Any 120 km/h non-motorway roads?

murphaph

Well? Any takers?

a_ominous

In the Republic? No. Check it out
Then again, that link says trucks are supposed to do over 80kmph and buses are limited to 65kmph. Yeah right! :rolleyes:

murphaph

a_ominous wrote:

In the Republic? No. Check it out

That site isn't exactly accurate. Local authorities can pass by-laws introducing speed limits of 120 km/h on dual carriageways if they wish. I wondered have any actually done so?

unkel

murphaph wrote:

I wondered have any actually done so?

No they haven't. Not a chance they will in the near future and rightly so

murphaph

unkel wrote:

No they haven't. Not a chance they will in the near future and rightly so

Have you seen the N20 or whatever it is out of Limerick towards Adare? Full grade separation and it's even got a half cloverleaf connecting it to the N22 (I think those numbers are right), has to be one of the best engineered stretches of roads in Ireland and it's only a 100 km/h limit whereas the crappy M50 complete with rough noisy surface is 120km/h. Makes no sense. The N6 from Galway to Balinasloe will also be full m-way spec. When the N7 upgrade is complete there will be scope to up the limit there too, but they probably won't.

mackerski

unkel wrote:

No they haven't. Not a chance they will in the near future and rightly so

Mighty dismissive, if I may say so. Consider roads like the Arklow and Newtownmountkennedy bypasses, along with the bulk of the inter-urban N-road upgrades being built. Most will quite safely sustain 120km/h and should be posted accordingly. The motorway/non-motorway distinction is in most such cases not related to suitability for high-speed driving.

Consider the UK, whose default speed limit for any kind of dual-carriageway is 70mph. That includes those with at-grade junctions. In Germany, a non-urban dual-carriageway has, by default, no speed limit whatsoever. The same is true of single carriageways with two or more lanes per direction.

In this country there is (still, even post-"reform") far too little thought given to actual safe driving speeds when setting limits. It makes no sense that a safe speed would be 20km/h lower just because the signs are green and not blue, and less still that a de-trunked N-road should suddenly have its speed limit docked.

Dermot

murphaph

mackerski wrote:

Consider the UK, whose default speed limit for any kind of dual-carriageway is 70mph. That includes those with at-grade junctions.

Indeed, look at the A1 north of the border! Not the best example of dualling you'll find and still has stretches of 70mph running. The statistics still show that the vast majority of fatalities on the A1 are on the single carriageway stretches with 60mph or lower limits though.

mackerski wrote:

It makes no sense that a safe speed would be 20km/h lower just because the signs are green and not blue, and less still that a de-trunked N-road should suddenly have its speed limit docked.

Exactly, this makes no sense, indeed it's perverse because in most cases the road will be carrying far fewer vehicles post de-trunking. :mad:

I'm not a speeder by any means, but a sensible approach to speed limits needs to be taken so that they are universally respected and the Gardai have the respect of the motoring public for enforcing them.

a_ominous

But the speed limits are not just about cars or the quality of the road surface. Motorways have higher speed limits because they're designed to have fewer access/egress points on them. Pedestrian and slow moving vehicles are also prevented on motorways. Even then, the M50 has that fecking 100 kmph stretch from Firhouse to Ballinteer because the designers couldn't be bothered to build a straight road.
I have read somewhere that one of the reasons for the changing limits on the N11 is due to the various towns along the (old) route.

Our man in Havana

No super R roads (100km/h) yet either, what a joke. :mad:

unkel

mackerski wrote:

Consider roads like the Arklow and Newtownmountkennedy bypasses, along with the bulk of the inter-urban N-road upgrades being built. Most will quite safely sustain 120km/h and should be posted accordingly

Any roads built to European Motorway standards should be marked as motorway, with the default motorway speed limit applied

I wouldn't favour single carriageways with a speed limit of over 100 km/h

DubTony

a_ominous wrote:

But the speed limits are not just about cars or the quality of the road surface. Motorways have higher speed limits because they're designed to have fewer access/egress points on them.

Surely the new stretch of the N11 has fewer access and exit ponts than the M50. There is definitely a case for increasing the limit. Although, when a council reduces the speed limit from 100 to 80 for a bend (just after Kilmacanogue), it makes it hard to believe that there will ever be an N road with a 120 limit.

Balfa

not to stray off topic or anything, but what is "de-trunking"?
And what's super R?

murphaph

Balfa wrote:

not to stray off topic or anything, but what is "de-trunking"?

It's when a fomer national route (NX or, rarely if ever an NXX) are stripped of their national route status because (usually always!) a better road is replacing it. Look at the old N1 where it runs beside the M1, oh wait-you can't-they detrunked it and slashed the old speed limit on a now quieter road, completely senseless.

Balfa wrote:

And what's super R?

It's not an official name but I bet the OP meant a former national (N) road, now reduced to regional (R) status or one of the many stretches of very high quality R roads which were always R roads where a 100km/h limit would be entirely appropriate.

sceptre

murphaph wrote:

Have you seen the N20 or whatever it is out of Limerick towards Adare? Full grade separation and it's even got a half cloverleaf connecting it

Aye, it's a fine road.

to the N22 (I think those numbers are right)

The road numbering is downright hilarious though. N21 by the way. Things is, that road is the N20 as you leave Limerick. It's still the N20 when you reach the turnoff for Cork. Then the exact same road magically instantly turns into the N21 and the N20 reappears up the hill going south for another 60 miles and north for another 60 yards. I assume it's at the bridge it changes as otherwise you'd be driving both on and under the N20. I suppose it's a historicical mudgefudgery thing - the old road had an actual turnoff on it where the major and minor roads were both the N20, though that was silly too. Doesn't affect your good point that it's basically a motorway called by another name, and darned if it doesn't feel as sweet as I use it twice a day.

murphaph

sceptre wrote:

The road numbering is downright hilarious though. N21 by the way. Things is, that road is the N20 as you leave Limerick. It's still the N20 when you reach the turnoff for Cork. Then the exact same road magically instantly turns into the N21 and the N20 reappears up the hill going south for another 60 miles and north for another 60 yards. I assume it's at the bridge it changes as otherwise you'd be driving both on and under the N20. I suppose it's a historicical mudgefudgery thing - the old road had an actual turnoff on it where the major and minor roads were both the N20, though that was silly too. Doesn't affect your good point that it's basically a motorway called by another name, and darned if it doesn't feel as sweet as I use it twice a day.

Woah, I'm confused just reading about it! I've driven it about 4 times and there were sneaky boys in blue on the overbridges twice. That's the kind of speed 'enforcement' :rolleyes: that gets right up my nose. Last time I used it was before metrication and I wondered in particular had that virtual motorway been given a 120km/h limit as it should have, sadly not it seems-more revenue for the exchequer. As you say-it's a motorway by another name but there are plenty of stretches of 'motorway' that are far far inferior to this and they have the same or higher speed limits. Very annoying. It should be like the UK-120 km/h for all dual carriageway unless there's a particular reason to lower it in certain stretches.

_Kaiser_

As well as speed limits being too low for the road, you have the opposite situation as well.

For example.. the backroad from Ballycoolin - Finglas is posted as an 80 kph zone and that's just madness as it's very poorly surfaced, narrow and with lots of twisty tight corners. There's a very bad blind corner on it as well that I always slow right down at for fear of being hit by some oncoming 40 footer or bus thats straying over the line

blastman

Agree with kaiser2000, that stretch of the road is extremely dangerous and to suggest that you could even approach 80 kph safely is almost criminally irresponsible, in my view. It illustrates perfectly how little thought goes into the setting of speed limits.

murphaph

Kaiser2000 wrote:

As well as speed limits being too low for the road, you have the opposite situation as well.

For example.. the backroad from Ballycoolin - Finglas is posted as an 80 kph zone and that's just madness as it's very poorly surfaced, narrow and with lots of twisty tight corners. There's a very bad blind corner on it as well that I always slow right down at for fear of being hit by some oncoming 40 footer or bus thats straying over the line

Yeah, that's a horrible road. Thankfully it's due for further upgrade. See here . The dashed grey line means new road. That's from the 2005-2011 development plan for the county, so expect to see it in 20015

mackerski

unkel wrote:

Any roads built to European Motorway standards should be marked as motorway, with the default motorway speed limit applied

One of the bigger obstacles to giving a new road scheme motorway status is the obligation to preserve a non-motorway route, which in some cases just plain can't be done (Dundalk North to border) and in others would simply cost more. Do almost-but-not-quite motorways have extra hazards? Yes, I suppose so - you might encounter a tractor accessing adjoining land, pass a cyclist on the hard shoulder or even see a lost pedestrian. An extra 20km/h is unlikely to put them any more at risk than they already are - a motorist, even the lesser-spotted safe and competent motorist, will never respect a system where the same grade of road has a significantly lower speed limit just because it carries less traffic (as tends to be the case where an almost-motorway is favoured).

