N4 - Downs Grade Separation

L1011

Chris_5339762 wrote: »

Can upgrading a DC to a slightly better DC really be justified, thats the question I have. The Carrig-Midleton part of the N25 had the medians closed off and be damned to turning traffic. Reckon this would do the job nicely for the N4 scheme and give the €12million to something else.

Doing that would leave a much longer stretch with no intersections.

nordydan - yes, about a year ago.

mickeyboymel

Hmmmm....18km of extra motorway, how much will this reduce journey times given that its already 100km Dual Carriageway.....money would be far better spent on the N52 sections between Cloughan Inn and Clonmellon which have continued to be neglected and seen many lives lost over the years

L1011

mickeyboymel wrote: »

Hmmmm....18km of extra motorway, how much will this reduce journey times given that its already 100km Dual Carriageway.....money would be far better spent on the N52 sections between Cloughan Inn and Clonmellon which have continued to be neglected and seen many lives lost over the years

It won't reduce journey times at all, its not being redesignated or the limit raised due to a lack of alternative route and premises opening on to it.

The reason it's being done is due to a massive accident rate, likely a lot higher than that section of the N52.

Sponge Bob wrote: »

This was the last Rubbish DC built in Ireland...that I can recall.

Built in a mad panic due to WCC/NRA realising there'd be a gap between the M4 and the Mullingar BP.

mickeyboymel

MYOB wrote: »

It won't reduce journey times at all, its not being redesignated or the limit raised due to a lack of alternative route and premises opening on to it.

The reason it's being done is due to a massive accident rate, likely a lot higher than that section of the N52.

Point Taken, very interesting data here : http://www.rsa.ie/RSA/Road-Safety/Our-Research/Ireland-Road-Collisions/

Sponge Bob

It could be a 120kph DC from c the Esso station to Kinnegad if this scheme + the part 8 is completed. Like the N25 east of the Jack Lynch Tunnel is a 120kph DC.

Pete_Cavan

Sponge Bob wrote: »

Any movement on this one or has Vladakar killed it off since he became minister??

No tender was published, just an information notice 10 months ago.

The tender documents must have only been sent to those who expressed an interest in the PIN. From the etenders notice;

Scheduled date for start of award procedures and duration of the contract

Scheduled date for start of award procedures: 20-04-2011
scheduled date for start of works: 20-09-2011completion of works: 20-11-2012

Siac are the main contractor anyway (I think Roghan O'Donovan did the design work), the company I work for received details from them to price the GSJ last week. I'll take it that means they will be starting on site soon.

Irish and Proud

SIAC has got the job!!!

Link to e-tenders - as well as the New Interchange and associated roads, the project includes the overlay of 5.7km of Dual Carriageway. AKAIK, the plan is to remodel the current at-grade dual carriageway (no hard shoulders) to the standard Type 1 Dual Carriageway. Even though each carriageway will increase from 9.5m to 10.5m, the overall profile will be narrowed as a RCB will replace the current grass median - I saw the WCC plans (PDF Document) to reconstruct the road from the centre out. Full list of Part 8 overlay documents here!

Regards!

spacetweek

Irish and Proud wrote: »

SIAC has got the job!!!

Link to e-tenders - as well as the New Interchange and associated roads, the project includes the overlay of 5.7km of Dual Carriageway. AKAIK, the plan is to remodel the current at-grade dual carriageway (no hard shoulders) to the standard Type 1 Dual Carriageway. Even though each carriageway will increase from 9.5m to 10.5m, the overall profile will be narrowed as a RCB will replace the current grass median - I saw the WCC plans (PDF Document) to reconstruct the road from the centre out. Full list of Part 8 overlay documents here!

Regards!

This is good news as connecting the Mullingar bypass to the M4 with a low spec dual was always an anomoly. I wonder if the whole stretch will be Type 1 now or if there will still be incursions. What about the premises accessing the mainline? Surely these will have to be diverted now.

Sponge Bob

The Roadhouse will still have access from west and exit to east.

L1011

It still won't have any chance of becoming motorway, and not even just due to the Roadhouse. As the 2000s scheme was entirely online barring one small section (they flipped sides of Mullingar Pewter from memory) there isn't an alternative route, and they aren't building enough frontage roads to substitute.

If it was just the Roadhouse and the Essos on the BP itself I'm sure they could have designated them as service areas under the 1993 definition if they really wanted to.

spacetweek

MYOB wrote: »

It still won't have any chance of becoming motorway, and not even just due to the Roadhouse. As the 2000s scheme was entirely online barring one small section (they flipped sides of Mullingar Pewter from memory) there isn't an alternative route, and they aren't building enough frontage roads to substitute.

If it was just the Roadhouse and the Essos on the BP itself I'm sure they could have designated them as service areas under the 1993 definition if they really wanted to.

Having gone through those documents, I'm pretty happy with what's proposed here. All median breaks will be closed and a number of LILOs removed.
Further work to complete to motorway would be completion of bits of frontage road and reconstruction of Junction 13 with bigger loops. Not for now though; it can wait 10-15 years.

Wild Bill

As this is one of the (the?) biggest national primary roads project (outside Cork) to be actually under construction I think it deserves a thread.






I was there today and snapped a few pics.

dubhthach

Nice what's the schedule build time for this?

annfield1978

who are the designers for this scheme

is the contractor siac?

Jayuu

Great pics. About time this section of road was sorted out.

However we already have an N4 Downs Grade Scheme thread in the Roads sub-section.
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056158137

Its not on the first page so its easy to think that we didn't have one. Can we merge this into that thread rather than have two threads?

Wild Bill

dubhthach wrote: »

Nice what's the schedule build time for this?

They said by December 2012; that's rather quick seeing as the have to build a bridge, ramps, feeder roads and so on.

Wild Bill

Jayuu wrote: »

However we already have an N4 Downs Grade Scheme thread in the Roads sub-section.
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056158137

Its not on the first page so its easy to think that we didn't have one. Can we merge this into that thread rather than have two threads?

My apologies! Merge of course.

(This is the second time his week I've done that)

Wild Bill

MYOB wrote: »

The reason it's being done is due to a massive accident rate, likely a lot higher than that section of the N52.

At the time they started building this (in 2000 I think) I contacted the NRA and had a long chat with them.

They had just finished closing a serious of absolutely deadly at-grade junctions on the N11 past Bray and built two junctions (one in '93 and the other in '95).

Now they were actually creating five more death-traps!

I pointed out that this was "almost criminal" - and I was told that here was a major internal debate in the NRA/Dept about how they could upgrade all the inter-urbans to 50mph (as they'd been instructed by the Government) - there wasn't enough money available to build motorway standard roads!

I guess someone managed to explain to the politicians that low quality DCs would be a recipe for major carnage. Thankfully. The result of the motorway decision was a major reduction in deaths instead.

Unfortunately that was too late for those killed and maimed on the Downs DC the past 10 years.

Pete_Cavan

annfield1978 wrote: »

who are the designers for this scheme

is the contractor siac?

Siac are the main contractor anyway and afaik Roghan O'Donovan did the design work.

dubhthach

Wild Bill wrote: »

My apologies! Merge of course.

(This is the second time his week I've done that)

I've merged the two threads, I forgotten about the original one tbh myself

SeanW

Nice! I used to use this dual carriageway a lot and while I never minded it most of the time, I once had a close call with a lorry taking a right turn from one of the side roads onto the other carriageway.

Are they building the DC towards the centre so as to have a hard shoulder to the side?

Thanks to the poster above for the pics

Wild Bill

SeanW wrote: »

Are they building the DC towards the centre so as to have a hard shoulder to the side?

In the centre I'd guess - there is a wide grassy median on the sections that have no hard shoulder and a hard shoulder on the sections with a narrow median.

spacetweek

Map of this scheme.

spacetweek

Thanks for the RSA link upthread. Very interesting.

(All data 2005-2009).
The Downs section has had 13 minor accidents and 4 fatalities, and low-grade DC between Carrigtwohill and Midleton has had 22 minor, 1 serious and 2 fatalities. A clear case for action, then.

L1011

Section nearest the Mullingar BP has its concrete barrier in place

Further towards then M4 its still untouched, nothing started at all.

Seem to be doing sectional working. I didn't notice any works for the junction yet either.

roadmaster

Drove by siacs job in mulingar and see they are laying a double barrier why is this as there is no bridge piers to protect there. Does not seem to be overkill?

Carawaystick

roadmaster wrote: »

Drove by siacs job in mulingar and see they are laying a double barrier why is this as there is no bridge piers to protect there. Does not seem to be overkill?

Saw this over the weekend, seems daft to build a double jersey barrier and not widen the carriageways to allow a shoulder

The work is progressing from the Mullingar bypass towards the Roadhouse, with further work offline going on near the end of the M4 to build a GSJ I'd imagine. There's fencing well back from the existing road there.

I'd have thought there'd be more gsj work, like at the Killucan junction ( or only a gsj at the Killucan junction)

Ascii

They are placing a double barrier to retain the existing running lanes. If they only placed one barrier, they would need to surface the large sections that would remain dormant between the fast lane and the concrete barrier. It is more cost effective to put up the concrete barrier as opoosed to doing road construction and surfacing.

roadmaster

Will they be just lay a new layer of blacktop on the old surface and regulate to get the levels ? And are they goin to take some of the grass verge to get the hard shoulder?

Wild Bill

Was there today.....







Certainly no shortage of space to add a full hard shoulder! Could be D3 + shoulder.