FF and the Greens.....

ubiquitous said:
I really wonder when the M3 is finally built will we look back and wonder what the fuss was all about? Some years ago there was similar doom and gloom about the "destruction" of the Glen of the Downs. Once the road was built, everyone realised that the "anti" lobby had grossly exaggerated the environmental impact of the road. Maybe Tara is different, but its hard to forget the story of the boy who cried wolf...



Bertie will definitely NOT sack either Cullen or Roche. In Bertie's book, electoral considerations in Waterford and Wicklow matter far more than competence or leadership qualities. Expect Cullen to be Minister for Defence or Community Affairs. Roche will end up in a similarly low-profile role such as Social & Family Affairs.
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I don't think bertie will be worried about electoral considerations this time as he is not running after this. Maybe bertie will really want to make his mark and maybe he won't go the consensus route. Cullen and Roche are hardly long term fianna fail talent, i think at least one will get the boot. I think Brian lenihan has to be promoted this time.
 
ubiquitous said:
I really wonder when the M3 is finally built will we look back and wonder what the fuss was all about? Some years ago there was similar doom and gloom about the "destruction" of the Glen of the Downs. Once the road was built, everyone realised that the "anti" lobby had grossly exaggerated the environmental impact of the road. Maybe Tara is different, but its hard to forget the story of the boy who cried wolf...
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Excuse me if this comes across rude but that has to be the single most ignorant statement I've read regarding the Tara fiasco.

The Tara 'complex' is THE most valuable cultural site or item in this country. More important than the Book of Kells, Cross of Cong, etc. by a country mile !!

It's 6000-odd years old, has no comparable competitor in the world (apart from the Pyramids in Giza, which were all 'skinned' in the same types of quartz as Newgrange)

The Glen of The Downs is or was a nature reserve... It's not the only one.
Tara is unique in it's importance to Ireland since it's use as a seat of kings and ....

WHy do I bother...if you don't care, that says more about you than the place itself and unfortunately there's too many people who want a bloody road to get them to Dublin instead of a cultural heritage !!


How about Stonehenge...world famous heritage spot.
[broken link removed]
Looks nice, doesn't it....

or

Let's just let this happen..


http://www.stonehenge-avebury.net/Photos/StonehengeAir.jpg

Dick Roche must have no conscience or balls...I can't decide which.
 
Such scaremongering!! The proposed M3 is nowhere near as close as the road in that picture of stonehenge - in fact - it's going to be further away than the existing N3.

Anyone would think that the motorway was going to be built straight through/over the hill itself - it's not!

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You obviously don't have to experience the daily nightmare that is commuting on the N3.
 
I experience the N3 nightmare daily going to/from work. I cannot see the M3 alone being of much benefit as the major bottle neck is at the Blanchardstown roundabouts. The M3 will just bring traffic faster down to those bottlenecks and make them even worse.

The only solution is to get the Navan rail link up and running before 2015.
This would take a lot of commuters off the road and reduce road traffic. After all, less road traffic = less congestion.

I think the Greens would give higher priority to the rail service.

The ideal situation would be to have the M3 and the rail link in place asap.
 
redstar said:
I cannot see the M3 alone being of much benefit as the major bottle neck is at the Blanchardstown roundabouts. The M3 will just bring traffic faster down to those bottlenecks and make them even worse.

The only solution is to get the Navan rail link up and running before 2015.
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Very good point, although it should hopefully :rolleyes: ease other congestion points such as Clonee bypass, Dunboyne Junction, Fairyhouse junction, Dunshaughlin,......
 
possibly, I don't know where the tolls are going to be located, but if the toll on the M4 is anything to go by, the delays will be nothing like what they are at the moment on the N3
 
Pique318 said:
Excuse me if this comes across rude but that has to be the single most ignorant statement I've read regarding the Tara fiasco.
....

The Glen of The Downs is or was a nature reserve... It's not the only one.
Tara is unique in it's importance to Ireland since it's use as a seat of kings and ....

...if you don't care, that says more about you than the place itself
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If I am ignorant I am in good company.

The renowned novelist Colm Toibin, who opposes the M3 Tara motorway, and who opposed the N11 Glen of the Downs Road some years ago, comments on both in very similar terms here:

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The house is built now that I have been dreaming about for years. Every week I drive down from Dublin, due south through County Wicklow into County Wexford. I was born and brought up near there.

This journey to the new house where I write belongs to memory. A few spots along that stretch of road have all the resonance and flavor of childhood, but most of the road has changed beyond recognition. The narrow winding road has become mostly motorway - anodyne, anonymous, flavorless. I love it.

I wish I missed the old narrow, familiar road. But I do not. I love the efficiency, the modernity, the coolness of the new road. I love getting to Dublin in an hour and a half rather than two hours. I love driving freely in the outside lane, rather than being stuck forever behind a tractor or a cattle truck.

Nonetheless, when, a number of years ago, they were widening the road that runs through a nature reserve called the Glen of the Downs, I supported the protesters, mainly young people who moved there and lived in the trees. I spoke in a television debate in their favor, pointing out that Irish governments since independence have seldom been willing to put our precious heritage before crude, quick development. They would, if the opportunity arose, run a motorway through the Hill of Tara, the most important ancient Irish site.

Until recently, this idea might be useful in a heated debate as a worst case, impossible to contemplate, on a par with selling your granny. But this now is the prospect we face in Ireland. Despite protests from many distinguished archaeologists and historians, it seems likely that in the next few weeks, the government will announce that it is going ahead with plans to build a four-lane highway and a busy interchange close to the Hill of Tara.

.....

For commuters who drive each day to work in Dublin from towns and villages in County Meath, where Tara lies, it might cut 20 minutes off the journey. It will make them happy as the road to Wexford makes me happy. But it seems almost beyond belief that Ireland, awash with new money and enormous economic confidence, cannot find another route for the road and leave for generations to come a heritage that has been left to us.
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....and Eamon Ryan of the Green Party goes further here
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We lost in the Glen of the Downs, in spite of the fact that we were right - there has been no decrease in journey time for people using that road. We lost in Carrickmines as corrupt rezoning ploughed a road through a national monument. When it comes to the M3, however, we will win because of the political change in this State and the realisation that the roads-based policy does not work. We are not willing to lose our archaeological past or give up our sense of ourselves and from whence we come. The current political mood questions where we are now and the way the Government wants to move forward. It is bent on building roads and servicing the building industry at whatever cost. That is its idea of progress. It is not progress, it is destruction, it is bad transport and social planning and, for a party that wraps itself in a republican mantle, it is destroying the essence of our heritage and our ability to understand it.
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Now, any chance that you might please address my question rather than attack me?
 
sign said:
Is that a real picture ? Is that road really there ? I ve yet to visit the henge.
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yes that road is there, i remember a few years ago i was on a bus that drove past it, i did not know stonehenge was there when on the bus but could not believe it when i viewed it by chance out the window. When you see stonehenge on discovery or whatever they must shoot it early in the morning and blank out the drone of the traffic. However recently when watching something about stoehenge I could now pick out the traffic drone simply because i knew there was a main road beside it. If the government goes ahead with this it will be shocking. However I also now believe it will not go ahead
 
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