Dublin Port tunnel

[A face]

I like this bit on front page.



Since when has a site been designed to make it difficult to use? Oh wait fai.ie

Maybe i'll bid for this...

For Adam... or this...

Would you get it though ... remember the best isn't always the cheapest, lots of different metrics involved. Just because the contractor is a buddy with the minister, doesn’t mean it had any bearing on the decision !!

[pete]

Would you get it though ... remember the best isn't always the cheapest, lots of different metrics involved. Just because the contractor is a buddy with the minister, doesn’t mean it had any bearing on the decision !!

Sure i'll setup an offshore left company for €20, bid for contract at €2m. I'll also hire a former civil servant to do the documents for me as he/she will know the tricks. Then i'll spend a week at Cheltenham where i'm bound to bump into the Minister & if my tips come good will get the contract.

[dahamsta]

Government tenders are an acquired taste, and I'm not that hungry yet...

[pete]

Government tenders are an acquired taste, and I'm not that hungry yet...

Its ok i'll subcontract to you when get the gig.

[Bald Student]

They give out about how much it cost compared to what the Government said it would cost, and for what we got compared to what was initially costed.

The government in 2002, when the details were finalised, said it would cost 675 million and started building it. The government then made 2 design changes, they decided to build a bigger station in Connolly and decided to build the Sandyford line to a higher spec so that it could be upgraded to metro easier in the future. These are both decisions which I agree with and cannot be called over-runs. This brought the cost of the project to over 700 million. The only over-runs that I know of is the cost of buying land was more than had been budgeted, land prices in Dublin have been rising quite fast.

There was a proposal in the 1990's to build a much cheaper system with a lower capacity and shorter lines. It was decided, correctly in my opinion, not to build that system but to build a better one. This urban myth of massive cost over-runs has come about because people are comparing the cost of the cheaper system to the final cost of the more expensive system which was built. This is no different from the other urban myth that the two luas lines were built to different guages.

[Bald Student]

It is ludicrous that the government up to now has been taking all the risk with projects as no encentive to developers to avoid those problems.

I agree with you to some extent but there are also problems which the builder cannot avoide for example rare snails or old buildings being discovered. If you ask the builder to take those risks on himself he'll charge a huge premium to cover himself in the event that they do occour. In the majority of cases when a problem doesn't occour it means that the government will be paying extra for no reason. It is better for the government to take these risks on themselves and pay them when they occour.

In the case where a problem is the fault of the builder (for example if glue is not mixed correctly), then the builder should cover it. I understand that this is already the case.

[Plastic Paddy]

There was a proposal in the 1990's to build a much cheaper system with a lower capacity and shorter lines. It was decided, correctly in my opinion, not to build that system but to build a better one. This urban myth of massive cost over-runs has come about because people are comparing the cost of the cheaper system to the final cost of the more expensive system which was built. This is no different from the other urban myth that the two luas lines were built to different guages.

Correctimundo. I worked in the Dublin Transportation Office (DTO) for a time in the early 1990s (I get around) and at the time the cost-benefit justification could only be made for the then-proposed three line network (Tallaght, Shanganagh, Airport) by scaling back on certain elements of the infrastructure - stations, OHLE and the like. So when the thing was finally built some of these corners could no longer be cut and, with increases in both land values and overall construction inflation, prices rose accordingly.

For me, the fact that the two lines built did not physically link together from the start is a complete fcuk up and one that I hope will be addressed in the shorter term (with a ground-level fixed link from St Stephen's Green to Abbey Street) way before the promised medium-term solution of a Metro tunnel to Broadstone.

The urban myth about the Luas gauge isn't actually far wrong as the running guage for both lines is 1435mm (or four foot eight-and-a-half in old money), which is the UIC standard for railway lines, whereas all railway tracks in Ireland come in at 1600mm (or five-foot-three). Hence no Luas services would ever be able to extend on to the main railway (as they do in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Karlsrühe) as they would be out of gauge. What that means for the future in practice is that the Luas/Metro network will have to be completely physically segregated from the DART and any heavy rail services that are to be developed under the Transport 21 banner (they can of course serve the same stations).

PP

[Macy]

I've no problem it costing x as opposed to y, if it's a much improved piece of infrastructure. I must have missed all the press releases and TV appearances by Government to say it was going to cost more and why.

[rebs23]

I agree with you to some extent but there are also problems which the builder cannot avoide for example rare snails or old buildings being discovered. If you ask the builder to take those risks on himself he'll charge a huge premium to cover himself in the event that they do occour. In the majority of cases when a problem doesn't occour it means that the government will be paying extra for no reason. It is better for the government to take these risks on themselves and pay them when they occour.

In the case where a problem is the fault of the builder (for example if glue is not mixed correctly), then the builder should cover it. I understand that this is already the case.

