N1 (Dundalk to Border)

AugustusMaximus

Can anyone give me an explanation why this wasn't built as motorway ?

Do the NI authorities have any plants to upgrade Belfast to border to motorway and if they do, will that section of the N1 be upgraded to Motorway under relevant legislation ?

This haphazard style of building either motorway or hqdc when there are alternative routes is quite bizarre at times.

murphaph

AugustusMaximus wrote: »

Can anyone give me an explanation why this wasn't built as motorway ?

Nobody will be able to give a definitive answer I believe. However, the claim has been made that a viable alternative for non-motorway traffic (mostly north of the border) does not exist and as the new road subsumed parts of the old road, it had to remain open to all traffic.

AugustusMaximus wrote: »

Do the NI authorities have any plants to upgrade Belfast to border to motorway and if they do, will that section of the N1 be upgraded to Motorway under relevant legislation ?

NI Roads Service has not publicly declared any intentions to upgrade any of the A1 to motorway standard. The new Newry Bypass (being built to motorway standard) will also subsume part of the existing Newry bypass and so very likely also be open to all traffic as a viable alternative would likely involve routing traffic back through Newry itself-this would be opposed locally of course. It is unlikely I believe that the NRA will seek to have our own N1 reclassified as M1 ithout NIRS reciprocating north of the border as it would be an awkward way to terminate a motorway (ie, at a border with an all purpose road) and could lead to legal problems.

AugustusMaximus wrote: »

This haphazard style of building either motorway or hqdc when there are alternative routes is quite bizarre at times.

I would have agreed with you a few months back but in hindsight it is clear what as going on-motorway orders are a more difficult way of building motorways than building them as dual carriageways and then reclassifying using the Roads Act 2007. I believe ALL the major interurban routes will be reclassified as motorway with the exception of the N1 to the border in fact. Even the N20 scheme is being designated as M20 from the outset. It makes absolute sense to designate such roads as motorway if only to ensure mapping accurately reflects the much higher standard of road (blue lines on maps are good!).

Skyhater

murphaph wrote: »

Nobody will be able to give a definitive answer I believe. However, the claim has been made that a viable alternative for non-motorway traffic (mostly north of the border) does not exist and as the new road subsumed parts of the old road, it had to remain open to all traffic.

The issue is more south of the Border.... all of the old A1 is intact north of the border.... The new A1 used a completely separate alignment.


Don't want to stray off topic, but I actually have more of an issue with the N2 (Ashbourne Bypass) not being designated motorway. It doesn't have the same north-south political issues and all (except the last km or so) of it's old alignment is in place. It should be made motorway north of J2.

mackerski

Skyhater wrote: »

The issue is more south of the Border.... all of the old A1 is intact north of the border.... The new A1 used a completely separate alignment.

Not over the entire length of it. About 400m of the old A1 has been obliterated at the Cloghogue Roundabout and the alternative routes, whereas they do exist, certainly haven't been made very obvious.

DWCommuter

Skyhater wrote: »

Don't want to stray off topic, but I actually have more of an issue with the N2 (Ashbourne Bypass) not being designated motorway. It doesn't have the same north-south political issues and all (except the last km or so) of it's old alignment is in place. It should be made motorway north of J2.

As far as I know....

It was designed and more or less built as a motorway. It was meant to be tolled, but strong objections put a halt to that and the road was reclassified. Bizzarely its the only non motorway with a 120kph limit. I understand thats a throwback to the original fracas.

murphaph

DWCommuter wrote: »

As far as I know....

It was designed and more or less built as a motorway. It was meant to be tolled, but strong objections put a halt to that and the road was reclassified. Bizzarely its the only non motorway with a 120kph limit. I understand thats a throwback to the original fracas.

Doesn't the N1 border section also have a 120 limit?

IIMII

murphaph wrote: »

Doesn't the N1 border section also have a 120 limit?

Yes

icdg

DWCommuter wrote: »

As far as I know....

It was designed and more or less built as a motorway. It was meant to be tolled, but strong objections put a halt to that and the road was reclassified. Bizzarely its the only non motorway with a 120kph limit. I understand thats a throwback to the original fracas.

The issue is the section between J1 and J2 and in particular northbound. Basically, at the terminal junction (N2/M50) access to the old N2 was blocked off leaving no alternative route for non-motorway traffic. Those that wish to access that section of the old road have a minor exit northbound between J1 and J2 close to Killshane Cross.

I don't see how a toll company could have made money on that road. It is probably one of the quietest D2s on any of the national roads in Greater Dublin, only busy in the morning and evening peaks. There are R-road D2s that are more consistantly busy than the N2 is!

