M6 - Galway City Ring Road [planning decision pending]

Chris_5339762

The crux of this is if/when the bypass is built, the city center traffic arrangement has to be gutted and public transport + cycling really brute forced. Then a lot of the nay-sayers re: the bypass will probably think it as quite a good thing.

But I have my doubts that CIE/BE and the councillors will use the opportunity, and that is a very sad assessment.

SeanW

what_traffic wrote: »

That's exactly the reason to do it. Convert that Car Traffic into using other modes.Get more people to use buses, walk and cycle.

Great idea. So what is (for example) Barna-Athlone or Tuma-Connemara traffic supposed to do? Put the car on their back at the Galway City Line, cycle through the city and plonk the car back on the road the far side of town?

fcio

SeanW wrote: »

Great idea. So what is (for example) Barna-Athlone or Tuma-Connemara traffic supposed to do? Put the car on their back at the Galway City Line, cycle through the city and plonk the car back on the road the far side of town?

You don't get it these people shouldn't live outside of cities because ... for some reason there is a strange hate of progress and technology and basic lack of understanding of history, economics when it comes to environmentalists.

If they had their way the human population be culled to a "more manageable size" and everyone herded into concentration camps "for efficiency" reasons or whatever nonsense is in fashion that month.

Bah! anyways back to the bypass whichever way its spun the problem of a city located between the sea and a lake with few bridges connecting both sides is the root problem for pretty much all traffic problems in Galway.

I get the impression that the local papers want ink for their pages, so they oppose the bypass to give themselves topics to write about.

I'm apoplectic that NUIG are mentioning light rail as an alternative to a bypass. In addition to, sure, but the cost of it would be more than the bypass.

If your journey starts West of Galway, and you need to journey East of Galway, you have no business in entering Galway. You should be able to go around Galway. By your own transport. We've seen the effect of bypassed traffic on towns & cities around the country, and it has made them safer, easier to move around in, and quieter.

We've had 20 years to sort this, enough is enough. Time to break ground. Get It Built.

monument

fcio wrote: »

Bah! anyways back to the bypass whichever way its spun the problem of a city located between the sea and a lake with few bridges connecting both sides is the root problem for pretty much all traffic problems in Galway.

Dublin has many more bridges over its main river yet the traffic is heavy over all of those bridges.... Why do you think Galway would be any different?

SeanW

monument wrote: »

Dublin has many more bridges over its main river yet the traffic is heavy over all of those bridges.... Why do you think Galway would be any different?

Dublin is a much bigger city, both in terms of population and size (at one time Longford was thought to be part of the Greater Dublin Area). Galway is closer in profile to a village like Moate than it is to Dublin. It's been said "you can't build your way out of a traffic jam" but the reality is you can - and often should - when the problem is tiny and with limited scope for "induced demand." That's why bypasses are built routinely.

Besides, if the bypass is actually designed to be and implemented as a bypass, designed mainly to cater for long distance, and the ridiculous "5%" figure touted in one of the reports is accurate (I think it's a load of cobblers but I dealt with that elsewhere), then it will be virtually abandoned!

Iwannahurl

fcio wrote: »

You don't get it these people shouldn't live outside of cities because ... for some reason there is a strange hate of progress and technology and basic lack of understanding of history, economics when it comes to environmentalists.

If they had their way the human population be culled to a "more manageable size" and everyone herded into concentration camps "for efficiency" reasons or whatever nonsense is in fashion that month.

1474 posts before Godwin's Law arrived on the scene. A record for Boards?

dubhthach

The modern Concentration camp were invented by the British, please think before you post again. Now back on topic.

spacetweek

SeanW wrote: »

Great idea. So what is (for example) Barna-Athlone or Tuma-Connemara traffic supposed to do? Put the car on their back at the Galway City Line, cycle through the city and plonk the car back on the road the far side of town?

Sarcastic comments like that don't help. Have you ever heard of a park 'n ride? Park your car there and get the bus/train. Not rocket science.

spacetweek

spacetweek wrote: »

Sarcastic comments like that don't help. Have you ever heard of a park 'n ride? Park your car there and get the bus/train. Not rocket science.