Dermot

unkel

You're raising interesting points once again, Dermot

mackerski wrote:

One of the bigger obstacles to giving a new road scheme motorway status is the obligation to preserve a non-motorway route

Is that so? In France for sure that's the case as the Autoroute is always an alternative for which you have to pay compared to the free route nationale

I'm not aware of a similar setup here

mackerski wrote:

Do almost-but-not-quite motorways have extra hazards? Yes, I suppose so

That's getting straight to the core. There is no such thing as an almost-but-not-quite motorway imho. The quality of the road itself is irrelevant. If there is any interaction whatsoever with other traffic, it cannot be a motorway and the max speed should not exceed 100km/h imho

mackerski

unkel wrote:

I'm not aware of a similar setup here

You'll agree, though, that nobody is going to get planning permission for a motorway on, say, the Dundalk-to-border alignment that just happens to scupper the existing route. I'm not even talking about tolls here, just the disruption to a route relied on by cyclists, learners, farmers, local residents etc.

unkel wrote:

That's getting straight to the core. There is no such thing as an almost-but-not-quite motorway imho. The quality of the road itself is irrelevant. If there is any interaction whatsoever with other traffic, it cannot be a motorway and the max speed should not exceed 100km/h imho

People get very hung up on the magic speed of 100km/h. Here, it's the max speed on everything from windy roads with no hard shoulders and concealed entrances up to motorway-class (in their construction) roads. Ireland has a pretty high standard for its new-build single carriageways compared to, say, Germany, if you consider our love of hard shoulders. Consider once again how much safer the almost-motorway is than the single lane single-carriageway. Which of the two roads does not merit its 100km/h speed limit?

The thing that tends to muddy the waters a bit in this debate is that motorways probably should have a higher limit than quality duals - and it should be higher than 120km/h...

Dermot

murphaph

striking a pedestrian at 100 will almost certainly result in death. We're talking about fatal speeds here, be it 100 or 120.

I can't think of any motorway in Ireland that has closed the old road, so we do maintain a non-motorway alternative.

The Dundalk-Newry scheme is irritating-there will be a 100km/h limit south of the border and a 70mph (~113km/h) limit ON EXACTLY THE SAME ROAD SCHEME north of the border. Will the contractors be building to different superelevations, different sight-lines? No, same scheme, same specs as it crosses the border.

loyatemu

afaik Arklow bypass was built to mway spec but wasn't designated as such due to local opposition (farmers possibly). one problem with raising the limit on non-motorways is that cyclists, tractors, scooters etc are permitted on them (although you see these on motorways all the time despite the BIG BLUE SIGNS at the entrance).

murphaph

Virtually all new dual carriageway built over the past fe years has been built to m-way spec. The design manual the NRA publishes states that there a are no technical differences between m-way and 'high quality dual carriageway'. Sight lines etc. are the same.

I can't understand the new stretches of N7 between Cork and Portlaoise and even less can I understand the N6, Galway to east Ballinasloe scheme which is a completely new road, nowhere near the old one! It shold clearly be M6!

Andrew Duffy

The N6 scheme is full of private entrances to adjoining land; you can see them on the maps. If the road were to have motorway restrictions farmers would have had to drive long distances on narrow single carriageways to access their lands - allowing heavy machinery on the dual carriageway is a much more acceptable alternative.

jlang

Andrew Duffy wrote:

The N6 scheme is full of private entrances to adjoining land; you can see them on the maps. If the road were to have motorway restrictions farmers would have had to drive long distances on narrow single carriageways to access their lands - allowing heavy machinery on the dual carriageway is a much more acceptable alternative.

From looking at the scheme maps I don't see any access to the road other than at the main junctions. Access roads for farms are provided in several cases (marked as 'Proposed Access') but that's access to the farm, not to the motorway - they run parallel to the 'motorway' until the next under/overbridge to connect into the local road network. That would be the usual way to do this on the high quality duallers and they seem to be following it here - so no tractors!

el tel

loyatemu wrote:

afaik Arklow bypass was built to mway spec but wasn't designated as such due to local opposition (farmers possibly). one problem with raising the limit on non-motorways is that cyclists, tractors, scooters etc are permitted on them (although you see these on motorways all the time despite the BIG BLUE SIGNS at the entrance).

I've seen a couple of tractors driven by yokels and a bailer machine on the hard shoulder of the M1!

BrianD

Indeed, look at the A1 north of the border! Not the best example of dualling you'll find and still has stretches of 70mph running.

Is this correct? I don't believe so! I have travelled the A1 from the border to Sprucefield (M1) for many years and never noticed a 70mph sign anywhere!! In fact they have been making the 60 signs bigger and bigger each year!!!

On an aside, they have erected new gantry signage on the M1 from Belfast. Perhaps the NRA should go up and see how its done.

Seth Brundle

BrianD wrote:

Is this correct? I don't believe so! I have travelled the A1 from the border to Sprucefield (M1) for many years and never noticed a 70mph sign anywhere!! In fact they have been making the 60 signs bigger and bigger each year!!!

UK & NI dual carriageways hold a 70mph max speed limit unless otherwise specified. The 70mph limit, being the max allowed is indicated by the traditional black& white round "end of speed restriction" sign.
Have a look at www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/transport/managing/speed

BrianD wrote:

On an aside, they have erected new gantry signage on the M1 from Belfast. Perhaps the NRA should go up and see how its done.

Another taxpayer funded junket!