Metro West Railway Order

greyed

Is elevated track as expensive as a tunnel? Or is it a matter of visual impact?

runway16

Cool Mo D wrote: »

I think that the main structural works for Metro West should be built, then run it as a busway. It would be almost as good as Metro West, for a much reduced cost.

Can we not move past the bus thing in this city?

People dont like busses. It is not something that will make people abandon their cars. Rail will. People like rail: the comfort, dependability, lack of being thrown all over the place going over manholes ;-), etc etc.

Busses dont cut it, they never have and they never will do.

Pete_Cavan

runway16 wrote: »

Can we not move past the bus thing in this city?

People dont like busses. It is not something that will make people abandon their cars. Rail will. People like rail: the comfort, dependability, lack of being thrown all over the place going over manholes ;-), etc etc.

Busses dont cut it, they never have and they never will do.

BRT does cut it, which is a viable alternative to rail for MW.

Transportuser09

I'm not really a fan of the guided bus way concept when a rail based link can be provided but they do have their merits. If there more incentives (not an outright ban though) to keep reduce the amount of cars in the city centre then I don't see why buses can't have their uses. At the end of the day we'll never have rail/metro/tram links to every corner of the Dublin area.

runway16

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

BRT does cut it, which is a viable alternative to rail for MW.

Yes, but try selling it. As I said, people do not like busses, they only take them out of necessity, usually if they dont have a car.

Telchak

I don't think people's preference for rail over bus will be able to be used as justification for the price this thing will cost.This route can't take the kind of numbers rail needs to be profitable, and won't for many decades I suspect.

runway16

Telchak wrote: »

I don't think people's preference for rail over bus will be able to be used as justification for the price this thing will cost.This route can't take the kind of numbers rail needs to be profitable, and won't for many decades I suspect.

I disagree re the numbers. The volume of commuting between the Western Suburbs is enormous.

Re being bus or rail, there is no point building anything if people wont use it - its not a matter of preference. It's will they use it or wont they.

Telchak

runway16 wrote: »

I disagree re the numbers. The volume of commuting between the Western Suburbs is enormous.

Not sure if I can believe that =/ I'm sure Metro West would increase the this, but I can't imagine the combined numbers of people currently using 17As, 76s, 210, 220, 239 is anything near the kind of numbers on Dublin's busier bus corridors. I think this is a billion euro that should go to any other Luas or Metro line first. The extension of the outer ring road to Blanchardstown would make buses and private transport have more than enough capacity for a long time IMO.

mgmt

Is there a case for the Metro West trams to be allowed down the Maynooth and Kildare Dart lines? Like what will happen with the Metro West trams going down the Metro North line. Obviously the lines would need to be upgraded to dual track. It would allow a complete integrated system.

Telchak

mgmt wrote: »

Is there a case for the Metro West trams to be allowed down the Maynooth and Kildare Dart lines?

They wouldn't fit on the track :P

mgmt

Telchak wrote: »

They wouldn't fit on the track :P

Like I said you would need dual track.

Telchak

mgmt wrote: »

Like I said you would need dual track.

Ah, sorry I misunderstood what you meant by dual track [:

DWCommuter

greyed wrote: »

Is elevated track as expensive as a tunnel? Or is it a matter of visual impact?

Visual impact.

DWCommuter

Transportuser09 wrote: »

I'm not really a fan of the guided bus way concept when a rail based link can be provided but they do have their merits. If there more incentives (not an outright ban though) to keep reduce the amount of cars in the city centre then I don't see why buses can't have their uses. At the end of the day we'll never have rail/metro/tram links to every corner of the Dublin area.

An interesting post that contains good thinking, but its very on the fence in its content.

Why would you favour a rail based link over a guided busway?

DWCommuter

runway16 wrote: »

Yes, but try selling it. As I said, people do not like busses, they only take them out of necessity, usually if they dont have a car.

If you are talking about your typical DB double decker, then yes I agree with you. But a BRT is an entirely different beast.

dowlingm

greyed wrote: »

Is elevated track as expensive as a tunnel? Or is it a matter of visual impact?

Noise is also an issue.

As for discussing BRT vs metro, can those pro-BRT please outline whether the busway would be fully ROW over its length, what the specified PPDPH level would be (passengers per direction per hour) and where the routing for it would be so we can gauge the likely reaction of central Dublin to the removal of traffic lanes?

markpb

Telchak wrote: »

Not sure if I can believe that =/ I'm sure Metro West would increase the this, but I can't imagine the combined numbers of people currently using 17As, 76s, 210, 220, 239 is anything near the kind of numbers on Dublin's busier bus corridors

You're right - people making those journeys don't take the bus because orbital bus routes are generally quite poor whereas the M50 is quite good these days.

KC61

markpb wrote: »

You're right - people making those journeys don't take the bus because orbital bus routes are generally quite poor whereas the M50 is quite good these days.

The fundamental problem with orbital services is that most individual orbital journeys differ with different starting and finishing points, unlike the radial routes where most people are going to somewhere on the route itself.

This is what makes designing these bus routes difficult as for them to be any way economically viable they have to serve major locations along the route.

That is changing somewhat with the impending redesign of the 76 group and the 75 being split into two routes.

Telchak

Updated animation video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fCjR5XvZUI

Telchak

Minister freezes planning for Metro West

Metro West has been put on hold indefinitely after the Minister for Transport suspended the planning process.

Leo Varadkar said funding to construct the new railway will not be available for the foreseeable future.

In a statement, the Minister said until financial credibility is restored, the international debt funding market would be reluctant to lend funds to finance projects in Ireland, and the exchequer will not be able to make its contribution to the cost in the foreseeable future.

Mr Varadkar said: "Acting on the advice of the National Transport Authority (NTA), I have instructed the Railway Procurement Agency to withdraw its application for a Railway Order from An Bord Pleanála".

He said Metro West has always been considered a long-term project and many of the new communities that it will to serve have not materialised due to the collapse in home building.

However, Minister Varadkar did not rule out the project completely saying it will be examined again when the country's finances have improved.

The Metro West line was due to go from Tallaght through Clondalkin, Liffey Valley and Blanchardstown, and link up with the planned Metro North line to end at the airport.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/0925/metro.html

Seems crazy to withdraw the applicaion at this point, will it really cost that much more to finish this last part of the process? It would probably have been quite a while before the order was granted in any case.

Jack Noble

Telchak wrote: »

Minister freezes planning for Metro West

Metro West has been put on hold indefinitely after the Minister for Transport suspended the planning process.

Leo Varadkar said funding to construct the new railway will not be available for the foreseeable future.

In a statement, the Minister said until financial credibility is restored, the international debt funding market would be reluctant to lend funds to finance projects in Ireland, and the exchequer will not be able to make its contribution to the cost in the foreseeable future.

Mr Varadkar said: "Acting on the advice of the National Transport Authority (NTA), I have instructed the Railway Procurement Agency to withdraw its application for a Railway Order from An Bord Pleanála".

He said Metro West has always been considered a long-term project and many of the new communities that it will to serve have not materialised due to the collapse in home building.

However, Minister Varadkar did not rule out the project completely saying it will be examined again when the country's finances have improved.

The Metro West line was due to go from Tallaght through Clondalkin, Liffey Valley and Blanchardstown, and link up with the planned Metro North line to end at the airport.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/0925/metro.html

Seems crazy to withdraw the applicaion at this point, will it really cost that much more to finish this last part of the process? It would probably have been quite a while before the order was granted in any case.

According to ABP website, a decision was due in late November.

Strange indeed that he has done this now - why not simply wait for ABP decision and then suspend planning?

Even the RPA at its most optimistic didn't expect construction to start before 2015/16 and trams to run in 2019/20. They wouldn't have needed to go near markets for PPP until 2013 at the earliest.

BluntGuy

The first in a line of announcements one would imagine, but MW was never going anywhere. What we await is the formal killing off of the other major transport projects.

wildefalcon

Jack Noble wrote: »

According to ABP website, a decision was due in late November.

Strange indeed that he has done this now - why not simply wait for ABP decision and then suspend planning?

Even the RPA at its most optimistic didn't expect construction to start before 2015/16 and trams to run in 2019/20. They wouldn't have needed to go near markets for PPP until 2013 at the earliest.

I suspect that there isn't enough money to pay for the various people that "mind" these projects. Lawyers, Planners, RPA staff, Marketing (fancy brochures with bad maps) and the like can consume money at a significant rate, even if only laying the administrative groundwork.

Not huge amounts of money, but when the country is running a current spending deficit, in times when the international credit markets are tight, well, every little helps.

Easier than taking on the unions and getting the existing public transport systems to work properly.

Sponge Bob

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2011/0925/breaking24.html?via=mr

Mr Varadkar said Metro West had always been regarded as a long-term project and that many of the communities that it would have served had not materialised due to the
collapse in home building.

“This does not mean that Metro West has been cancelled. However, with very limited funding available for capital projects over the next few years, I did not consider it to be a good use of taxpayers’ money to advance Metro West any further through the planning process, as I do not know when we will be able to build it.

strassenwo!f

It is very positive that the RPA are not going to waste any further time and money on this absurd project. Even when the country was awash with cash it should have been a very low priority, but for some reason it made it to the top table.

By all means reserve a route for this project for when it might make sense to build it, in many years time when the other necessary projects have been completed.

As Martin Cullen said in praise of the metrowest: "The problem we have with a lot of the public transport systems that exist is that they all come into the city centre."

So cities like Munich, which has a pretty well developed public transport network and where practically everything travels through a 1 km stretch of the centre - they were the ones that had a problem, according to the Minister.:mad:

There were and still are many more important projects for Dublin than the metrowest. If it is ever possible, we should be building routes into and then across the city before we countenance spending money on routes around it.

The planning was poor, the project was not a priority for Dublin, and it's good that it has finally been binned.

DWCommuter

Surely we all realise that this project was merely a vehicle to drive outlandish planning and development on the basis of the Celtic Tiger madness continuing forever. It was just following a semi circle belt of hopeful development that started in the 1970s.

MN is the real deal, but will inevitably fall at the expected hurdle, along with DU. It is indeed over and I am not surprised after 3 years of continuously saying it. The reason? More politics than money.