I think you need to read his post one more time to see why Park and ride won't work

Aard

If within-city (ie intra-city) travel switches to less space-occupying modes then a lot of road capacity will be freed up for those long distance journeys.

SeanW

Aard wrote: »

If within-city (ie intra-city) travel switches to less space-occupying modes then a lot of road capacity will be freed up for those long distance journeys.

You will still be running lots of long distance traffic through a city where it has no business being, to the detriment of both drivers in question (who are travelling slower and wasting time and fuel in stop-start motions) and the city they have to drive through, which continues to suffer from having added traffic that doesn't benefit its people or its businesses. Forgive my bluntness on this point but advocating this state of affairs strikes me as both counterproductive and bizarre.

Aard

I gave a case previously in the thread for the Red bypass route. Galway is (almost literally) between a rock and a hard place. Any solution will be a compromise. My fear for the city-region would be a bypass routing that promotes further economic decentralisation. Hence my support of the tight Red route over, say, the Green route.

SeanW

To be fair, your fear is legitimate, i.e. a bypass could end up becoming a new car-centric Main St.

But the way to avoid that has already been outlined by myself, i.e. give the job to the NRA with a remit to take all possible measures to avoid making it a useful local road, e.g. by limiting junctions to major roads (N roads and key Rs). Also some members of the local authorities have - despite their efforts to contrary - provided key insights into the matter as well; either in this GCOB thread or another some local figure was reported to have said "You have to build it close to the city or people won't use it ") so the NRA should be told to do the exact opposite, i.e. put it far away as possible so its as useless as possible for local traffic. It also has to be motorway, so that it maintains speed and lack of stops for lights etc appropriate to long distance traffic, provides enough capacity and is protected from inappropriate development (like some rural secondary bypasses built with lots of roundabout to facilitate development) :mad:

The NRA have proven themselves capable of building and more importantly maintaining the purpose of a National road network (the latter in particular they proved beyond doubt in Co. Clare), and I'm confident they're up to the job.

Aard

It's not current Galway residents using the road that will be the problem – it's the new residents in neighbourhoods that don't exist yet. Villages in the hinterland will become dormitory towns. This is also known as leapfrog development. Development that would have happened in Galway city will be facilitated much further out. Bad news for the regional economy.

M50-isation of Galway is inevitable with a far-out bypass.

SeanW

Aard wrote: »

It's not current Galway residents using the road that will be the problem – it's the new residents in neighbourhoods that don't exist yet. Villages in the hinterland will become dormitory towns. This is also known as leapfrog development. Development that would have happened in Galway city will be facilitated much further out. Bad news for the regional economy.

M50-isation of Galway is inevitable with a far-out bypass.

I didn't see your analysis, what post number was it in?

My feeling is that the local authorities out there do indeed want that, but the very simple workaround is to simply exclude them from the process. The NRA knows what it takes to maintain a long-distance road system and can be trusted to act severely against anything that threatens it.

_Puma_

fcio wrote: »

...

If ever get bored enough I will try to recreate Galway in Cim City should make for epic traffic jams

...

Shouldn't be too hard! In fact someone was already working on getting an elevation map working for Dublin in the newly released Cities Skyline. The traffic model used the game is very realistic apparently.

*Edit Turns out its incredibly easy. terrain.party can produces a Greyscale image that the games map editor can work off seamlessly. Just a matter of filling in the highways and water features/vegetation. Will give it a go once I pick the game up. The game is fully moddable too so should be a way fiddle around with the Traffic model.

L1011

There was a decent Sim City 3000 official ("DLC" before the idea existed) Dublin map available from Maxis's website back in the days

spacetweek

Deleted User wrote: »

I think you need to read his post one more time to see why Park and ride won't work

Got it now, sorry SeanW!

Zzippy

SeanW wrote: »

I didn't see your analysis, what post number was it in?

My feeling is that the local authorities out there do indeed want that, but the very simple workaround is to simply exclude them from the process. The NRA knows what it takes to maintain a long-distance road system and can be trusted to act severely against anything that threatens it.

