely freeflow, don’t quite believe them on that one.

😉 Now, just in case any of you have long memories and remember me defending the original alignment of line A through the red cow, i would still do so, & did so at the time on the basis that it leads to a long stretch of properly segregated line both before & after the red cow & also in the knowledge that the pending M50 upgrade would eliminate the obstacles for luas at that junction. There was really no other way to route luas from tallaght, without forcing it to share road space with regular traffic – which really should be the last resort.