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Only you could come back with such hot air. Your argument above is splitting hairs; the definition of anything is what is the ordinary meaning or understanding is when read or heard once.

To say that someone is a liar because they pick something up in what is its ordinary meaning as opposed to picking up your deliberately anal use of the english langauge shows you up for the petty small minded clown that you are.

Whether the interconnector uses an overhead wire or third track has no bearing on its viability or the facts that no system capable of bearing wires have been built on the section of line described.

Also the fact that you claimed that Maynooth Line trains go to Connolly was ‘A Howler’ shows just how little you know of the Dublin rail network. It is an undisputable fact that the Maynooth line joins the northern line on the City side South of the side line for Spencer Dock branches off; be as anal as you like but it shows you up to be either flagrantly attempting to mislead or clearly shows that you have never considered any resolution of the major capacity constraint on the rail entire network; i.e. freeing up capaity after the Maynooth Line joins the currently single line DART network.

In any event everything is academic as long as Metro North is undermined by the following no longer being true

The Government was still running €7bn surpluses,
Government debt was still less than 30% of GDP;
Government bond rates were still within 0.05% or 5 basis points of German bond rates,
Unemploment was still less 5%.

What is going to pay for it?

How do you redevelop nimby zones like the those contained within the link below and this type of development density is entirely typical of most of the route for this project.

http://www.multimap.com/maps/?qs=ballymun&countryCode=IE#map=53.3871,-6.26282|19|256&be=29503419|North&bd=useful_information&loc=IE:53.38724:-6.26225:17|albert%20college%20drive|ALBERT%20COLLEGE%20DRIVE,%209,%20DUBLIN

Wrong project even if there were funds around – doubling capacity by building the interconnector is the only large scale underground project that stacks up. You obviously prefer to champion a project that in so many ways the Metro symbolises all that was wrong with the Celtic Tiger mind set.

1. We are going to start from scratch – it will be new and shiny
2. We are not going to make it compatable with any existing network
3. We are going to borrow the entire cost
4. We are going to hire a team who have never done a similar project before
5. We are going to ensure it is on a stand alone ticketing system
6. We are going to make assumptions that economic circumstances will never change

In the link below you said that the Tokyo network uses overhead wires

https://archiseek.com/content/showpost.php?p=97309&postcount=104

You moving to spelling as an argument is to be expected although I image your use of ya was probably deliberate. I suppose it should be considered progress from personal abuse, the only constants are the failure to understand:

1. The rising price of money,

2. Expanding government deficits,

3. Collapse in actual demand at Dublin airport,

4. Collapse in projected development along the route,

5. Unsuitability of the route for development,

6. Lack of viability

7. Fact that there are other ways of moving people from Dublin Airport to the rail network.

This project does not stack up on the basis that it delivers 12 miles the majority of which are through low density areas; whilst the interconnector delivers 3 miles of new line but critically doubles capacity on another 48 miles of line. Luas is a good project but you don’t spend €2bn to deliver 12 miles of it. Particularly when money is tight

@marmajam wrote:

Tallaght Luas is standing room only beyond Red Cow. Doubt you’ve ever been on it..

I have and no that has not been my experience or common perception; are you really saying that a tram going down the middle of a logistics and car distribution district is unable to cope?

@marmajam wrote:

Point is though that a Luas line to Ballymun will be over capacity, so waste of money. .

The line goes through areas that are a mix between 3 bed semi’s and parks. Even if the entire population use the service it will be far from over capacity. What are the bus usage figures for this section?

@marmajam wrote:

Maynooth DARTs will come into Connolly. Another howler. .

The Interconnector trains will have left the existing Dart Network before Newcommon Junction, your point is?

@marmajam wrote:

But the point is the track will have to be 4 tracked to Malahide. Very expensive and PP problematic.

A spur to the airport from Malahide will end costing the same as the Metro – take longer to deliver and offer a lot less.
this is why the metro will be built..

The new signalling required on this line for the interconnector will address this issue; this does not need four tracks it will work only if the interconnector is built. It will cost somewhere in the region of €250m – €350m and has been costed by Irish Rail.

@marmajam wrote:

You started saying the metro would cost 200 million a year. In fact it will cost less than 100 million. .

Government bond rates are c5.59% taing that alone the costs are north of €100m, add operating losses resulting from it going through an area consiting of 3 bed semis and the €200m loss is very real. When people insist the finance can be raised cheaper than Government debt they are really deluding themselves.

@marmajam wrote:

You said metro trains don’t use overhead power lines when in fact some of the leading cities in the world use exactly this system. .

