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Unread 25-09-2015, 10:28   #22
James Howard
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Join Date: Aug 2009
Location: Sligo Line
Posts: 1,115
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It sounds as if the potential solution here would be quite similar to Lisbon. The idea of a airport spur or a mainline reroute to go through the airport would work fine with the interconnector in place.

We are all too much in love with our cars in Ireland. We can't see the value in paying a bit a bit more tax so that we could get by without the need for a family to own two cars. When I lived in Dublin, by far the most viable way to make the 30 km daily round-trip from Lucan into work was by bicycle. This is still the case and is likely to be the case for at least the next 15 years. And that was a direct link.

Here is an amazing journey time for a student from just beyond the western edge of the city. Hazelhatch to Sydney Parade typically takes just under 2 hours. Using Google maps, the same journey takes 1 hour 15 minutes to cycle the 23 km. This is just an absurd journey from a town so close to the city to the station for the city's biggest university. How much economic damage is being done by the lack of a working transport system in the city?

Everyone thinks I'm made to commute from Edgeworthstown to Dublin but aside from the absurdly early last train, it is a far more viable commute than that available for a lot of people on the Kildare line. I suppose that the PPT should help that dramatically but it is going to make the morning schedule very brittle.

The airport issue is a bit of red herring in ways. Aside from the people who work there, most people take a trip to work a lot more often than a trip to the airport so the lack of a railway link is more of an embarrassment to the country than a practical problem. It is unlikely that an airport train would be any quicker than the bus services that use the port tunnel in any case and for people travelling to the West and North, Bus Eireann provide an excellent service from the airport.
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