Oy vey, my son the Engineer designs signalling systems for railways in England. Railways generally get a green pass. Their rights-of-way were acquired in the 19thC when Capital was king. In general railway stations are plunk in the centre of town, so it's still quicker to travel between major UK hubs by rail than by flying. Because the last 10km in from the airport is shared by too many cars, buses, traffic lights and potholes.
An Bord Pleanála ABP is a powerful quango, the last court of appeal in Irish planning. They can take a hella long time to come to their considered opinions about whether projects can go ahead. There is plenty of scope for corruption and their deputy chair just avoided getting banged up in chokey for losing count of how many cunning schemes in property development he had going on the side. otoh, someone has to ensure that major infra-structural projects are compliant with multi-faceted rules, regulations, guidelines, plans and laws. I wouldn't trust engineers, or politicians, or me, on their own [each with their own limits, bias, obsessions] to decide where new roads should go . . . even if "we" agree that new roads are really what people or planet need in the mid-21stC. There are so many more stake-holders than 19thC railway engineers encountered:
- Population and human health
- Ecology & biodiversity
- Soils & geology
- Hydrogeology & water
- Landscape & visual
- Noise & vibration
- Air quality and climate
- Archaeology & heritage
- Agricultural land
- Other land assets
March is when Engineer's Week happens. Wexford Science Café were induced to Ask An Engineer for their March meeting. I suggested an evening on new roads projects in the County. Our convenor ran an engineer to ground. On 19 Mar 24, Bratislav Dimitrijevic, unburdened himself about the many and varied tasks he had to do as Project Manager, N11/N25 Wexford by-pass. When he graduated in Serbia 20 years ago, he little imagined that in 2023 he'd be haggling with an Irish farmer about a cattle-pass under a proposed road in Wexford. Which proposed road? 75 different routes for the 33km between Oilgate (end of the M11) and Rosslare EuroPort have been considered over the last 5 years. Here are the main options:
In April 2023 the "final" route was chosen after optimizing all the variables. It's more-or-less Route C except that the final route is going to use the existing right-of-way along the Wexford Bypass and ?upgrade the roundabouts? The Green Agenda requires the project to include Park&Ride facilities and "active travel" options: we should be able to walk/cycle from Oilgate to Rosslare barrier-separated from cars and trucks. At the WexSciCaf meeting on 19/Mar we were shown The Map with a fat yellow line looooping across it. This 300m wide corridor has been "sterilized" for planning purposes. But the final road will be only 20m (on the level) to 50m (cuttings and embankments) wide. Apparently ~380 land-owners (great and small) have stake in the 300m x 33,000m strip.
The River Slaney at Ferrycarrig has foreshore and tidal slobs which make it a SAC Special Area of Conservation. 13,500 sq. km. of this our Republic (including 3 stream-fronting hectares at Chateau Blob) are so designated: that's 18% of the whole country. The new bridge will be parallel to and West of the existing 1980 bridge. Built before SACs were a twinkle in an ecologist's eye, this bridge is 125m long and supported on 7 concrete piers sunk in the tideway and damn the otters. Check out the Old Ferrycarrig bridge. The new bridge won't be allowed to drip diesel-contaminated rain-water into the holy Slaney valley, let alone sink concrete piles into the slobs. The engineers are accordingly looking at building another 800m bridge to facilitate trucks and tourists spreading out across the country having arrive at Europort Rosslare. The RoseFitzKenn bridge over the R. Barrow 40km to the West is 890m long with the longest span 230m.
My question was whether sterilized land-owners who were not finally CPOed (compulsory purchase order) would be compensated for spending ?5 years in legal and asset-management limbo. I didn't get an answer to that. But we were invited to reflect on the plight of land-owners abutting the corridor: they get nothing except noise, disruption and envy.
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