Incidently, the aforementioned and thread-titled (!) N1 Dundalk-Border also has a 120 km/h speed limit

Mayo Exile

Whats the speed limit on the A1 section of the Dundalk to Newry N1/A1 scheme. Is it 70mph? There are no signs to show the speed limit until you get to the border where 120kph (roughly 75mph?) signs are visible.

Slice

Wasn't it the case that even though funding was made available for a motorway to the borders the then Unionist-dominated Northern Ireland Parliament decided to shun a motorway to the border in favour of a motorway to primarily unionist areas along what is now the M1 motorway in the North?

Terrontress

What would have been the point in Northern Ireland building a motorway to the border when the Republic had no motorway programme to meet it? Unionist or not, it would not have made sense.

Slice

Funding for the motorway network in the North from the British exchequer was mainly intended for a motorway to Dublin. The point, and accepted convention, being that motorways are intended for regional routes connecting major urban centres, as oppose to commuter journeys. Look at the M1 on a map and you'll see it leads no where in particular.

Terrontress

The M1 was designed to go to Craigavon, a "new town" in the British sense, which never took off. There's no way any civil servant, bigoted or not, would agree to the cost of building a motorway to the middle of nowhere just out of spite.

Look at the road from Dublin to Belfast ten years ago. The part from Belfast to the border was nearly all dualled, alot with 70mph limit, including the A1 and no towns to go through. On the other side there was Dundalk, Castlebellingham, Drogheda, Julianstown, Balbriggan and those infernal roundabouts at Swords.

I used to live in Dublin 8 and had to drive to and from East Belfast weekly. I would prefer the Unionist bigoted planning system to the approach of linking Dublin and Belfast any day.

Carawaystick

in Belfast though the M1 is signposted to "the West", a little piece of social justice for the good people of Enniskilen...

the N1 from Ballymascanlon is not Motorway to allow access to Jonesboro and Carrickcarnan to non-motorway traffic, otherwise an access road would have had to have been built, or FF could have lost electoral support


Dual Carriageways have a default speed limit of 70mph as shown by the national speed limit sign. Some of the A1 dual carriageway near Banbridge has a 60mph limit, this has explicit signs for 60.

I wondered last time crossing into armagh why there wasn't a standard EU type sign stating the limits, I suppose it's a bit sensitive.

most other EU borders have 3 or 4 limits posted, urban, rural and Motorway
and in france Motorway limit in the rain.

murphaph

There was a plan to build an M11 motorway to Newry, which would have been the 1st spur off the M1, the second (which did get built) was the M12 into Craigavon. That's why the M2 becomes the M22, there was to have been an M21 spur off the M2 going to the north coast somewhere.

Northern Ireland ran into 'troubles' which almost immediately saw the motorway funding disappear into the 'security' budget.

The M1 wasn't supposed to go as far as it did. It was supposed to terminate in and around Craigavon new town (as stated above). However the local council was planning to build a dual carriageway upgrade to the A4 anyway and they got this tagged onto the end of the M1 project. That's why it appears to end in the "middle of nowhere"!

Slice

I would prefer the Unionist bigoted planning system to the approach of linking Dublin and Belfast any day.

Nobody said anything about bigotry. I was just making the point that the money allocated to the motorways in the north was intended for linking Belfast with other major urban centres - specifically Derry and Dublin. This didn't happen.

Terrontress

Well the post stating that funds were diverted to run the M1 to protestant areas would suggest bigotry to me. The fact though that your second post says the motorway leads to nowhere in particular, which I imagine could be of no religious classification if there is nothing there, would contradict that. So the two must cancel each other out.

Slice

I really couldn't care less what flag flies up north. I'm just answering the question raised in the opening post as to why there are no motorways on the Dublin-Belfast route north of the border. It's no coincidence that at the time funding for motorways in the north was made available there was a sectarian, Unionist-dominated administration and these motorways were built to predominantly protestant areas.

L1011

Thing is they had motorways planned and under construction all over the place - and then the cash was just cut short. There was going to be a motorway all the way from Belfast to (Nationalist then as now) Derry - theres two segments of it built, but the rest never happened due to the money ending virtually instantly. Go look (not expecting you to go up there, theres websites about it) at the 'bridges over nothing' at the end of the M2 at Ballymena for instance.

Had NI's motorway funding continued for another decade I'm sure the M11 to to the border would have been built.

murphaph

The M1 starts in mid Ulster (nationalist) and ends a few feet from the Falls Road (um, also nationalist last time I looked!).

The unionist government plans weren't sectarian-they were just never completed because the cash ran out. They planned a motorway to Newry (M11) and to Derry (M22) from Belfast. They started the motorways at the densest end (Belfast) just as we started our motorways at Dublin.