Absolutely spot on. If you ask the builder to take all risk then you are going to pay for it big time and in fairness how can you possibly ask them to take on archeological risks, wage increases, land costs, oil price rises, steel rises etc, etc. There will be a hefty premium for carrying such risks or else they'll go bust and you'll have more Eyre Squares. The cost of infrastructural projects in Ireland would go through the roof and there is no country in the world where the builders carrying all the risks on Infrastructural projects, it just doesn't work and hasn't worked elsewhere.

However the point remains that the Dublin Port Tunnel is a white elephant of a project where the most obvious solution and most cost effective to the problems of Heavy Articulated Trucks driving through the centre of Dublin to get to the port would have been to relocate the Port activities to Drogheda, Dundalk and Arklow thereby freeing up land in Dublin City Centre for housing. That would finance the cost of relocating Port activities elsewhere and provide more city centre accomodation for Dubliners thereby reducing on the double traffic conngestion in their city.

[higgins]

Ah at last some decent points coming across other then "Rip off politicians" ... I think people nowadays just say things have over run and they don't actually know that to be the case.

Like the clip of Seamus Brennan on Primetime that was shown by Eddie Hobbs. If Eddie had of played the whole interview (I know he didn't have the time) he would have seen that poor oul Seamus made some very good points that night and his comment was taking way out of context.

I'm not saying FF are great but its nice to deal in facts and not just blame people for overruns! Great point about the unforeseen issues above, you would be mad to start asking for contracts with one total cost as nobody would come in cheap.

The urban myth about the Luas gauge isn't actually far wrong as the running guage for both lines is 1435mm (or four foot eight-and-a-half in old money), which is the UIC standard for railway lines, whereas all railway tracks in Ireland come in at 1600mm (or five-foot-three). Hence no Luas services would ever be able to extend on to the main railway (as they do in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Karlsrühe) as they would be out of gauge. What that means for the future in practice is that the Luas/Metro network will have to be completely physically segregated from the DART and any heavy rail services that are to be developed under the Transport 21 banner (they can of course serve the same stations).

Another good point but isnt it now common around the world that the 1435mm is standard? DART tracks were laid in the goold old days of her majesty I think and are built to some old english rules??? Could be wrong but I thought to keep everything at the 1600mm gauge would have been silly or where did I hear that ?

[Macy]

i repeat, when did the politicians ever come out and explain why the cost was going up when they made the changes? If the impression is there that they didn't tell the truth, it's because they fookin didn't! If they were adding stations, why not come out and say the cost implications when they decide it? The only possible explaination is that they use these things to hide genuine overruns.

[Plastic Paddy]

Another good point but isnt it now common around the world that the 1435mm is standard? DART tracks were laid in the goold old days of her majesty I think and are built to some old english rules??? Could be wrong but I thought to keep everything at the 1600mm gauge would have been silly or where did I hear that ?

The 4' 8" gauge (1435 mm) was the gauge used by early horse-drawn railways in the coalmines of the north-east of England when George Stephenson developed his prototype steam engines. The world's first steam-powered railway was the Stockton and Darlington Railway of 1830, which used the gauge and since British money and the Empire spread railways around the world, this gauge was eventually adopted as standard.

The situation in Ireland is different as you know. This is from Answers.com which does the subject more justice than I:

The track gauge adopted by the mainline railways of Ireland is 1600 mm (5 ft 3 in). This unusual gauge is otherwise found only in the Australian states of Victoria and South Australia (where it was introduced by the Irish railway engineer F. W. Shields), and in Brazil.

The first three railways had lines of three different gauges, the dimensions being : the Dublin and Kingstown Railway, 4 ft 8½ in (1435 mm); the Ulster Railway, 6 ft 2 in (1880 mm); and the Dublin and Drogheda Railway, 5 ft 2 in (1575 mm). The Board of Trade, recognising the chaos that would ensue asked one of their officers to advise. He consulted widely and eliminating the widest and narrowest gauges (Brunel's 7'0 1/4" and Stephenson's 4'8½"), all other answers lay between 5'0" and 5'6". By spliting the difference, a compromise Irish standard gauge of 5 ft 3 in (1600 mm) was reached. The gauge of the Ulster Railway was altered about 1846, and that of the Dublin and Kingstown Railway in 1857, the alteration costing the latter company £38,000.

Numerous narrow-gauge systems were built around Ireland, usually to a gauge of 3 feet (914 mm). Most are now closed, including what was the largest narrow-gauge system in Ireland or the U.K.: those operated by the County Donegal Railways Joint Committee. The Irish narrow gauge today survives as heritage railways in both the Republic and in Northern Ireland; and, in the Republic, in the bogs of the Midlands as part of Bord na Móna's peat transport network.

There's more at http://www.answers.com/topic/history...ort-in-ireland if you're interested. Or even still awake...

PP

[pete]

I can't wait til Luas construction on College Green starts as will some nasty gridlock caused by it as College Green is the real centre of the city.

[Bald Student]

i repeat, when did the politicians ever come out and explain why the cost was going up when they made the changes?

