Public transport and active travel (walking and cycling) are being promoted and funded by the Government with new bus routes and cycle lanes being created all over the country.
Drogheda Cycling Group see this as an exciting new phase in the development of our infrastructure and welcome the expansion of DART+ Coastal North project to Drogheda.
Later this year Louth County Council will launch a plan for a new cycle lane from the Bridge of Peace to the Railway Station. In time the cycle lane will continue on up the Dublin Road which will be a great boost for the residents in that part of town.
However Drogheda Cycling Group are concerned about the railway bridge on the Dublin Road beside the railway station. Under the current plan recently published by Iarnrod Eireann this bridge will be widened to accommodate the new DART trains but there is no plan to widen the opening under the bridge.
This section of the Dublin Road is very narrow with just enough room for the two lanes of traffic and one footpath already there. As the numbers of pedestrians and cyclists increase this narrow opening will prove too small in our opinion to accommodate everyone.
In our main picture (above) we can see two buses are going to pass each other in that narrow space. This space is also shared by cyclists including children. This is a potentially dangerous section of the road.
On one side there is a metal barrier to protect pedestrians but it could be a hazard to cyclists. On the other side there is no footpath at all. As this is one of the busiest roads in Drogheda we think it is essential that we get the planning right for now and for the future of Drogheda.
Dart+ Coastal North has requested submissions from the public and the following is the submission made by Chairperson of Drogheda Cycling Group Noel Hogan:
“We welcome the Dart + project in general and the extension to Drogheda of the Dart system. Our submission relates to the requirement to enable better access for cyclists to and around Drogheda Train Station. Louth County Council currently are developing plans for cycle lanes from the Bridge of Peace to Drogheda Train Station and we believe this proposal will complement further active travel development in this town.
Firstly, as can be seen from this google street view screenshot below, there is very limited space under the bridge on the Dublin Road for pedestrians and cyclists.
As can be seen from this image, there is no footpath at all on the left. Cyclists and cars heading into Drogheda have to share the same narrow space which presents obvious dangers.
There are two alternatives for the traffic heading for town – one is demonstrated by the image below showing a bridge in Ennis, Co. Clare. The tunnel on the left was developed in the 00s when the line was being upgraded. This is one possibility for this route.
Another possibility is to reopen the old, overgrown link road, the entrance of which is shown below. This would allow an “up and over” option to be developed for active travel heading towards Drogheda town. This would require a “pedestrian level crossing” at the top of the bridge on the left, after which it would rejoin the link road from St. Mary’s Villas (Shown below).
This would merely involve reopening an existing road and some minor improvements – but would significantly ease the “bottleneck” caused by the existing bridge.
For Southbound traffic we propose that Irish rail consider using the extensive land bank (Seen on the right of the above picture) to either develop a tunnel similar to the idea outlined above – or a gently sloping up ramp to access the station. This would then join in with the existing entrance to the station on the north (town centre) side.
The two routes (one of which already exists and just needs clearing) can be seen on the aerial screenshot below:
