M50 thread

_Kaiser_

One of the first initiatives by the IICG was the development of emergency diversion routes to provide an alternative to traffic in the case of a M50 closure. Signs are in place on all available routes between the M1 (J3) and the Red Cow (J9) and remaining routes are being finalised with the relevant Local Authorities with a view to completing these in the coming months.

I've seen these myself (and the questions on the Motors forum and elsewhere asking what they are!) but will these alternate routes be FULLY and CLEARLY signed until they rejoin the M50? Many's a time I've been diverted off a motorway and once you get to the top of the off-ramp it can be a mystery as to where to go next.

With a view to the longer term, TII is currently developing a scheme for the implementation of mandatory variable speed limits on the M50. This is a system where the speed limit is varied to suit traffic and weather conditions in order to reduce collisions and improve journey time reliability. Typically in congestion or adverse weather conditions the speed limit would be reduced from 100 km/h to 80 km/h or 60 km/h and would contribute to the reduction of the ‘stop-start’ nature of traffic which often results in rear end collisions. This scheme requires significant collaboration with An Garda Síochána and changes in legislation and consequently it is envisaged that this scheme could be operational in 2019.

Worthwhile idea IF it is used properly, but I get the sinking feeling it'll just be used as a means to fine motorists given historical precedence and focus. Also, what about revising the 100 limit UP to 120 say during nighttime/quiet periods? I'm guessing not.. it'll just be easier to fine people if they do exceed the 100 on an empty motorway at 3am

TII confirmed that in some cases, motorists involved in minor collisions insist on waiting in a live motorway lane until An Garda Síochána arrives at the scene. “This type of behaviour poses a serious risk to the driver in question as well as to other motorists. Where drivers are involved in a minor incident and are uninjured, they should drive to the hard shoulder as soon as it is safe to do so.” TII’s incident response staff will provide assistance to drivers when in attendance.

Insurers probably have a part to play here as well. Many drivers will leave things sit until AGS arrive to take statements and pictures etc. The default position in such cases is that the driver that ran into the other car is always at fault.. even though the front car may have jammed on or cut in front of them etc.

And that latter point is a BIG issue on the M50. If you try to leave a decent gap, you're inviting idiots to try and get into it just to get a car length ahead, hence cars driving too close.

marno21

http://www.irishtimes.com/business/transport-and-tourism/ross-rejects-call-for-multiple-m50-tolls-to-curb-congestion-1.2920448

No multipoint tolling under Minister Ross.

Have to laugh at the suggestion that Luas Cross City will ease congestion on the M50. As if

Middle Man

marno21 wrote: »

http://www.irishtimes.com/business/transport-and-tourism/ross-rejects-call-for-multiple-m50-tolls-to-curb-congestion-1.2920448

No multipoint tolling under Minister Ross.

Have to laugh at the suggestion that Luas Cross City will ease congestion on the M50. As if

Luas Cross City will help to ease city centre congestion I reckon, but it will do very little to help things on the M50. Perhaps, a good uptake of commuters (mainly from Kildare) through the Phoenix Park Tunnel might help a little, but the only real solution is the DART Interconnector in full - no shortcuts! In fact, the DART along with four tracking should be extended all the way to Kildare Town - such investment should take a lot of cars off the Naas Road during the rush.

Sam Russell

marno21 wrote: »

http://www.irishtimes.com/business/transport-and-tourism/ross-rejects-call-for-multiple-m50-tolls-to-curb-congestion-1.2920448

No multipoint tolling under Minister Ross.

Have to laugh at the suggestion that Luas Cross City will ease congestion on the M50. As if

It's OK. Minister Ross sees the solution to congestion on the M50 as 'more roads'. Great, so more roads means more cars and that means more congestion.

His predecessor saw the problem of increased travellers at Dublin Airport as requiring 'more car parks'. Good to see they both keep with the programme.

road_high

Middle Man wrote: »

Luas Cross City will help to ease city centre congestion I reckon, but it will do very little to help things on the M50. Perhaps, a good uptake of commuters (mainly from Kildare) through the Phoenix Park Tunnel might help a little, but the only real solution is the DART Interconnector in full - no shortcuts! In fact, the DART along with four tracking should be extended all the way to Kildare Town - such investment should take a lot of cars off the Naas Road during the rush.

How far does 4 tracking currently go? Only to Hazelhatch or something is it?
Look of houses backing on the railway around Newbridge, Sallins etc isn't there? Wound there be room without compromising these?

BrianD3

I haven't used the M50 regularly at peak times since 2001. I used to travel east on the N4, onto the M50, over the bridge, through the toll plaza and take the N2 exit. If I remember correctly I'd hit heavy traffic at or a bit before the N4 Newcastle Rd junction and it would be very slow and take around 45 mins from there until getting through the toll plaza. Very free after that with only another 5-10 mins to get off at the N2 interchange at about 8:45 am.

What is this journey like now after all the upgrades but considerably more traffic than there was in 2001 - based on stats from DTTAS there are close to 1 million more vehicles on Irish roads now than there were back then :eek:

The queues are shorter now because the traffic has more lines to use.:P
Like the old joke: "how do you shorten the dole queues?
Make them stand two abreast!

Middle Man

road_high wrote: »

How far does 4 tracking currently go? Only to Hazelhatch or something is it?
Look of houses backing on the railway around Newbridge, Sallins etc isn't there? Wound there be room without compromising these?

The four track section only goes as far as Hazelhatch - if houses are in the way of extending the railway, then they'll simply have to be removed. Houses are knocked to make way for motorways - for example, a number of houses had to go to make way for the M11 Arklow to Rathnew scheme.

Middle Man

Middle Man wrote: »

The four track section only goes as far as Hazelhatch - if houses are in the way of extending the railway, then they'll simply have to be removed. Houses are knocked to make way for motorways - for example, a number of houses had to go to make way for the M11 Arklow to Rathnew scheme.

In the case of all the newer development along that line, I think track widening has already been taken into account as none of those houses are right next to the track.

Sam Russell

Deedsie wrote: »

It wont unfortunately, the issue is single occupant private cars. Same people will continue driving into the city centre. Close down some of the city centre car parks and remove some of the on street parking if you want to stop people driving into the city centre.

It is only by controlling all day parking in the city centre that the attraction of driving into the city centre will diminish. Making tax saver schemes helped get people onto trains, next try BIK for car parking in the city centre.

L1011

I currently work in D1 and have a guaranteed albeit non-dedicated parking space at or adjacent to my office. I take the train because driving in is either horrific (quays) or painfully dear (I gave up smoking to save less than a third of what the M50/DPT tolls would be a day - albeit smokes were much cheaper then).

My colleagues who drive in mostly come from one specific area - North County Dublin. No public transport; no decent P&R setups and all have factored the DPT in to their costs of going to work. If they lost the dedicated spaces a sizeable amount of them would find somewhere else to park rather than mode-shift; not that there is spare PT capacity anyway.

I don't think parking has *that* much impact really.

We need a vast increase in public transport capacity, met with park and ride facilities on all suitable mass transit routes (the four train lines basically - both Luas lines seem fairly well served). The PPT route opening is very much welcomed but we need extra capacity on existing routes as well as Maynooth-Docklands services (and Northern-Docklands if they can build the suitable track connections).

marno21

L1011 wrote: »

I currently work in D1 and have a guaranteed albeit non-dedicated parking space at or adjacent to my office. I take the train because driving in is either horrific (quays) or painfully dear (I gave up smoking to save less than a third of what the M50/DPT tolls would be a day - albeit smokes were much cheaper then).

My colleagues who drive in mostly come from one specific area - North County Dublin. No public transport; no decent P&R setups and all have factored the DPT in to their costs of going to work. If they lost the dedicated spaces a sizeable amount of them would find somewhere else to park rather than mode-shift; not that there is spare PT capacity anyway.

I don't think parking has *that* much impact really.

We need a vast increase in public transport capacity, met with park and ride facilities on all suitable mass transit routes (the four train lines basically - both Luas lines seem fairly well served). The PPT route opening is very much welcomed but we need extra capacity on existing routes as well as Maynooth-Docklands services (and Northern-Docklands if they can build the suitable track connections).

This is about it really. Most people aren't enthusiastic about commuting an hour each way daily, and only do it because they have to. There's also the issue of a lack of suitably priced accomodation but that's a debate for another thread.

If you had DU bringing you straight from the Kildare line's catchment area to Pearse/Docklands in half an hour you would have a massive drop in car commuting from these areas into the CC. Bundled with that, in the future you could get the DART from the Kildare line to SSG, and the Luas to the likes of Sandyford/Cherrywood/Dundrum. That relieves CC congestion and takes a chunk of cars off the M50.

Of course you would still have people commuting by car, but when the city isn't a congested mess and it's possible to take an alternative, you can bring in congestion charges/toll the M1/4/7/11 (when these widening/motorway upgrade projects go ahead).

This government has made it repeatedly clear that they have NO interest in investing in capital projects - so it's a moot point anyway until we have a change of scene.

_Kaiser_

marno21 wrote: »

Of course you would still have people commuting by car, but when the city isn't a congested mess and it's possible to take an alternative, you can bring in congestion charges/toll the M1/4/7/11 (when these widening/motorway upgrade projects go ahead).

Not everyone wants to go to "An Lar" however and with the housing/rental crisis in Dublin being years away from easing (based on the current numbers of new builds), your solution would punish those not on that A-B route, or who have been forced further and further out as a result of Government inaction/policy on this issue.

Setup a high-frequency, high-speed service that runs parallel to the M50 intersecting all the major junctions between Ballymun and Sandyford (although with the planned expansions to Cherrywood they might as well extend it there too), with plenty of parking at each site and integrated attractive ticket pricing... and THEN you can think about charging people for (having to travel to Dublin to) going to work

marno21

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

Not everyone wants to go to "An Lar" however and with the housing/rental crisis in Dublin being years away from easing (based on the current numbers of new builds), your solution would punish those not on that A-B route, or who have been forced further and further out as a result of Government inaction/policy on this issue.

Setup a high-frequency, high-speed service that runs parallel to the M50 intersecting all the major junctions between Ballymun and Sandyford (although with the planned expansions to Cherrywood they might as well extend it there too), with plenty of parking at each site and integrated attractive ticket pricing... and THEN you can think about charging people for (having to travel to Dublin to) going to work

I'm thinking more when we have an actual PT network, as opposed to the disconnected under capacity mess at present. With DART Underground + Metro for a start you have connection points at Pearse, SSG, Drumcondra to get from DART to Luas/Metro and you can get from A to B fairly handily.

Fast frequent trains/trams with good connection points = incentive to stop car commuting. Not remotely there at present.

First Up

I'd like to thank whoever managed to cause the 2+ hour snarl up Northbound at rush hour this evening. I sincerely hope their bloody cars were wrecked and they can't afford to replace them. It would at least be two less careless eejits on the road.

Almost every bloody day.

Alun

First Up wrote: »

I'd like to thank whoever managed to cause the 2+ hour snarl up Northbound at rush hour this evening. I sincerely hope their bloody cars were wrecked and they can't afford to replace them. It would at least be two less careless eejits on the road.

Almost every bloody day.

http://www.independent.ie/videos/irish-news/video-major-delays-of-up-to-90-minutes-on-m50-as-dumper-truck-sheds-load-35354036.html

Sam Russell

First Up wrote: »

I'd like to thank whoever managed to cause the 2+ hour snarl up Northbound at rush hour this evening. I sincerely hope their bloody cars were wrecked and they can't afford to replace them. It would at least be two less careless eejits on the road.

Almost every bloody day.

Mod: I feel your pain but this thread is not the place to vent it.

First Up

Sam Russell wrote:

Mod: I feel your pain but this thread is not the place to vent it.

Do you have another suggestion?

First Up

First Up wrote: »

Do you have another suggestion?

There’s a "I hate the M50 " thread in after hours.

Sam Russell

First Up wrote: »

Do you have another suggestion?

Mod: After hours perhaps. Here is not the forum for such views as you expressed - (wishing people harm). Read the charter before posting again. Further comments will be considered backseat modding. Use a PM if you think it will help.

Middle Man

Need to widen the M50???

Here's how to get more lanes into to the same space...

Stacked roads in Moscow!

Cool! :cool:

BonnieSituation

Let's just tarmac Dublin and be done.

Falcon L

BonnieSituation wrote: »

Let's just tarmac Dublin and be done.

Can we build a wall around it first?

Jayuu

Question: Who is repsonsible for the messaging on the M50 (and ancillary road) VMS signs?

As a regular M50 user I find them really poor. Generally every morning going southbound there's just the usual "Delays/Long Delays" message and they are very slow to update them after collisions have been removed.

One evening a few weeks back one of the signs on the M3 approach informed of a collision at Junction 4/5 (can't remember which) but when I listened in to the Dublin City traffic programme on 103.2 FM I was informed that the collision had been removed and there was no significant tailback. This isn't the first time this has happened. If I had relied on the sign I might have taken a different route and added significantly to my journey time.

Is it possible for these signs to rotate messages so that they can be more meaningful. Otherwise it seems like a lot of money wasted on them.

veryangryman

The toll and all that...

Im wondering if that road should be shadow tolled. After all, it is a vital artery of the state for many many reasons. Surely the productivity gained through journey time reliability would more than pay for the 2.60 average per car generated at present.

Vojera

veryangryman wrote: »

The toll and all that...

Im wondering if that road should be shadow tolled. After all, it is a vital artery of the state for many many reasons. Surely the productivity gained through journey time reliability would more than pay for the 2.60 average per car generated at present.

I don't think removing the toll (for drivers) will change the fact that the M50 is simply over capacity at peak-times. You can't rely on your journey time from A to B being consistent day-to-day when a single collision or breakdown on either side, or any of the arteries away from the off-ramps, can cause catastrophic delays. I don't think it's people avoiding the toll that's the problem.

celticbest

veryangryman wrote: »

The toll and all that...

Im wondering if that road should be shadow tolled. After all, it is a vital artery of the state for many many reasons. Surely the productivity gained through journey time reliability would more than pay for the 2.60 average per car generated at present.

By shadow tolled do you mean a toll at every junction?

If you do I would agree it is badly needed, the amount of people who jump on for one or two Junctions in rush hour is crazy. A small toll charge might make them think again and use local routes instead.

Another is why do ferries arrive at peak times? Lorries streaming onto the M50 and then hogging lanes 1 & 2 at the height of the rush is crazy, surely these can be scheduled to come in just before or after the rush hour. Add to this Dublin Buses coming on and going 60km/h from Junction 4 to 6 this is an accident waiting to happen.

The whole planning and usage of the M50 needs to be reviewed…

MayoSalmon

Outer orbital is needed simples...

markpb

MayoSalmon wrote: »

Outer orbital is needed simples...

It's not that simple.

yannakis

celticbest wrote: »

If you do I would agree it is badly needed, the amount of people who jump on for one or two Junctions in rush hour is crazy. A small toll charge might make them think again and use local routes instead.

Do they not currently toll for the bridge and not the M50 as such? It would be an excellent idea to pay per use (between entry and exit points).

MayoSalmon wrote: »

Outer orbital is needed simples...

Outer orbital is slowly starting same way the M50 started back in the day:
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2057736281