I dare say a LOT more political interference played a part in the planning of our southern motorways in fact

L1011

The M2 was going to go to Derry, not the M22

I know you take the M22 to go to Derry as it stands, but due to the tortous terrain (Glenshane) along the route there, the motorway was going to be routed North via Coleraine, which is why theres the 'second M2' around Ballymena. The M22 was a spur of the M2, meant to serve Castledawson; there would have been an M21 as well somewhere. Wesley Johnston's site suggests it would have been a spur to the Airport.

murphaph

MYOB wrote: »

The M2 was going to go to Derry, not the M22

I know you take the M22 to go to Derry as it stands, but due to the tortous terrain (Glenshane) along the route there, the motorway was going to be routed North via Coleraine, which is why theres the 'second M2' around Ballymena. The M22 was a spur of the M2, meant to serve Castledawson; there would have been an M21 as well somewhere. Wesley Johnston's site suggests it would have been a spur to the Airport.

We were both wrong-the M2 was to terminate at Coleraine, the M22 at Magherafelt and the M23 would have served Derry.

L1011

Either way, lots of 'Nationalist' areas were getting motorways, had the cash not gone kaput.

Just like how we had duallers to Naas, Lucan, Clonee, Stillorgan by the 1990s - closer in areas got their motorways built.

ardmacha

The new Newry Bypass (being built to motorway standard) will also subsume part of the existing Newry bypass and so very likely also be open to all traffic as a viable alternative would likely involve routing traffic back through Newry itself-this would be opposed locally of course.

The Newry bypass can easily be made motorway, the northern part does not replace the existing bypass and there is a minor road parallel to the southern section of the bypass that is being replaced. Non motorway traffic is mainly agricultural traffic and the like and this road would be suitable for this traffic, perhaps with minor improvements.

The fact that it is not planned as a motorway reflects a policy difference more than real difficulties about an alternative route. The view in NI seems to be that is a good idea to mix 70mph traffic and cyclists, tractors etc. This does not seem a good idea to me.

The unionist's government plans for "phase 2" of the motorway network may have been less sectarian than the original work. The later plans were conceived in the O'Neill Lemass era when the situation was evolving. However the money ran out and the only real example of more balanced development was the Newry Warrenpoint dual carriageway.

L1011

There was no 'phase 2' of the plans until the money started to run out - the original plan was to build *everything*. Ring road of Belfast (the unfortunately titled Belfast Urban Motorway), M2+forks, M1+forks, and so on.

Blame Westminster not Stormont.

Hotblack Desiato

MYOB wrote: »

Ring road of Belfast (the unfortunately titled Belfast Urban Motorway)

Sorry, just couldn't resist

aquascrotum

MYOB wrote: »

There was no 'phase 2' of the plans until the money started to run out - the original plan was to build *everything*.
Blame Westminster not Stormont.

Agreed.....Fairly certain theres a seperate forum on here for conspiracy theories??

Random roadbuilding in NI in the 60/70's wasn't restricted to motorways. There are numerous random trunkroad upgrades that start and end in the middle of nowhere - a random 5-mile section of the A28 Caledon to Aughnacloy, for instance, is what would today be termed a high quality single carriageway (the hardshoulders have been deliberately overgrown as they can't afford to maintain them...) Also the A29 Armagh-Newry road (two intensely populated centres of Unionism....) is HQSC. Another could be the section of dual carriageway linking the hardcore loyalist :rolleyes: towns of Cookstown and Moneymore in Tyrone. Or the A29 HQSC Tobermore to Maghera, upgrades to the approach to Armagh of the A3 from Monaghan and A29 from Moy etc etc etc

Also possibly worth noting that at the time, cross border traffic was nothing compared to what it is today, whereas the M1's final destination, the grand planning masterclass that is Craigavon, was expected to be something approaching NI's 2nd city, with high quality road and rail in place to Belshaft. Notwithstanding the fact that the M12 offspur terminates at the A3 (main trunk route to the Irish midlands, in theory) and M1 terminates at the A4 (main trunk route to Enniskillen and the West).

Planners North and South had (and still have) a lot to learn. And if the budget hadn't run out, one suspects the RoI would still be playing catchup with the NI roads network.

spacetweek

Carawaystick wrote: »

the N1 from Ballymascanlon is not Motorway to allow access to Jonesboro and Carrickcarnan to non-motorway traffic, otherwise an access road would have had to have been built, or FF could have lost electoral support

Are you seriously suggesting that they decided on motorway status based on the fear of losing votes from two tiny insignificant villages?

Carawaystick wrote: »

I wondered last time crossing into armagh why there wasn't a standard EU type sign stating the limits, I suppose it's a bit sensitive.

most other EU borders have 3 or 4 limits posted, urban, rural and Motorway
and in france Motorway limit in the rain.

Always thought this was weird too. Apparently under the Good Friday Agreement they aren't allowed sign the border in any way, in case it reminds you that the island is divided into two separate jurisdictions. :rolleyes: