M7 - Nenagh to Limerick

Carawaystick

crucamim wrote: »

Is there now a motorway running from the Dublin ring-road to Limerick - and open all the way?

No. Nor is there planed to be.
It is Dual carriageway from Naas to the Dublin outer ring road and Dual carriageway with a set of traffic lights between the outer ring road junction with the N7 and the M50 junction of the N7.
There is a plan to remove the traffic lights but there is no plan to make the N7 from the M50 to Naas Motorway.

gryff

Mc Love wrote: »

I was quoting you!?

...ooops sorry bout that... I must learn to read one of these days...
Drove up as far as Birdhill for a spin tonight... lots of .. ripples ???.. rather than bumps - certainly not a smooth drive. Possibly the smoothest bits were over the cast sections at each bog.. or maybe I imagined that....great that it's finally open !!

Tech3

veryangryman wrote: »

A quick q for Furet (off topic here)

Would it be above board to start a thread to track Dempseys empty promises (without the obvious "go suck a lemon Noel" and "quit already" comments that we all have in our heads for him)

If not, thats cool

I will answer this one, No it would be not. A thread started like the above will result in a immediate 3 day ban.

dergside

bacon&cabbage wrote: »

The sculpture piece just after the bog isn't really up to much, 3 or 4 rusty bits of steel sticking from the ground with a picture of what looks like a bull on top, but then what do I know ,I'm no artist

Are you sure its art?

Any chance its some parts of the mythical JCB that sank in the bog just bubbling back up to the surface??

Mc Love

They showed footage of the opening on TV3 news at 11, but nothing about Kellys of Fantane protest, but you could see the trucks all parked up

charlemont

took my boy for a spin up to nenagh and back, decent road, i think the bog looks class, especially on way back with the fog, nice views of slieve kimalta /keepers hill, i found the limerick SRR between J29 and J28 to be very bumpy, the new road itself was grand.. very quick, its great to have these roads now.. with regard to the landscaping give it till the spring, im sure plenty of stuff will grow on it.........thanks everyone who put up pictures and information relating to the bog...


the A4 dungannon to ballygawley still has its bog of doom:D

ki

Birdhill was very quite this morning, 4-5 cars @ 8:00am.

Turning right was a breeze!!!

mossym

there is obviously a few people unaware it has opened, some funny readjusting on roundabouts last night/this morning..also people were coming southbound from nenagh, taking the birdhill exit, then realizing the road was open and getting back on straight away..

was great having it open, pretty much did the limit from the door of my house to the door at work, took a good 15 mins off what it would have been in traffic, and no dealing with backups, slow trucks/cars or busy junctions

ki

Any Reports from the Newport Roundabout this morning?

Has the traffic eased much?

mossym

ki wrote: »

Any Reports from the Newport Roundabout this morning?

Has the traffic eased much?

drove over it this morning, but from the motorway you can't even see the finnegans roundabout any more, which iw as surprised at, so couldn't tell if there was traffic or not

Mc Love

Around 8 there was little or no traffic, usual morning, a lot of cars coming from Raheen side still taking off ramp.

Does anyone else think the area where the off ramp begins and the left hand lane are tight looking?

Delirium

ki wrote: »

Any Reports from the Newport Roundabout this morning?

Has the traffic eased much?

There wasn't as much traffic as usual this morning, this would have been at about 8am.

Amtmann

I drove it last night and one thing really struck me: the signage is illegible! I think it was the dew, but last night, at 10pm, all signage was very hard to discern. Also, no emergency phones.

sillyboy

Arrived at Finnegans roundabout this morning from Nenagh at 8:50. There was one truck and one car in front of me. Still a nice bit of traffic on the roundabout. I assume these are people coming from Castleconnell and using the SRR. There was a lot of traffic up to the Technology Park Roundabout but it was moving quickly. 23 minutes door to door yesterday evening and this morning. I love the consistency and that while keeping within 5 kph of all speed limits.

dergside

Had to go to Galway yesterday evening and took the long way home via Limerick, the tunnel and the new section to Birdhill just to try it out. An easy 15 mins from Dock road slip road to Birdhill on cruise control at about the limit. One hour 20 mins from Oranmore roundabout in Galway to Ballina in light traffic on the non-motorway/dual carriageway sections.

This morning set the cruise control at the on ramp in Birdhill and didn't have to come off it until approaching Roxboro interchange.

Result!

clon

Furet wrote: »

I drove it last night and one thing really struck me: the signage is illegible! I think it was the dew, but last night, at 10pm, all signage was very hard to discern. Also, no emergency phones.

