Dublin Airport Metro to have unconnected terminus?

The red and green DART lines running up past Stephen’s Green-are these above or below ground?And if below ground, would this not be extremely difficult to carry out, given the types of buildings, their age, and the designs they tend to built to i.e many basements etc-in that area?

This is the so called ‘Interconnector’ and it runs underground from Spencer Dock to Heuston station. The tunnelling would be 20m underground and wouldnt effect the buildings over head.

Insted of linking the LUAS lines together at connolly, would it be easier to link them together at the St. James stop that’s there alredy?

A bit confused here. Are you referring to the Point depot Luas extension from Connolly? If so , this is already a defo and should start construction early next year.
If you refer to the linking of the 2 current Luas lines, they link at Abbey Street not at Connolly and is only 1km in length. As for joining at St James, the interconnector is heading down the same route and is pointless to have a Luas line going down the same route. Its also longer and would cost more.

That would possibly mean less tunnelling for DARTS?Maybe easier?

The interconnector cant really be shortened any more. The current route is a MUST if dublin is to have a intregrated rail system by linking all the lines including the Luass to each other.

I travel in on the Northern commuter line every day to Pearse station, and while extending the DART to MAlahide is an excellent idea, it appears to be messy juggling the timetables for the DART with the commuter train timetable.While the southside of the city has DARTS every 10 minutes or so, all day, you regularly arrive at Malahide and find yourself waiting maybe 30 mins. Also in the morning when the DARTS are every 15 mins, people at Malahide push on the commuter trains, and give out because there’s no space for them.Can they not just wait????The DART is there for them, at least they have the option!The rest of us HAVE to get the commuter train!!Also connolly station, although it currently has 7 platforms, there are only 2 tracks heading out of the south side of the station. So no matter how many trains are in that station only one at a time can ever enter or leave.So intelligent….

This is all dissapear after the Dublin Rail Plan. All the current Commuter service from Connolly to Drogheda will be removed as the DART would be extended to Drogheda and therefore getting rid of the WARPED timetable the DART currently suffers from.
Also congestion at Connolly would be reduced as the northern DART line will no longer stop at Connolly but will turn off to East Wall (new station) and to Spencer Dock (new station) and through the Interconnector and on to the Kildare DART line. Only the Dundalk and Belfast ‘Enterprise’ services will continue as usual but stop at Connolly. It wont continue on to Tara and Pearse St.
The Current South DART line will link to the Maynooth DART line at Connolly.

Grange Road?New station??

Yes. There is planned development there and this is also needed to link the Drogheda to Kildare DART line to the Dublin Airport spur. Any station in the Plan that is not on the DART/Irish Rail website is a new stop.

Isn’t there a rail line running up past Croke Park and up by a canal, around Phibsboro somewhere? Does that get included?

The Croke Park Line will be used for Commuters and Intercity services only heading to the new Spencer Dock and not to Connolly (less traffic stopping at Connolly).
The Maynooth DART will use the line at the Hill 16 side of Croke park which will use the current Drumcondra station. These 2 line will join at Glasneven Jtn .

I’m glad to see that the plan seems to focus on connecting the area AROUND Dublin to the centre, as opposed to connecting the centre of Dublin to, well, the centre.Let’s face it, you can walk from one side of Dublin centre to the other, and there are hundreds of buses crossing the liffey, to the main shopping streets of Dublin. And now the LUAS aswell. It’s just if you try and get to, say, Park West from Lusk, or Clontarf to Red Cow that you run into trouble. Or maybe Adamstown to Blackrock.And considering that’s what most people are trying to do almost everyday, what choice do they have at the moment but to drive???Trains aren’t great, but buses are seriously a lot worse, if you live anywhere except the southside of Dublin really. You could be waiting forever to get a bus

Again this will all change after the Dublin Rail Plan.

I advise you to take a closer look at the plan at P11 web site and all of your question would have been answered.

Originally Posted by Irish Indo
Metro work to begin in April

Chaos feared as new city Luas link gets green light as well

Treacy Hogan

Environment Correspondent

DIGGING work on the controversial €1.5bn Metro line from Dublin city to the airport gets under way in April, it was revealed yesterday.

The fact that the initial exploratory work begins so soon will come as a surprise to commuters and businesses.

Already serious concerns have been raised over the impact of the digging and tunnelling works on traffic.

We will have to put up with digging for the Metro – to be completed by 2015 – and for a new link between the two unconnected Luas lines in the city centre.

Both rail systems will be totally separate but will run along exactly the same route as far as O’Connell Street, the Metro running underground, the Luas link running overground.

The Metro route from the city centre to Swords via Dublin Airport is being officially unveiled by the Government next week following a briefing to the Cabinet by Transport Minister Martin Cullen, yesterday.

The Metro is expected to go from St Stephen’s Green, Westmoreland Street, O’Connell Street, Dorset Street, Griffith Avenue, Glasnevin and Dublin City University (DCU), Ballymun, Dublin Airport, and on to Swords. Travel time to the airport is estimated at 17 minutes.