Here's an example, there's plenty more if you look. http://www.transport.ie/viewitem.asp...g=ENG&loc=1345

Revised Budget

By the end of 2002, the required budget was revised to €691 million. The reasons for this revised budget included the redesign of the Luas facilities at Connolly Station. The new Connolly Station will be a major public transport integration hub where interchange of mainline rail, DART, Luas and bus services will take place.

Contract Dates

The contractual completion dates are October 2003 for the Tallaght line and December 2003 for the Sandyford line. The contractor has informed the RPA that these dates can not be met and that early 2004 is a more realistic date for both lines.

I agree that FF have made a complete mess of the PR of the luas and tunnel but they've not been helped by the newspapers who've made false claims or the opposition politiacians who repeated them.

As for gauge, I presume that the european standard was used because the trains were available 'off the shelf' where as to build them for Irish gauge would have costed more to get the trains designed specially. The metro is being built to luas gauge now so it's a problem were stuck with. Incidentally the 4 foot 8 inch gauge was originally used by the romans as the wheel base for their chatiots, it being the average width of two horses backsides.

[Bald Student]

I'm in two minds on the issue of seperate lines. It'd be nice now if they were linked but there was enough disruption when it was being built first day digging up about half the city centre at the same time would have been a nightmare.

[pete]

Incidentally the 4 foot 8 inch gauge was originally used by the romans as the wheel base for their chatiots, it being the average width of two horses backsides.

I've heard that before.

[Bald Student]

I've heard that before.

I only heard it last night. The electrical engineer from the tunnel was giving us a talk and went out of his way to bring up the topic of trains, just so as he could tell us his joke.

Did you know they'll dim the tunnel lights to half brightness at night? I tought that was funny.

[Plastic Paddy]

As for gauge, I presume that the european standard was used because the trains were available 'off the shelf' where as to build them for Irish gauge would have costed more to get the trains designed specially. The metro is being built to luas gauge now so it's a problem were stuck with. Incidentally the 4 foot 8 inch gauge was originally used by the romans as the wheel base for their chatiots, it being the average width of two horses backsides.

Bang on. The Luas trams are from Alstom's Citadis range, at least 50% cheaper than any custom build. http://www.railway-technology.com/pr...n/dublin2.html

Consolidation in the worldwide railway market means that only a few key players still build rolling stock here in Europe. Iarnród Eireann is in the middle of a complete rolling stock replacement programme and many of IE's new DMUs and EMUs (for the DART) come from Mitsui of Japan,although CAF of Barcelona still supply a number of cars.

Certainly from a British perspective the market to Ireland has died since the Mk 3s (those are the newer InterCity carriages in real speak) were built in the late 1980s and early 1990s. BREL (the main supplier of those carriages) used to claim that it wasn't actually that expensive to re-gauge their stock for Ireland but obviously the European companies are having a harder time building competitively against the new mainly south-east Asian players.

I'm in two minds on the issue of seperate lines. It'd be nice now if they were linked but there was enough disruption when it was being built first day digging up about half the city centre at the same time would have been a nightmare.

On the issue of digging up the city centre to link the two LUAS lines, as with all on-street light rail schemes you have to see the bigger picture... simply, the eighteen months or so disamenity that would be caused while construction was underway would be far outweighed by the benefits accruing from the number of potential interchange journeys that would be made afterwards and in perpetuity. Ten years ago usage of 10,000 journeys each way at peak times was predicted between the Tallaght and Sandyford lines. Well worth it on that basis alone. Who knows what the figure could be now? Think about the number of cars that could take off the roads...

PP

[Bald Student]

On the issue of digging up the city centre to link the two LUAS lines, as with all on-street light rail schemes you have to see the bigger picture... simply, the eighteen months or so disamenity that would be caused while construction was underway would be far outweighed by the benefits accruing from the number of potential interchange journeys that would be made afterwards and in perpetuity. Ten years ago usage of 10,000 journeys each way at peak times was predicted between the Tallaght and Sandyford lines. Well worth it on that basis alone. Who knows what the figure could be now? Think about the number of cars that could take off the roads...

I agree, what I meant to say was that I think digging up the city in two seperate digs is probably better than one big dig.

[higgins]

Yes I knew the difference in the gauge was for a reason, thanks for the explanation above. So if you think that LUAS had of went with 1600 to keep it in line with other tracks in Ireland what would the claims have been from opposition?

No doubt they would be backward FF not keeping pace with the rest of the world and leaving us now paying through the nose for wider gauge trains etc etc .

If the opposition didnt act like children we may actually see what the facts are. A comment above about lack of updates is strange as the six one news is hardly going to carry every little change in construction projects around the country. Im sure the information is out there if you want it.

Again its not a FF v non FF question as I think they would all do as good or as bad a job. The opposition have not exactly come up with any plans of their own have they?? If they had something to show us the country would be in better shape but 90% of the time goes towards tripping up the current lot. You wouldnt see that carry on in a primary school..