Saw this in today's Irish Independent.

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/dew-drops-nra-in-it-with-dodgy-motorway-signs-2357110.html

DRIVERS are unable to read giant new motorway signs at night because of the dewy Irish climate.
The National Roads Authority (NRA) yesterday admitted the problem, which is being blamed on a build up of dew on the thousands of new blue and white signs on the country's newest roads.
This is stopping the light from car headlights reflecting back to approaching motorists.
As a result, drivers are frequently unable to read the writing on the expensive signs, which appears as "grey and hazy".
Top engineers with the NRA are now carrying out experiments to see if special coatings can be applied to thousands of signs along the 750km-long network of motorways and dual-carriageways.

cson

I think Ireland is pretty unique in not lighting road signs. Anywhere I've been on the continent and in England as far as I can remember have the road signs lit up.

mackerski

cson wrote: »

I think Ireland is pretty unique in not lighting road signs. Anywhere I've been on the continent and in England as far as I can remember have the road signs lit up.

Germany certainly doesn't do so as a matter of course.

cson

France is pretty ridiculous for it; every sign is lit.

Lucky they have nuclear power! :pac:

Jumpy

cson wrote: »

France is pretty ridiculous for it; every sign is lit.

Lucky they have nuclear power! :pac:

Thats why the signs are glowing.

Stinicker

There is a sign lit up as you approach the end of the M8 coming down into the Dunkettle Roundabout and the morons who did the lighting have the lamp infront of CORK so you can only barely see CORK on the sign!

Tech3

Rossbrien to the start of the Nenagh-Castletown in 20 mins- superb!! Landscaping is not good but its not major when at least the road is open. needs some trees planted along the stretch

ullickmagee

tech2 wrote: »

Rossbrien to the start of the Nenagh-Castletown in 20 mins- superb!! Landscaping is not good but its not major when at least the road is open. needs some trees planted along the stretch

They planted Hundreds of trees in the Bog.... They Disappeared overnight..Straight down like the piles:D:D:D

123easy

tech2 wrote: »

Rossbrien to the start of the Nenagh-Castletown in 20 mins- superb!! Landscaping is not good but its not major when at least the road is open. needs some trees planted along the stretch

Who gives a **** about landscaping! The bloody thing is open at long last.

murpho999

123easy wrote: »

Who gives a **** about landscaping! The bloody thing is open at long last.

Got agree with this, what is people's obsession with Landscaping? The roads are designed by the NRA not Diarmuid Gavin.

The road for cars to drive on is the main thing, suggest people drive to Botanical or Japanese gardens for landscaping.

Lived in Holland for several years, and motorways are not landscaped at all. Don't see what difference it makes.

Wild Bill

cson wrote: »

I think Ireland is pretty unique in not lighting road signs. Anywhere I've been on the continent and in England as far as I can remember have the road signs lit up.

Hardly! France does, Spain doesn't.

Wild Bill

123easy wrote: »

Who gives a **** about landscaping! The bloody thing is open at long last.

Well lot's of people do actually!

My one beef with folk here is they expect full size plants the day after a scheme opens.

And the motorways in Holland are ugly as s***.

Amtmann

Wild Bill wrote: »

My one beef with folk here is they expect full size plants the day after a scheme opens.

I don't. But I do expect a lot of things to have been planted, however small they might be for the first few years. I also expect the millions of thistle and dock plants that thrive because of soil disturbance to be eradicated.

Two schemes that were landscaped well: M3 Clonee to Kells and M8 Cashel-Culahill. Lots of planting and very few weeds. Both will take a long time to mature but you can tell when looking at them now that they will look great in ten years' time. For a rotten scheme, just look at Nenagh to Limerick. To those who think it doesn't matter, it certainly does, for a whole host of reasons I've written about at length before. Look at the 'landscaping' tag in the Thread Finder and have a read.

messi1985

be hitting down from dublin to limerick on fri.. was just wondering will i still get caught in traffic in adare.. hit adare around the 5 o clock mark and usually stuck there for a while.. hope with this road (of which is FINALLY OPEN) i cant beat the jam!!!!

murpho999

Wild Bill wrote: »

Well lot's of people do actually!

My one beef with folk here is they expect full size plants the day after a scheme opens.

And the motorways in Holland are ugly as s***.

Well I find the fact that Dutch motorways often have more than two lanes, have ample service stations, signs with live traffic information,surface that is better in wet weather, drivers who are trained to drive on motorways and patrolling police who regularly enforce laws,much more important than plants and trees.
I don't know how anybody can call a motorway ugly or good looking.....it's a road!