Infrastructure that never happened

brianc89 · 23-09-2022 6:27pm #1

I came across some road infrastructure plans for Dublin which never happened, THANKFULLY. I thought it would be interesting to post here and see what other projects people can think of.

brianc89 · 23-09-2022 6:29pm

An advanced plan to build additional motorways into and around Dublin city would raise serious eyebrows today.

I laughed at the image below which shows a section of the Royal Canal which was due to be filled in and replaced with a 6 lane motorway.

https://randall.ie/unfinished-dublin/

Screenshot_2022-09-23-18-15-22-19_e4424258c8b8649f6e67d283a50a2cbc.jpg

L1011 · 24-09-2022 2:46pm

For Dublin alone, these being serious plans that had things like land reservations for them:

The bulk of the 30s Abercrombie plans for the city.

The 70s rapid transit plans with DART to what became the Square and Blanchardstown SC.

The M7 from Naas to the non existant J8 on the M50.

The Eastern Bypass, many different forms proposed over the years.

Metro West

The SDCC master plan for the Jacobs factory - it just got a data centre plonked on it instead

EnzoScifo · 26-09-2022 11:16pm

Wasn't there a plan to build a rail tunnel from Broadstone to Harcourt Street to link the railways and create rapid transit line?

would have been fierce handy!

Gusser09 · 26-09-2022 11:24pm

Bertie bowl. The prison at thornton hall.

Zebra3 · 27-09-2022 8:25am

Eircom Park as well.

Scannal covered both in a great episode.

Sam Russell · 27-09-2022 12:33pm

The children's hospital in various locations - at least three failed sites, before the current site in James.

brianc89 · 27-09-2022 5:10pm

I didn't realize it had a name but ...

...SUAS???!!!

Maybe this is still planned by DCC?

Screenshot_2022-09-27-17-09-17-87_e4424258c8b8649f6e67d283a50a2cbc.jpg

brianc89 · 27-09-2022 5:11pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119669581#Comment_119669581

Any links to this?

Zebra3 · 27-09-2022 5:22pm

Looks to be just the interview with whiskey nose and not the full episode.

edit- full episode there:

https://www.rte.ie/player/series/the-scannal-collection/SI0000004189?epguid=IH000383920

JohnnyChimpo · 28-09-2022 1:25pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119672128#Comment_119672128

That's the kind of high-volume, practical transport solution we need more of in Dublin!

cgcsb · 28-09-2022 8:01pm

The 1973 DART plan would be fair handy if it existed today and was supplemented with a tram system covering the city centre and the inner suburbs. Instead we have trams on street running for whopping distances

28-09-2022 8:16pm

The nuclear power station at Carnsore. Although this hadn't progressed as far as some of the projects above.

A bit like the Rossport thing, the protests did act as a magnet for activism, and helped advance a few careers.

cgcsb · 28-09-2022 10:10pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119677804#Comment_119677804

We got moneypoint instead to make us dependent on English coal imports and ensure that the Burren gets lots of nice acid rain. A tragedy really.

kravmaga · 28-09-2022 10:23pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119678216#Comment_119678216

I thought Moneypoint was closed down years ago

loyatemu · 30-09-2022 10:39am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119678271#Comment_119678271

it was barely being used until last year, it's back burning coal again now:

https://esb.ie/media-centre-news/ask-esb/moneypoint-power-station

loyatemu · 30-09-2022 10:44am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119675865#Comment_119675865

it was supposed to be a tourist attraction, not public transport. I don't think SUAS was an official name.

Around the same time there was the proposal for the giant lattice statue of a man standing in the Liffey, designed by Angel of the North sculptor Anthony Gormley (I'm not sure if this counts as infrastructure...)

Version 1

Version 2 (after people pointed out it looked like he was pissing on the quays)

JohnnyChimpo · 30-09-2022 11:34am

Did that Gormley sculpture ever pick up a suitable nickname, like the Millennium Clock becoming "The Time In The Slime"? Thus far my brain is only providing me with The Chap In The Crap but clearly the good people of Dublin must have collectively produced something good

loyatemu · 30-09-2022 12:39pm

I don't think enough people were aware of it before it was cancelled for it to pick up a witty nickname.

JohnnyChimpo · 30-09-2022 1:19pm

Missed opportunity. Actually I love Gormley's works and I think this would have been bizarre but pretty class, ah well

gormdubhgorm · 30-09-2022 1:24pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119675865#Comment_119675865

Jayus, the Greens would be on a real high if that came in!

The only obvious one I can think of is the Metro link. That has dragged on for ever. But I suppose that doesn't count because it is happening again, supposedly.

loyatemu · 30-09-2022 5:01pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119684739#Comment_119684739

Metrolink has gone for planning today, which will apparently take a year. Assuming it gets planning, it will then be at the same stage Metro North was at when it was canned.

murphaph · 07-10-2022 12:02pm

The Greenhills Road realignments are all still officially in the development plans I believe but barely anything has happened with them. The reserved lands around Tymon can clearly be made out on google earth. I am pretty sure that Greenhills Road traffic is someday to be diverted along Calmount Avenue.

whisky_galore · 08-10-2022 4:31pm

The demolition of a swathe of Temple Bar and the plonking of a massive bus station on the site.

L1011 · 08-10-2022 6:22pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119672128#Comment_119672128

It was a private plan, not DCC.

L1011 · 08-10-2022 6:23pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119712423#Comment_119712423

Those are in the busconnects corridor plans, I think.

Sam Russell · 09-10-2022 2:52pm

What ever happened to the waterbus service from Heuston to the Point?

It did start but then what?