But the NRA aren't in charge of this project... we're supposed to trust Galway Co. Co. which is the lead agency :rolleyes:

antoobrien

Zzippy wrote: »

But the NRA aren't in charge of this project... we're supposed to trust Galway Co. Co. which is the lead agency :rolleyes:

http://www.nra.ie/about-us/

The NRA has a general power to direct the road authority to "do any other thing which arises out of or is consequential on or is necessary or expedient for the purposes of or would facilitate the construction or maintenance of a national road".

The NRA may give specific directions to local road authorities relating to a number of matters, including motorway schemes; applications for a bridge orders; acquiring land by compulsory purchaser orders; preparing Environmental Impact Statements (EIS), and entering into contracts for and/or undertaking specified construction or maintenance works.

serfboard

SeanW wrote: »

by limiting junctions to major roads (N roads and key Rs)

I've said this numerous times as well - in particular GCOB should have four, and only four, junctions - M6, N84, N59 and R336. I would eliminate planned junctions at both Knocknacarra and Barna, otherwise it'll become what many here fear - a commuter belt, much as SQR/QCB is now.

Aard wrote: »

M50-isation of Galway is inevitable with a far-out bypass.

I don't agree that this is inevitable if what I've suggested above is done and if sensible planning follows it.

Three things that have screwed the M50 - too many junctions, inappropriate development right alongside it (Liffey Valley, IKEA etc.) and inadequate public transport alternatives.

Repeating the same mistakes in Galway will repeat a similar result.

monument

serfboard wrote: »

I've said this numerous times as well - in particular GCOB should have four, and only four, junctions - M6, N84, N59 and R336. I would eliminate planned junctions at both Knocknacarra and Barna, otherwise it'll become what many here fear - a commuter belt, much as SQR/QCB is now.


I don't agree that this is inevitable if what I've suggested above is done and if sensible planning follows it.

Three things that have screwed the M50 - too many junctions, inappropriate development right alongside it (Liffey Valley, IKEA etc.) and inadequate public transport alternatives.

Repeating the same mistakes in Galway will repeat a similar result.

There's nothing so-far to even indicate (nevermind guarantee) that the same mistakes won't happen again and again.

There does not seem to have been any real shift in thinking with Galway TDs, councillors or council officials.

Aard

serfboard wrote: »

I don't agree that this is inevitable if what I've suggested above is done and if sensible planning follows it.

It sounds like you have a lot more faith in County Councillors than I have, when it comes to them voting to rezone land on the urban periphery.

Rezoning land adjacent to interchanges is inevitable. My go-to example is this disastrous development on the absolute periphery of Longford Town: http://goo.gl/maps/5JsDp

This will happen beside the junctions of the GCOB too. The choice is whether those junctions are as close as possible to existing urban areas, or whether the junctions are greenfield. If it's the latter, there will be development far from existing populated areas. If it's the former, then the citizens of Galway will have excellent "opportunity sites" on their doorstep.

spacetweek

serfboard wrote: »

I've said this numerous times as well - in particular GCOB should have four, and only four, junctions - M6, N84, N59 and R336. I would eliminate planned junctions at both Knocknacarra and Barna, otherwise it'll become what many here fear - a commuter belt, much as SQR/QCB is now.

^^ This times 1000.
It should be built exactly as you've described, and the existing bypass converted to a rapid bus corridor. Knocknacarra residents wishing to get to the far end of the city should be facilitated by a frequent and fast bus service.

antoobrien

spacetweek wrote: »

^^ This times 1000.
It should be built exactly as you've described, and the existing bypass converted to a rapid bus corridor. Knocknacarra residents wishing to get to the far end of the city should be facilitated by a frequent and fast bus service.

Knocknacarra should have a junction or it prevents development that could rebalance the city in terms of jobs and services. Otherwise we're just perpetuating one of the the problems that causes the congestion.

serfboard

antoobrien wrote: »

Knocknacarra should have a junction ... Otherwise we're just perpetuating one of the the problems that causes the congestion.

Completely disagree with you. IMO, giving Knocknacarra a junction will generate congestion on the GCOB - this is exactly what's happening now on the M50.

