Luas BXD - Broombridge to Finglas

Wild Bill

dowlingm wrote: »

Citywest should probably have been BRT at best, extending through to the Kildare Line at Hazelhatch. Instead there's 40m trams running to Mansfield's Folly.

Straying ever further away from Finglas here but; did not Mansfield and development charges pay for the Citywest extension?

And reading the humongous subsidy we are now having to pay for the National Convention Centre it seems Mansfield's privately funded centre (blocked by planning regulations) would have been a much better bet.

Thanks to the trendy planning ideologues we now have no convention centre in Saggart and hence no convention traffic for the Citywest extension and a costly White Elephant in the city centre.

I'd take Mansfield's vision and money over the anal-retent "planners" and their taxpayer funded sinecures any day. :cool:

dowlingm

Wild Bill wrote: »

Straying ever further away from Finglas here but; did not Mansfield and development charges pay for the Citywest extension?

And reading the humongous subsidy we are now having to pay for the National Convention Centre it seems Mansfield's privately funded centre (blocked by planning regulations) would have been a much better bet.

Thanks to the trendy planning ideologues we now have no convention centre in Saggart and hence no convention traffic for the Citywest extension and a costly White Elephant in the city centre.

I'd take Mansfield's vision and money over the anal-retent "planners" and their taxpayer funded sinecures any day. :cool:

55% was contributed to A1 construction cost, but Citywest won't be covering operating costs over the lifetime of the infrastructure. As for the "trendy" planning "ideologues", Mansfield gave them the finger on a regular basis, building and then seeking retention. The historical picture is not one of someone looking to engage with the process. Citywest only makes sense to drive traffic to his airport at Weston where again he regularly butted heads with the local council.

A place like Citywest would have made sense if the Air Corps had shifted their HQ out of Baldonnel to Shannon and Baldonnel had become Dublin's second airport.

As for an extension to Finglas, are there any significant employment centres which could drive counterpeak traffic?

Wild Bill

dowlingm wrote: »

As for an extension to Finglas, are there any significant employment centres which could drive counterpeak traffic?

Dunno. But there is one mega-counterpeak at the northern end of the much maligned (on boards.ie) Green Line extension.

It's called the "Sandyford Industrial Estate". Site of some Nama buildings and 20,000 real jobs.

It was created by the Mansfields of this world when Sandyford was a rural village. :cool:

spacetweek

Wild Bill wrote: »

Thanks to the trendy planning ideologues we now have no convention centre in Saggart and hence no convention traffic for the Citywest extension and a costly White Elephant in the city centre.

I'd take Mansfield's vision and money over the anal-retent "planners" and their taxpayer funded sinecures any day. :cool:

Sorry Wild Bill your posts are usually good but this time there are just too many lazy generalisations.

Mansfield was a lone gunman out in Citywest; the council were right to stop him building a convention centre *without* planning permission. Cowboy building of the highest order. It's that type of reckless disregard for the neighbourhood that created ghost estates across the country. By "trendy planning idealogues" I think you mean "stuff must be built with the permission of the county council." Hardly a shocking idea.

A convention centre out in fields miles from the city centre is hardly a "much better bet" - the Docklands convention centre is in a great location. It's true that you would defo need Baldonnell as a second civil airport first.
Can you explain why the NCC is a white elephant? I was under the impression they were booked up a year or two in advance now.

Wild Bill

spacetweek wrote: »

Sorry Wild Bill your posts are usually good but this time there are just too many lazy generalisations.

Mansfield was a lone gunman out in Citywest; the council were right to stop him building a convention centre *without* planning permission. Cowboy building of the highest order. It's that type of reckless disregard for the neighbourhood that created ghost estates across the country. By "trendy planning idealogues" I think you mean "stuff must be built with the permission of the county council." Hardly a shocking idea.

My generalisations are not lazy! The Council was wrong to block planning permission in the first place; that's what I mean by "trendy planning ideologues". I do not meaning building stuff without PP!

A convention centre out in fields miles from the city centre is hardly a "much better bet" - the Docklands convention centre is in a great location. It's true that you would defo need Baldonnell as a second civil airport first.

I beg to differ, obviously. A convention centre just of the M50 via the upgraded Naas road and on a Luas line to the City Centre is an excellent location.

A group of demented ideologues, led by the usual suspects in the Irish Times campaigned to block the Citywest venue in favour of a City Centre location. As Mansfield was privately funding his centre they should have let the it go ahead; it could stand or fall on the business it attracted. It's location was better from the pov of both internal and external customers and it would have attracted many more convention - proof being the fact that the Elephant on the quays is booked up for two years.

I despair of the small-minded begrudgery and small thinking that caused the boom to pass with so much less than we could have had.

Can you explain why the NCC is a white elephant? I was under the impression they were booked up a year or two in advance now.

The NCC is losing the State a vast sum every year (because it cost so much to build) according to an article I read at the time of my post, I'll root it out.

teol

Wild Bill wrote: »

The NCC is losing the State a vast sum every year (because it cost so much to build) according to an article I read at the time of my post, I'll root it out.

STATE PAYMENTS of more than €43 million have been made to the consortium behind the National Convention Centre since its opening in Dublin’s docklands one year ago.

The payments represent a subsidy of more than €500 for each visitor to events held in the centre since last August.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2011/0801/1224301686670.htm

D.L.R.

Why oh why can't we use O'Connell St for a two-way tram line. Still haven't heard an actual good reason to build the loop.

?

cgcsb

Wild Bill wrote: »

My generalisations are not lazy! The Council was wrong to block planning permission in the first place; that's what I mean by "trendy planning ideologues". I do not meaning building stuff without PP!



I beg to differ, obviously. A convention centre just of the M50 via the upgraded Naas road and on a Luas line to the City Centre is an excellent location.

A group of demented ideologues, led by the usual suspects in the Irish Times campaigned to block the Citywest venue in favour of a City Centre location. As Mansfield was privately funding his centre they should have let the it go ahead; it could stand or fall on the business it attracted. It's location was better from the pov of both internal and external customers and it would have attracted many more convention - proof being the fact that the Elephant on the quays is booked up for two years.

I despair of the small-minded begrudgery and small thinking that caused the boom to pass with so much less than we could have had.



The NCC is losing the State a vast sum every year (because it cost so much to build) according to an article I read at the time of my post, I'll root it out.

the mansfield centre would end up being a NAMA asset so we'd end up paying for it anyway. We got a a central landmark building that's booked solid for 2 years. Result.

spacetweek

Wild Bill wrote: »

My generalisations are not lazy! The Council was wrong to block planning permission in the first place; that's what I mean by "trendy planning ideologues". I do not meaning building stuff without PP!

What? Permission was refused, end of story. In *Mansfield's* opinion, it should have been granted. You can't just go "Well I don't agree that it should have been refused, so I'm gonna go ahead and build anyway." This is the type of mockery of the planning system that people like Mansfield demonstrated. I don't admire him as much as you seem to.

proof being the fact that the Elephant on the quays is booked up for two years.

It's a white elephant, and your proof is that it's booked up solid for 2 years? I don't get it.

As for the location, I think Citywest is in a terrible location. But we'll have to agree to disagree.

teol wrote:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/...4301686670.htm

I've no subscription - could you reproduce the article for me? Thanks.

Wild Bill

cgcsb wrote: »

the mansfield centre would end up being a NAMA asset so we'd end up paying for it anyway.

Only if the cretins in Government decided to pay for it.

Which is a totally different question.

Now we have a tax-bleeding Convention Centre that, even in a recession, isn't capable of meeting demand (and maximising visitor revenue) or making money when booked out.

teol

spacetweek wrote: »

I've no subscription - could you reproduce the article for me? Thanks.

The Irish Times seems to block direct linking. However you can copy and paste the text into google and get the link.

Here's the link again if it works this time? http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2011/0801/1224301686670.html

Wild Bill

spacetweek wrote: »

What? Permission was refused, end of story.
It's a white elephant, and your proof is that it's booked up solid for 2 years? I don't get it.

(1) Permission was refused because of the ideologues, as described above. Not "end of storey". Far from it.
(2) The fact it is booked for 2 years and is still losing a fortune is proof of it's white elephantness!
(3) The clear implication of "booked out 2 years ahead" and yet needing a €500 per skull taxpayer bailout is that if left head-to-head; without subsidy, Citywest would thrive and the City quay venue would go to the elephant graveyard in Nama.

:cool:

markpb

Wild Bill wrote: »

(1) Permission was refused because of the ideologues, as described above. Not "end of storey". Far from it.

I understand that you disagree with central developments oriented around public transport and would rather see everything built along the M50 but that doesn't mean you need to denigrate other peoples opinions. Calling something "trendy planning ideologues" just because you disagree with it makes you look childish.

Apart from the obvious success of the M50, one of the reasons it had to be upgraded and one of the reasons that upgrading it cost so much is because there was too much development directly adjacent to it. At the same time, the more development that happens on the fringe of the city means that public transport is both more expensive and less attractive, driving more people into their cars.

Building tram and rail lines in and around the city centre and inner suburbs should drive infill development and higher density there making public transport a lot easier to provide.

(2) The fact it is booked for 2 years and is still losing a fortune is proof of it's white elephantness!
(3) The clear implication of "booked out 2 years ahead" and yet needing a €500 per skull taxpayer bailout is that if left head-to-head; without subsidy, Citywest would thrive and the City quay venue would go to the elephant graveyard in Nama.

I think the article was a little misleading. The State contracted Treasury/SDCCD to build and operate the convention centre at a fixed cost per year. It doesn't matter how many or how few people use the centre, the price the state pays won't change. Dividing the number of people by the build/operate cost tells you nothing. It doesn't tell you how much of a profit the centre is returning, it doesn't tell you about the wider benefits that are returned to the economy. It's like dividing apples and oranges.

Wild Bill

markpb wrote: »

Calling something "trendy planning ideologues" just because you disagree with it makes you look childish.

I call it as I see it. I'd regard "looking childish" as a reflection more on the observer than the observed in this case.

And I fully support the M50 as an engine of economic growth, urban expansion and intelligent development.

For Dublin bypass traffic we should build the Outer Orbital Motorway when required. (And if it in turn provides nodes of development at it's junctions - great! - if only we'd be so lucky).

Think trains or buses or trams will carry the products of Industrial Estates to markets country wide and world wide?

Not being a trendy ideologue, I think we need to wake up and smell the brutal competitive world we live in. And cut out the notion that cities must be based on the model appropriate to Babylonian and Medieval times.

:cool:

bk

Wild Bill wrote: »

Think trains or buses or trams will carry the products of Industrial Estates to markets country wide and world wide?

But the most important and valuable part of our economy is graduates working in the IT and financial services, usually in the cities. This people need to get around these cities and to their work places in a fast and easy manner and that means trains, trams, etc.

That isn't to say we don't need roads as well. Just that we aren't Germany, we don't really have heavy industry that requires great roads.

It is ironic that we spent all our focus of the celtic tiger years on road building, when we don't have a massive need for it, instead of what the most important parts of our economy (IT/Financil Services) needed (Broadband infrastructure and Public Transport).

Wild Bill

bk wrote: »

But the most important and valuable part of our economy is graduates working in the IT and financial services, usually in the cities. This people need to get around these cities and to their work places in a fast and easy manner and that means trains, trams, etc.

Never said we don't need public transport in cities. But Dublin city doesn't stop at the City Council boundaries. The people you speak of work in Sandyford, Clondalkin, Leixlip, Blanchardstown and, yes, Citywest. Places their employers wanted to set up in. They are not based, in the main, within smelling distance of that great urinal, Temple Bar!

That isn't to say we don't need roads as well. Just that we aren't Germany, we don't really have heavy industry that requires great roads.

As someone in the "heavy" end of the business and who currently personally travels 50k/annum on the new motorways I can assure you the impact on productivity of man and machine is humongous. We needed them extremely badly; they were 20 years late.

It is ironic that we spent all our focus of the celtic tiger years on road building, when we don't have a massive need for it, instead of what the most important parts of our economy (IT/Financil Services) needed (Broadband infrastructure and Public Transport).

We did, absolutely, have a massive need for the new roads. We also needed (and could afford) the public transport projects about to be abandoned - but we spent too much time in trainspotting arguments ('scuse pun), begrudgery, objections and endless pointless "debate" - and blew it. Money all gone.

And yes we need fibre; but we need both; and at least we got the roads. The screw-up on the broadband was not caused by the road-building. No "irony".

And I think since 2008 there is a fairly universal re-think in the West about the future being in Financial Services and not in manufacturing. Our agricultural sector is looking a much better bet right now than our Financial services sector - to put it mildly; the world still has to eat even as the financial system shrinks.

bk

Wild Bill, despite 2008 the financial services sector continues to do very well in Ireland.

The reality we are a small Island on the periphery of Europe with few natural resources and no history of heavy industry and manufacturing. We will never be a power house in this sort of industry.

Our advantage will be English speaking, excellent education system, low tax, business and foreigner friendly government and people.

That isn't to say that we didn't need the road network. Just that we way over engineered and over spent on it and that we should have put more effort into the equally if not more important MN/DU at the same time.

D.L.R.

bk wrote: »

That isn't to say that we didn't need the road network. Just that we way over engineered and over spent on it and that we should have put more effort into the equally if not more important MN/DU at the same time.

+1.

If the prev govt understood that, then maybe they wouldn't currently be languishing on the garbage heap of Irish history along with their garbled message.

Regards BXD, I feel a tad sorry for Leo having to serve up this sh!t sandwich that wasn't even of his making.

But its depressingly predictable that Dublin is to get yet another cheap-fix, stop-gap solution, while we wait for the real thing.

Wild Bill

bk wrote: »

That isn't to say that we didn't need the road network. Just that we way over engineered and over spent on it and that we should have put more effort into the equally if not more important MN/DU at the same time.

Nonsense - not remotely "way over engineered". That's the kind of mentality led to us having no MN/DU.

It wasn't the spending on motorways (as I've already said several times) that caused the failure to build MN/DU - it was the constant squabbling by folk just like you - who failed to take a holistic and ambitious view of our infrastructure.

Everyone fought for their own little favourites and attacked the others; pro-rail were anti-road; pro-city were anti-suburb, pro-begrudgery were anti-common sense; - add in the NIMBYs and the Greens and trendies and we got a self-indulgent Tower of Babel.

Thankfully, out of that morass, the NRA left us with something of great value. :cool:

Cathaoirleach

I can't believe what I'm reading. Our own Lord Mayor advocating buses over trams due to safety concerns to cyclists. :rolleyes:

Dublin’s Lord Mayor, Cllr Andrew Montague of the Labour Party, yesterday called on the Government to reconsider the proposed Luas link because of the “severe” impacts its construction and operation would have on bus services and on cyclists in the city.

“This project is going to cost €500 million, and the money would be better spent on bus parking and bus interchanges, tackling pinch points like the Cat and Cage [in Drumcondra] and expanding the Dublin bikes scheme tenfold to 5,000 bikes covering the whole city.”
Mr Montague expressed concern about the impact on the city centre of construction works scheduled to run for 3½ years, and about the long-term impact on cyclists having to share streets in the central area with tram tracks running parallel.


“Tram tracks are dangerous for cyclists. So, in addition to damaging bus services, Luas BXD is going to make cycling less attractive,” he said, adding that unless rubber strips were inserted alongside tracks to close gaps, it would “damage cycling in the city”.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2011/0825/1224302930945.html

cgcsb

Cathaoirleach wrote: »

I can't believe what I'm reading. Our own Lord Mayor advocating buses over trams due to safety concerns to cyclists. :rolleyes:



http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2011/0825/1224302930945.html

what a douche

NFD100

Oh no, more vested interests over the common good! He isn't a Labour politician by any chance? All those union heads in Dublin Bus pay their subs and support the Labour party...

Dublin Bus... run for its employees, not for the general travelling public

markpb

NFD100 wrote: »

Oh no, more vested interests over the common good! He isn't a Labour politician by any chance? All those union heads in Dublin Bus pay their subs and support the Labour party

What a load of rubbish. Every Luas tram operator must be a member of Siptu by contract - it's a closed shop. More Luas tracks = more Luas trams = guaranteed more Siptu members.

monument

While I would not be fully in agreeance with him, he does have some valid points.

It's a general problem caused by the disconnect transport and road authorities.

The decision making (including direct voting for packages of transport measures), funding (including tax collection), planning, design, and routing for buses, rail, light rail, and traffic, including cycling, should be in the hands of one body... Ok it may be too forward thinking for Dublin to get ahead of such advance cities such as Los Angeles. But at least the route, understructure, and traffic planning should be all in one.

Just as with Metro North and Dart Underground, the buses services were not looked at when it came to BXD or other Luas projects. The bus services were mostly an afterthought. With BXD: Where are the bus stops going to go? What impact will it have on services? What services should be made interchange with it? What services need to be scraped or changed? Should we look a different bus-only routes for the city centre? These are questions we should have answers to before not after the project gets the green light.

As for the impact on cyclists -- you clearly haven't seen the designs for the trams ways in the city centre if you think it won't have any impact on cyclist movements and by mixing an ever growing number of cyclists with buses more you're going to slow cyclists and buses at peak and off peak times. And there's loads of questions around could better designs have helped? But the problem is again bodies with very limited remits which do not look at the bigger picture.

In future planning terms BXD is crazy in its self -- We don't know what the plans or options for expanding it from Broombridge. This is the kind of thing we should know before building.

donvito99

Its rather amazing to think that the Lord Mayor has two arguments against BXD;

- Conflict with buses = valid point

- CYCLISTS = jesus, build a fupping cycle lane? I cycle the on street sections of the green line everyday, and have done the Abbey St section on the red once from Connolly to the CCoJ building: wheres the problem?

To be honest, if BXD doesn't go ahead, I'd be in favour of a re-think on it. I believe a routing down past G/ment buildings and to Pearse etc would offer some pretty good connections, but oh no wait....no DU :rolleyes:

cgcsb

presently, there is a very serious issue with Dublin Bus and that is their fetish for O'Connell Bridge. Far to many services use O'Connel Bridge+College Green, when more direct routes are available.

Luas BXD will require the following changes:
-The Taxi rank on Grafton Street Removed
-The Bus stops on Grafton Street removed
-a 18hr/day car ban on Grafton st/College Green
-a serious reduction in Dublin buses using the street.

This will lead to a possible restoration of two way movements for buses on Nassau St/Grafton st route, and a possible pedestrianisation of Sufolk st.

bk

In fairness, he has a point about the need for a bus interchange and the elimination of bottlenecks like the Cat & The Cage.

The necessity of Luas BX is questionable if we had Metro North

monument

cgcsb -- For better or for worse, should your suggestions not be looked at and made public over the planning stages of BXD?

donvito99 -- Surely the people who are planning to dig up the roads should also be planning for cycle lanes or other cycling previsions and not leave it up to somebody else to have to come along later and fix what they broke?

cgcsb

monument wrote: »

cgcsb -- For better or for worse, should your suggestions not be looked at and made public over the planning stages of BXD?

the taxi rank and bus stops will HAVE to be removed for luas BXD to function. A Private traffic ban and a reduction in buses on college green will have to take place for BXD to rub well.

cgcsb

there's a brand new real time display at a bus stop on Grafton st. perhaps this is an indication that BXD is not going ahead?