What happened to the Hydrofoil ferry that was to go from Dublin to Liverpool?

spacetweek · 09-10-2022 8:53pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119721370#Comment_119721370

Water taxi happened for a while but demand wasn't high enough. Covid would have killed it anyway.

Zebra3 · 09-10-2022 10:40pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119721370#Comment_119721370

Is the hydrofoil ferry a different thing to the hovercraft, or the same??

If it’s different what happened to the hovercraft??

Sam Russell · 10-10-2022 9:03am

A hovercraft is a boat that sits on a cushion of air kept in place by a curtain/skirt. With it lifted off the water, it is blown along by propellers/fans.

A hydrofoil is a ship lifted out of the water by propellers still in the water. The ship can travel much faster because there is less drag with the hull out of the water.

Neither are particularly fuel efficient. The hydrofoil is not very good at tackling flotsam like logs. The hovercraft suffers from damage to the skirts.

Both are good for grabbing headlines and for grabbing the attention of politicians who like to project an image of being modern and leading the technological future. These type of projects usually die before launch and are soon forgotten. Some unfortunately get launched and sink soon after much funding disappears.

GerardKeating · 10-10-2022 9:28am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119669113#Comment_119669113

There was also a plan for a link along the south quays from Pearse to Hueston.

Donald Trump · 10-10-2022 9:30am

A big beautiful wall

BailMeOut · 10-10-2022 9:34am

The Dublin Bay Motorway

https://www.irishbulletin.ie/dublin-bay-motorway

10-10-2022 9:38am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119677804#Comment_119677804

Then again we could be better off without a 70’s nuclear power plant

Ronald Binge Redux · 10-10-2022 9:44am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119724632#Comment_119724632

Pretty much why the original plans for DART were criticised in the papers. Mosherways me buckos!

10-10-2022 9:52am

Michael lowerys vision of a thurles Las Vegas

10-10-20 · 10-10-2022 11:03am

The tChina Hub in Athlone... Shenzhen's Midlands bazaar...

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2056539255/athlone-chinese-hub

https://www.thejournal.ie/athlone-china-trading-hub-2-3166550-Jan2017/

Zebra3 · 10-10-2022 3:42pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119724704#Comment_119724704

Would’ve been some opportunities for cash payments though.

L1011 · 10-10-2022 3:51pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119721370#Comment_119721370

The Boeing 929 Jetfoil service started (so isn't 'never happened') but the seas were too rough for it.

The actual vessel was sold on and is still in service as far as I know, it had an accident in 2019.

One of the roughest/most dangerous pubs to ever exist in Dublin was on Commons Street and named The Jetfoil after it.

GerardKeating · 10-10-2022 7:58pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119724704#Comment_119724704

There was also a plan for a massive Theme park in North Country Dubin.

veryangryman · 10-10-2022 8:12pm

Theoretically speaking... if the Eastern bypass was to be built, would the toll barriers still exist. And if so, would the road then tunnel immediately under liffey?

cson · 10-10-2022 9:51pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119725022#Comment_119725022

Wasn't there mention of an Athlone International Airport or some nonsense like that?

We can probably file the GLUAS and CLUAS (or whatever the Cork one was to be called) under this thread before long.

brianc89 · 10-10-2022 9:55pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119728094#Comment_119728094

Yeah I was gonna throw that in there but wasn't sure if I was mixing up with the Chinese Economic zone. I think they were doing the rounds at the same time 😂🤣

Seriously like, to think we would build a new international airport in Athlone. Lolser

10-10-2022 10:16pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119724704#Comment_119724704

That was Richard Quirke who was behind that, of Dr Quirkey’s Good Time Emporium fame. Twas to be in Two Mile Borris, just off the M8.

Lowry was just the facilitator...

Sam Russell · 11-10-2022 11:37am

Of course, we had white water rafting in the Dublin City Centre. Has that been mentioned?

A huge waste of DCC funds.

CreadanLady · 11-10-2022 1:30pm

The whole transport infrastructure minset in dublin is still based off plans that are decendents of mad notions of a huge network of urban motorways and parkways dreamed up by the Corporation in the 60s and 70s.

11-10-2022 1:52pm

I knew I remembered something about this, The proposed City of the Sacred Heart. Even more demented when I read back on it.

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/the-100bn-future-city-26110658.html

Although this does seem like the type of grandiosity symptomatic of some illnesses like bipolar, albeit on a larger than usual scale.

L1011 · 11-10-2022 1:55pm

Mentioning out west, there was the proposal for a major rail-sea interchange at Belmullet, the expectation being that trains would be much faster than boats and that all express traffic to Europe from North America would call there to transfer to train to Rosslare and again over Wales/England.

Then aircraft came along. Belmullet never got a railway line at all!

timmyntc · 11-10-2022 1:59pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119730148#Comment_119730148

Combine that with one of the proposed rail tunnels/bridges between UK and Ireland and you may have another business case for the belmullet interchange!

crowe79 · 11-10-2022 2:52pm

Really interesting post from Idyll Race about the Mitsui Proposal for a metro in Dublin.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/80467061/#Comment_80467061

They wanted to build a metro from Dundrum to Dublin airport using the Harcourt Line to the City Centre (now the Luas Red Line). Then underground from Harcourt Street to the airport. He includes a really good article by Shane Coleman detailing the decision making process at the time. Unfortunately a process that led to the proposal been rejected. A terrible missed opportunity IMO.

The rest of the thread is very good too.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2056736126/unified-proposal-the-circle-line-and-the-luas

I'm intrigued by the mention of something called the Dargan Project but unfortunately the link to the website appears to be broken. I'd love to find out more about what it involved.

brianc89 · 11-10-2022 2:54pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119729584#Comment_119729584

Ah here now. Controversial addition.

Infrastructure that never happened

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