Metro
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Just noticed the following but don’t have a subscription to read on….
“Key metro links are axed to save €700m
THE revised metro from Dublin Airport is to go straight into O’Connell Street, by-passing key city centre rail stations to save €700m, it was learned last night. “no link to connelly, no link to pease, stop at o’cll and another on d’olier street with a travellator to tara. mixed feelings myself, seems silly to have a big curve in the link, but this simplified version is inconvenient i guess to people getting a mainline train into dublin and then a metro to the airport.
indo is free by the way, you just have to register.
I have the horrible feeling they will make a pigs ear out of the Metro. All this talk about integrated transport and they still go ahead with an expensive transport link which completely fails in this respect. Why do we need to have a major interchange at O’Connell Street! Why not link up with the exisiting transport network at Connolly and Tara Street.
And how shortsighted to miss out the opportunity of including stations outside of the canals. That means anyone who wants to use the airport link and not want to travel in from the city will have to use their car…
I didn’t see any drawings from the paper, but the TV briefly showed a “concept map” that was used before. It showed the metro line running through a station called “Liffey Junction”.
If this is the suggested station in Phibsboro on the “D-Connector”, surely it would make sense to include the link from Heuston to Connolly in this plan. This would then bring passengers to both stations without moving them through, what will be a highly overcrowded, O’Connell Street Station.
Originally posted by Harry
I didn’t see any drawings from the paper, but the TV briefly showed a “concept map” that was used before. It showed the metro line running through a station called “Liffey Junction”.i.e., it will join up with the Maynooth line and run down the old Broadstone line trackbed. Possibility of a connection to the Kildare line on the disused line from Islandbridge Junction to Connolly Station (the one Irish Rail pretend doesn’t exist) although engineering wise, it would be tight to fit platforms in.
An indirect link to Heuston and Connolly could be provided by running a LUAS spur from Line A to Broadstone to connect into an interchange station on such a METRO line, but would the authorities have the vision to co-operate to allow this to happen?
I doubt it.
isnt there also a route planned 2 link Ballymun/Blanchardstown/Lucan/Tallaght? Where in blancharstown will this line run through as i doubt all of this line will be underground.How foolish was it not to provide space for a metro line and stations in the major shopping centres and surburban certres around dublin like most ‘proper’ countries! Are the trying 2 prevent us from getting around?
It’s pretty common in other countries to have to walk a fair distance underground to connect between different rail systems.
It might seem quite far on the surface between O’Connell Street and Connolly or D’Olier Street and Tara but it would seem much closer underground with level walkways, travelators, lack of weather and so on.
The spread of some underground stations abroad can be astounding but they are perceived as being quite localised because a single station name covers several platforms and many exits.
Examples that come to mind would be T-Centralen (subway)/ Central Station (mainline rail) in Stockholm (link) and Central (subway) / Hong Kong Station (airport line) in Hong Kong (link – all that brown and grey shaded area).
If there is a travellator connection between Tara street station and the D’Olier street Station then it is connected to the network. An underground link there is less than 400 yards so get walking.
Why do we need a Station at O’Connell Street – because it is the central street of the city, if we are truly going to revitalise it then it should be treated as the centre not something to be ashamed of.
Carlton Centre for New station I say
Funny way to save money though isn’t it? If we really wanted to save money and minimise the disruption the entire track could be laid in a spiral out in the docks or how about decentralising and putting it in the midlands?
Rail infrastructure shouldn’t be built in the wrong place just ‘cos it’s cheaper.Rory W, connecting to Tara Street doesn’t connect the Metro to the main line rail, it would be good if someone could get from Kildare to the Airport with only one change, getting a Dart from Connolly to Tara and then a metro north would be a pain in the arse. However, the discussion above provides a partial answer: connect to the platform 11 d-connector and run some of the trains through from Heuston, this won’t help you if you are coming from Maynooth, but you can’t do everything with a single line.
I do think it should link at liffey junction with the interconnector and sligo line. My point was aimed at those who think just because it doesn’t run directly into Connolly/Tara/Pearse and that you wont step off the Dart and step directly onto the metro without having to walk for a while.
At least it will be an underground link that people will be able to walk
Originally posted by ed69
isnt there also a route planned 2 link Ballymun/Blanchardstown/Lucan/Tallaght? Where in blancharstown will this line run through as i doubt all of this line will be underground.How foolish was it not to provide space for a metro line and stations in the major shopping centres and surburban certres around dublin like most ‘proper’ countries! Are the trying 2 prevent us from getting around?I understand that there is a reservation from the Maynooth Line to the Blanchardstown Centre. However, Fingal are currently revising their development plan (ads in the paper) so whether or not it will survive is another matter.
I say scrap the RPA and the DTO, that’d save a couple of millions, what do they all do all day?
The money saved from this could be given to a private company to design, construct and run the metro for 30 years. Any cost overruns/delays would be the company’s fault.
The government would waive the Vat and pass enabling legislation. The state gets the metro back after the 30 year period
Problem solved!!
Over to the Spanairds/Japanese/Alabanians (whoever)!
It should be pointed out that this is only a single phase of the metro, hopefully the first of many, and as a result, it should stick rigorously to its primary mission of providing a direct high volume high speed link from the airport to the city centre.
Once you start saying that for only a little bit more money you can have this or you can link it to that, you are succumbing to exactly what keeps driving the costs up. How many people on average are going to insist on an immediate link to a mainline rail station, of all the people who arrive in the city? How many times do you insist this when you go abroad as a tourist. A short five minute walk or luas trip from O’Connell St to Connolly and you have your mainline link. As a citizen of the country, i don’t particularly want to be dumped in Connolly as my first stop returning home here. Much prefer O’Connell St!
Good point about Metro Stations being a sprawl underneath the city, despite the small sizes of the exit. A travelator from D’Olier St to Tara should be very quick.
Anyhow, the ‘real’ plans will be displayed for a month of public consultation, so i will wait until then!
redeoin, dublin airport is used lots of people from outside dublin, it would be useful to link to mainline rail, at the moment none of our airports are easily accessible by rail and if you live outside dublin this is a real hassle. If the metro is going as far as d’olier street, how much harder would it be to link to pearse? the link to connelly and the otherhand is an irrational ir/rpa obsession and it is right to drop it.
I was in Barcelona recently and the majority of stations involved down a stairs to the ticket hall and down another stairs to the platform (interchanges aside). You rightly point out that this is the first phase of what will hopefully (I won’t hold my breath – remember DART) be a number of phases. All the more reason then that you get the location of stations right and plan these stations as if they are the basis for a larger network.
I think you have a good point about arriving in O’Connel Street, but I reckon that, with the arrival of LUAS and the inevitable reduction in taffic that will have to take place in Dublin city centre, Connolly will increasingly become a more important transport hub with mainline, DART, LUAS and bus links. Not everyone taking the metro into the city will want to stay there – many will be continuing in to the southside or into the expanding east of the city (ie Docklands). I think the Metro shoudl stop at O’Connell Street (up near Parnell Square – a great draw to the north end of the street – see ‘Carlton’ threads) and continue on to Connolly and then Tara then St Stephens Green.
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