Works on the Wellpark road at the new traffic cross.

lucianot

They are building a new bus stop up the hill, took off some parking spaces in front of the furniture shops in the shopping center and they are knocking off the walls by the corner, so it looks like they are going to broad the road as well so cars can turn left and so aliviate some of the queue by the traffic ligths.

KevR

Yes indeed. They are widening the approach to the junction from the Monivea Road side to allow for an extra lane approaching the junction.

Wompa1

Not sure how big a difference this will make. I use that road every evening and the majority of the traffic goes right or straight. Plus it can only be widened from the entrance/exit of well park down to the lights. I suppose it will help some people hopefully. I feel angry for those that want to go left but can't because others are blocking there way.

lucianot

At this stage anything helps. I am sorry for the people on the bus, you just get stuck there.

KevR

My recent thoughts on the Moneenageisha junction in another thread

KevR wrote:

In my opinion, the Moneenageisha junction could be a lot better than the roundabout that was there. Firstly, Galway drivers are far too laid back - they're way too slow pulling off when they get green. Secondly, I think there are too many right turn movements allowed through the junction. I think they should ban right turns into the G Hotel from the Dublin Rd, ban right turns from Dublin Rd onto the Monivea Rd and ban right turns from Cemetary Cross side onto Lough Atalia. Then you can have 2 lanes from Dublin Rd going straight through to Cemetary Cross. Anyone coming from Dublin Rd wishing to access the G Hotel or Monivea Rd can go to the roundabout at Cemetary Cross and double back. Anyone coming from Cemetary Cross wishing to get to Lough Atalia should not even come down to this junction and instead go via Bohermore. By eliminating these right turns we could have Cemetary Cross and Dublin Rd on a longer green sequence at the same time. Could also increase the lengths of sequences for both other roads through the junction.

At night the sequences need to be a lot shorter/change more quickly.

The bus lane outbound on the Dublin Road should not start until after the entrance to Wellpark.

As there is 2 right turning lanes from Lough Atalia onto the Dublin Rd I don't understand why buses use the right hand lane to turn right instead of the left one. It causes unnecessary lane changing when they try to get into the bus lane after the junction. If they turned right using the left hand lane then they would end up in the bus lane without having to change lanes.

Just compare the Moneenageisha junction to the Quincentennial Bridge/Newcastle Road junction. They're quite similar in terms of roads going through each junction, the big difference is the the Quin Bridge/Newcastle Rd junction has no right turns allowed. It's a very effecient junction, way better than a roundabout. Can't ban all right turns at Moneenageisha but can ban what I outlined above.

Anyone else think this would make a huge improvement? For example, as it stands if each of the 4 roads using the junction gets a minute of green each. If we have Cemetary Cross and Dublin Road both on green at the same time we only need a total of 3 sequences instead of 4. At peak times you could give each road an extra 20 seconds of green time per cycle without anyone having to wait longer for green than they do now.

If we just say it's 1 minute per direction currently (I'm not sure exactly what it is) then we have:

• 1 minute green Lough Atalia
• 1 minute green Monivea Road
• 1 minute green Cemetary Cross
• 1 minute green Dublin Road

This could change to:

• 1 minute 20 seconds green Lough Atalia
• 1 minute 20 seconds green Monivea Road
• 1 minute 20 seconds green Dublin Road and Cemetary Cross at the same time.

An extra 20 seconds for every direction on every cycle would make a huge difference at peak times. Not sure if all surrounding junctions could handle the Moneenageisha junction pumping traffic through at such a rate but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to make Moneenageisha as effecient as possible.

At night time or whenever traffic is very light it could be 40 seconds or less per road per sequence.

lucianot

Some of that yes, I already expressed my opinion on this, this is not an intelligent desing as it was announced originally mainly because the sequence does not change according to the amount of traffic, it's always the same no matter what time of the day it is.

Thargor

I used to hate it but Im kind of warming to it now, I get a 5pm bus out to Kinvara every weekend so its straight into rushhour traffic on a Friday evening, when it was a roundabout the traffic jam used to start at the Raddison and creep along for 30-45 minutes until the roundabout then more stopping and starting all the way up to GMIT and out past Merlin, but tbh the junction seems to have cleared it, now you just drive straight through in a third of the time, with a few more adjustments and improvements it could turn out to have been a good idea in the end.

dinneenp

I know that this wouldn't be implemented but in theory it could work-
have the roundabout and traffic lights.
use the traffic lights when it's busy to control flow of traffic
during quieter hours just turn them off and then you wouldn't end up with the traffic queues at 9pm at night....

OR if people respected the roundabout and didn't clog it up then there wouldn't have been a need at all for the junction.

KevR

Has anyone used the Moneenageisha junction in the last few days? Has the extra lane from the Monivea Rd side opened yet?

dloob

Extra lane is open, I don't drive that way often so I don't know what impact it's had.

Madame Razz

It looked less congested there today but that wasn't at rush hour. Seems to have alleviated it some bit tho that said.

Chris_533976

At rush hour, this junction is of much higher capacity than the old one. At all other times of the day its much busier because you have to wait so long. Simple as that.

lucianot

Now you can turn left when going out of the shopping on the Monivea road, which is good, but if there is a queue you are still trapped.
I will test the new junction today at peak time and see if it really helps. Yesterday evening without traffic was OK

DD67

lucianot wrote: »

Now you can turn left when going out of the shopping on the Monivea road, which is good, but if there is a queue you are still trapped.
I will test the new junction today at peak time and see if it really helps. Yesterday evening without traffic was OK

You could always turn left, (towards traffic lights) exiting the retail park i think you mean turn right (towards Thermo King).:rolleyes:

lucianot

Yes! Sorry, I meant to say right.
Thanks.

lucianot

Just been there turning left onto the Dublin Road at 4:45 pm and was all clear.

Xiney

Galway Bay FM reported that the new lane was making a massive impact: that of all the arterial roads in Galway the Wellpark road was the only one without congestion.