I can't see how not giving Knocknacarra a junction will:

antoobrien wrote: »

prevents development that could rebalance the city in terms of jobs and services.

What about putting some more industrial units in this area (beside Dunnes and Aviva)? Knocknacarra-living Aviva workers have commutes of (at most) 2.5K. Easy walking or cycling distance. A few more units like that, and you could take hundreds of QCB-crossing commuters out of their cars.

antoobrien

serfboard wrote: »

Completely disagree with you.

Not putting a junction there will force non residential traffic down residential roads e.g. the start of N59 was originally an access road for the estates built in Newcastle, now it's the right turn for the N6 off the QB.

Aard

Knocknacarra has the highest car use in the city. Any longterm solution for the suburb involves people switching to less space-consuming modes of transport. A road will not do this. A road will allow Knocknacarra's dependence on the car to continue. Knocknacarra needs alternative transport option, and not more of the same, if the traffic problem is to be sorted out.

antoobrien

Aard wrote: »

Knocknacarra has the highest car use in the city. Any longterm solution for the suburb involves people switching to less space-consuming modes of transport. A road will not do this. A road will allow Knocknacarra's dependence on the car to continue. Knocknacarra needs alternative transport option, and not more of the same, if the traffic problem is to be sorted out.

Okay so we're back to reducing car dependency by PT & other modes..

Have you seen the PT feasibility study? It looks at a "Greater Galway" area - not just the city - covering the area West to Rossaveal, Oughterard & Tuam to the north, Loughrea to the east and Gort to the south, covering a total population of 168,259 (2006 census). This is a much larger area than the ones chosen for the "smater travel" study which stopped at Bearna, Moycullen, Claregalway & Ornamore.

This study puts forward a best case scenario:

The phantom network concept facilitates an unconstrained analysis of potential public transport demand within the Galway study area. In modelling the phantom network, it is assumed that the entire public transport network will operate with optimal characteristics in terms of frequency and speed, thus representing the most attractive mode for the people of Galway. In adopting this approach, it ensures that the maximum theoretical potential for public transport within Galway City can be ascertained.

From the baseline analysis, strong transport demand was identified between the residential areas to the west of the City and the business park areas to the east. A direct link between these origins and destinations was added to the public transport network.

The key characteristics of the Phantom Network are as follows:
�� Frequency: 30/ hour; and
�� Speed: 30 km/h.

This best case (probably should be called fantasy case) if applied in 2009 would have resulted in the "Greater Galway" PT usage being 26% instead of 3%.

Let's repeat that:
The maximum theoretical PT potential for "Greater Galway" - given a perfect PT friendly road network - is 26%.

The study showed that BRT - a single route running from Ballyburke to Ardaun (no frequency mentioned) - with PNR would have been 13% in 2009, rising to 20% in 2030.

Park and ride was found to have an effect of an additional 1% on the PT share (sites at the M6 RAB, Ballymonnen & Claregalway).

There's also a prediction of the maximum passenger flows for BRT.

Maximum forecast passenger flows along the Rapid Transit Corridor in the 2020 AM peak are 692 passengers per hour eastbound (at NUIG) and 670 passengers per hour westbound (at GMIT). In 2030, these passenger flows are 807 and 740 passengers per hour respectively.

The recommended reconfiguration of bus network and expansion of the bus fleet is estimated to cost approximately €89 million. This together with the capital costs associated with the implantation of the central Bus Rapid Transit system is estimated at €204* million

The mode share looks impressive but the real world numbers are what matters and the actual numbers are low.

At the time of writing of the report, there were (2006 census) 11,758 people working in Galway that left home between 8am & 9am, and the proposers of the main alternative being touted state that they think it will only be able to take 10% of them to work.

Will the proposals be enough to justify not building a bypass? Here's some food for thought - in 2011 the number of people leaving for work between 8am and 9am had reduced to 10,204 - a 13% drop. And yet we still had fairly serious congestion during peak travel times.

If employment returns to where it was, then BRT & PT is clearly not going to be enough.

*€212m when adjusted for inflation since 2009.