Like you saying that the Ginza and Maranouchi lines in Tokyo use overhead power lines; International experience is split with the biggest systems such as London, New York and Paris using third rail.

@marmajam wrote:

Now you’re telling us that Lenihan (and Dempsey and Cowen) are bluffing when they say the metro will certainly go ahead.
In fact it is very significant that they publicly state this since the political embarrassment would be big if they don’t deliver.
You seem very detached from the real world.

Are you really saying that an FF cabinet that got c20% of the vote in the last election and are doing nothing on cutting the deficit are going to sign this off?

Finance available cheaper than Government bonds for a project that is certain to lose money. The calendar no longer says June 2006………..

Leverage is dead only viability works these days and this project doesn’t possess the latter

@neutral wrote:

This will help a bit but not on a wider scale in Dublin’s public transport mess.:

I agree it is not the only solution but it costs nothing and could have been done from the day the tunnel opened; combine this with the re-configuration of the road formally known as the M1 from Santry into Collins Avenue and you see a bottleneck created which has further exacerbated road capacity in towards the CC. The cynic in me says this was deliberately done by the NRA to create a worse problem to justify completion of the Eastern Bypass which was and remains well off the agenda.

@neutral wrote:

Lets try and do it right for once it needs projects that are going to work for the next 100 years or so and not in the doom and gloom times we are presently in.If MN and the IC go ahead we’re looking at 6/7 years before its all in place so please think ahead on what Dublin will need and not what we have at the moment!

I agree that we have to plan for the future but lets look at what MN actually does; it starts in Stephens Green and goes to the Maynooth Line / Drumcoundra via O’Connell Street; it goes from Drumcoundra to DCU/Ballymun, it goes from there to Dublin Airport, it goes from there to Swords and a little beyond into green fields.

Lets look at that in 4 stages using your first quote below

@neutral wrote:

Build 2 light rail lines and lets not join them up because of some moaning by narrow minded business thinking only done a few years ago.:

Phase 1

Agreed on not joining up both original luas lines from day 1 being a big mistake, the Green Luas line should be extended to some point on the Maynooth line; possibly Liffey Junction but somewhere a little closer to Drumcoundra or Glasnevin may be preferable; this should have a more or less immediate planning process commencement. By doing this you link the North inner suburbs to the Luas network; they have access to the rail network at Drumcoundra at present but don’t seem to use it much. You have to wonder if the Liffey Junction routing was designed deliberately to make the option of ruinning Luas to Drumcoundra / DCU more difficult. Costs to Drumcoundra or Phibsboro c€200m?

Phase 2

You build a spur from close to Malahide on the Northern line to Swords and Dublin Airport to coincide with opening of the interconnector in 2016 when the loopline constraint is removed thus creating significant additional capacity. In essence all you are doing is extending the DART route that currently goes to or towards Malahide. Costs €250m- €350m?

Phase 3

You extend the Luas from the Maynooth line to Ballymun. Cost €100m?

It is clear that the densities once you cross the Canal and south of the Airport cannot justify expenditure of €2bn; you spend the money get a transit network capable of dealing with densities equivelent to phase 2 of the IFSC and then every resident objects when a developer wants to build a three storey building.

http://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/map/google_map_Dublin.htm

Why spend €2bn when all objectives can be secured for less than half that sum.

I have no idea what you are trying to say but wonder why you are factoring in a metro that will never be built or the term major to cycle routes which appear to be virtually non-existant.

I am amazed by the above

Yes a culture emerged where virtually unlimited finance was available and it was possible to lobby the government for urban renewal tax breaks for projects that in the absence of same would never have been built; in many cases lie empty and should never have been built and in some other cases would have been built anyway as the gentrification frontier was moving in that specific direction anyway.

The real problem to my mind was not that some nomadic international parasite landed it was that large numbers of business people with no economic training became developers without any appreciation that property is linked to economic cycles like every other asset class.

A shopping centre is not just an investment product it is series of interlinked spaces which retailers will occupy to sell their goods and services. If you build too many shopping centres a retailers trade from one centre cannibalises trade from another centre and they will if they are smart assign their lease and if they are not will be unable to pay their creditors and enter liquidation. Similarly if you build too many houses buyers identify an oversupply and play one development off another. Ultimately lending should only take place where a presumtion can reasonably exist that the project fulfills a genuine market need or has the capacity to stand up to a 2 year recession by having one or more special advantages.

I do not however think that linking residential prices to social welfare or the minimum wage is appropriate for four reasons.