Separately, a €100m Luas line linking the two unconnected lines from Tallaght and Sandyford will also go from St Stephen’s Green, Westmoreland Street, and O’Connell Street.

Work on this project is due to get under way later this year and the link is due to be finished by 2009. This is the route which emerged as the most popular with the public during consultations on possible routes.

Following a Cabinet meeting Mr Cullen announced that the route for the Metro will be unveiled next week and the public invited to air their views.

Geophysical digging is due to start on the Metro project in April.

Mr Cullen said yesterday: “These developments represent significant staging posts on the delivery of one of Transport 21’s key projects, Metro North.

“We are now ready to start the physical groundwork on building the Metro service, running from St Stephen’s Green via the airport to Swords,” the minister added.

A Department of Transport spokesperson said yesterday that the geotechnical work would not cause any traffic disruptions.

Meanwhile, plans for a new Luas line to Dublin’s booming Citywest area are being unveiled tomorrow.

As recently revealed by the Irish Independent, the 3.2km tram service spur off the Tallaght line is expected to cost up to €100m.

Much of the cost is being met by two developers, Davy Hickey Properties and Harcourt Properties in a public-private partnership.

The line will run from Belgard to Citywest and will cater for the commercial district there as well as an expected housing boom and is due to open in 2009.

The cost of building new Luas lines is currently running at €30m per kilometre. A public inquiry into the extension of the Sandyford line to Cherrywood in south Dublin is being heard next Monday. This line is scheduled to open in 2010.

Luas is now carrying over 70,000 passengers a day. Mr Cullen will launch the public consultation on the proposed Citywest Luas link at South Dublin County Council’s offices in Tallaght tomorrow.

I guess we’ll have the answer next week

“Chaos feared as new city Luas link gets green light as well”

why is everyone’s first reaction to news of a major infrastructural problem to have a big moan about all the “disruption” and “chaos” it’s going to cause? 😡 Will people never learn? you can’t make an omelette withouth breaking eggs; you can’t have a first class transport and infrastructural system without digging up roads.

Remember all the fuss about the “disruption” Luas was causing on Harcourt Street? Who mentions it now? Now that we have a brilliant tram system linking Sandyford with the city centre? Nobody. But all the whingers and moaners and begrudgers are just resting their tonsils, ready for the next onslaught against the Luas interconnector, Metro or whatever it is that delays their pedestrian lights for more than 10 seconds. They’ll be back with the same whinges, nothing learned from the fact that their last campaign now looks stupid and small-minded 😡

It is the Irish disease Sue. Is it any wonder nothing ever happens here while every other tin-pot country in the northern hemisphere manages to implement large scale infrastructural projects without so much as a moan or whimper.

Sue,

I totally disagree in relation to Harcourt Street as my complaint was not against what would be normal construction distrubance but a rather a long running comedy of errors such as

1> A JCB bucket knocking out all telecoms and power because a proper survey of the utitlities was not conducted.

2> The collapse of the road over a cellar because no one bothered to check the maps to see what was there and lets face it under street cellers are typical in Georgian streetscapes.

3> The pedestrian arrangements which left pedestrians walking 30 metres into oncoming traffic with no-one to supervise; although it appeared that the tea pot had about 10 regular senior directors.

The project management of Luas was a fiasco that came in years late and at a multiple of its original budget despite not even meeting its original route.

I hope that the RPA have learned their lessons and that I will be able to stay silent this time

Sue, it is not “everybody” as you say, but rather a specific anti-Urban/Public Transport agenda led by the Independent Newspapers Group with their pro-Farming/One-Off Housing/Western Crackpot Corridor and their close ties with the Motoring Industry. The Indo is essentially a urban-phobic and pro-motoring lobbyist posing as a newspaper.

Throughout the whole of the development of Luas unnamed “experts” were cited by one writer as suggesting that Dublin was unsuitable for rail development. It turns out that at least one of the “experts” cited is a notorious US anti-rail campaigner who is apparently funded by the concrete and motor industry.

The Sindo was claiming the Luas was a “train set that no one wanted” – 22 million passenger journeys per annum would suggest otherwise. This is a sensational number of passenger for a two unconnected Light Rail lines which are still in the early stages of their development. A massive success for public transport by any international standards. So what do Tracy Hogan the the Indo do…why they potray Luas as a failure and a menace to society of course!

I would call on all people who care about public transport investment in Ireland to boycott the Independent rags.

According to the Six One News today we will have the Dublin Metro up and running by 2012! Is it really going ahead or is it just all talk? Dublin certainly needs it.

If the scheme was launched by the end of March it would take six months to get the inquiry going,

three months for a route to be chosen presuming there are no legal challenges

two years to design and acquire the route

Six months to tender

Six month lead in time pre construction

Construction could start in 2010

with a further 6 months required for tunnel safety tests

plus whatever rail safety period would be required say 6 to 12 months

I’d say a construction period of 3 to 4 years is required bringing us up to 2014 or 2015

I some how doubt that it could be built in six months

if they are utilising 24hour boring and the critical infastructure bill then they can get it completed by 2012. This kind of project is done in the rest of Europe with little fuss.

Looking at those routes, my guess is that TCD will be making a submission:p