1. In a ten year cycle employment levels should average roughly 90 – 95% of the population therefore the majority of the population will want a product that can’t be built for the construction cost alone taking the earnings to debt multiple that such a figurewould acheive.

2. People on the minimum wage or social welfare tend to receive help from the government with accomodation costs or live in pre 63 accomodation or social housing.

3. It would be financial suicide in the context of the land bank held by NAMA which requires a return to a normal functional market. There may however be an angle in NAMA retaining ownership of unoccupied schemes that have been completed and or are close to completion and setting up a body to ensure that income is raised on this stock until the stock overhang is removed. It could form the basis of creating a mature private rental sector based on secure annualised returns as is the case in say Germany but it cannot be at the cost of depriving the consumer of choice.

4. Much of the existing housing stock is in the wrong places; if sustainability and making transport infrastructure viable are to take place a lot of housing needs to built on existing rail lines. If you ensure that nothing gets built by removing both demand by having only low quality cheap housing built and profit which means banks won’t lend then we are stuck with one off housing and SUVs as no doubt any threshold will exempt less than 3 houses.

What you will see is a period of limited constrruction whilst the overhang of existing units is removed from the market and then banks taking much more control in all stages of the development process to ensure that any developments they are lending against are of an appropriate quality and that the price matrix will not be undermined by over supply.

I was wondering how many posts you could make without dodging the issues completely and resorting to personal attacks.

In a downturn the question is not do we reject the sector we find ourselves in but how do we apply scarce resources to acheive above sector averages. How do we analyse the altered economic and sector specific circumstances to think differently and draw more out of what already exists.

In so many ways the Metro symbolises all that was wrong with the Celtic Tiger mind set.

1. We are going to start from scratch – it will be new and shiny
2. We are not going to make it compatable with any existing network
3. We are going to borrow the entire cost
4. We are going to hire a team who have never done a similar project before
5. We are going to ensure it is on a stand alone ticketing system
6. We are going to make assumptions that economic circumstances will never change

http://www.rte.ie/news/2009/0711/electricians.html = cut price cost

Is there one assumption for the conception of this project that still stacks up other than labour costs which seem to be mired in the personal animosity between Parlon and his union sparring partners.

The failure to acknowledge that circumstances have changed is clearly causing concern in finance markets. Pragmatism is required not clinging to an economic past that no longer exists.

What you can do is allow taxi’s to use the port tunnel free to reduce journey times

@marmajam wrote:

U C PeeVeeCee you’ve produced this expert’s assessment without the knowledge that IE have already rebuilt the KIldare line bridges to take overhead lines.

But the wirescape has not been built; I have no issue which method they use but outside Spain where there seems to be a deviance from normal practice the norm seems to be a third rail fixed to the track bed. Examples include Hong Kong, Singapore Japan etc

It seems strange that if they were constructing additional tracks that they didn’t electrify at the same time or at least put the structural steel in place; very short sighted when you consider the different funding environment that has now materialised. No doubt a little rezoning and development levy regime beyond Kilmainham will supply the revenue streams close to project completion; there is a lot of redundant industrial stock that if combined into a wider holding will provide the necessary scale to do something very orderly out there. A lot of season ticket holders who will want access in all directions

@wearnicehats wrote:

no – I looked at the scheme actually – did you? the plan is nice and simple if you don’t mind having to go through your living room to get to the kitchen, I can’t figure out how they got round the part m requirement at ground floor and I think the quality of light to the rear of the living room will be poor. Most of all I find the elevations jarring and just a lot of cranky shapes and lines for the sake of the AIA. When we ignore context, proportion and urban grain then architecture becomes very easy. lazy. That enough for you?

I just thought that such a withering dismissal of ‘an aia award winner’ and their ‘lazy’ proposal, ‘knocked out on a quiet afternoon’ required a little more reasoning from yourself.

Given what adjoins the site, it could be a welcome diversion, might work, might not, i’m keeping an open mind.

@bitasean wrote:

I can’t imagine they’d be that expensive to build, 300K each methinks, if the shard of glazing to the front is as tricky as it gets then the glazing could come in under 40K. Dont know much about aluminium cladding but I still reckon the price tag is (to use a topical phrase) “so 2006.” The biggest risk is trying to find non-architects (since we’ve no money) to buy one, as far as I’m aware the lovley Boyd Cody box on Mount Pleasant Ave is still waiting for someone with a healthy bank account and appreciation for design to step up and buy it off the original owner – open to correction on that but the blinds are always down when I pass, shame really.

The positive says investing ahead of the curve

Fact says time will tell

Ed says we’ll see if there is a fee – but the provenance is good