A Real Dublin Area Rapid Transit

This project is currently receiving no Irish government or EU funding and is completely self-financed your donation via Patron will help with further promotion and advertising of the project only, No salaries are paid.

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What is Dublin Loop?

DublinLoop is an alternative ambitious plan to solve all future transport needs for the city and brings together all the latest and major advancements in transport technology of underground vehicle tunnels and Autonomous Electric Vehicles for both private vehicles and public transport (Darts) that can be used for both above and below ground for A real Dublin Area Rapid Transit. a future proof high-speed nonstop public transport service for Dublin and beyond.

  • Make public transport more desirable
  • Speed up journey times
  • Promote MaaS & Shared Mobility
  • Reduce the number of cars on the road
  • Make Cycling safer & more desirable with propper segregated infrastructure
  • A Free Public Transport business model
  • A Door to Door service for those who need it
  • Make Full Pedestrianisation of City Centre shopping & business core possible
  • Improve Air Quality in the City
  • Reduce City Noise
  • Preserve the city's Biosphere
  • Improve Dublin as Tourist & Events Destination

Advantages of The DublinLoop

Less disruption to the city during construction, no need for large station blocks as required by Metrolink, no need for disruption to major road arteries, and by putting the majority of traffic underground this would reduce the number of vehicles on the surface, reduce emissions, reduce city noise, make further pedestrianisation of the city center core possible, free up surface streets allow for proper larger double-wide segregated cycling lanes.

The Dublin Loop Was proposed by Cormac McKay as part of his Transport development policy for Dublin to deliver a desirable free public transport system and was planning on running in the race for proposed position of Dublin’s first Directly Elected Mayor for Dublin currently being discussed by the Citizens' Assembly for Dublin as an independent candidate who was to assume responsibility for transport for Dublin from the NTA National Transport Authority.

He has self-studied future road and air electric transport and Autonomous vehicles development for a number of years and is now founder and spokesperson for Aeravai Autonomous Electric Road & Air Vehicle Association of Ireland and advocate for MaaS & shared mobility and urgent climate change action.

Parliament Street Dublin

More pedestrianisation would make the city more livable, safer, and enjoyable for pedestrians making Dublin City centre a more desirable place to live and visit as an international or domestic tourist.

Cycling Infrastructure

Busconnects

Unfortunately, the upcoming proposed €2 Billion Busconnects redesign of Dublin's roads, bus lanes and cycle lanes has poorly designed cycling infrastructure! With only a single 1-1.5m lane on each side of the road with poor not international standard cycling junctions,

This is a poor design it doesn't leave enough room for peak-time traffic flows in the cycle lanes and they don't leave enough room for faster-moving cyclists and faster moving new e-Mobility, E-scooter E-bike, etc. Because of this poor design, this may be one of the reasons the whole Busconnects project may be rejected by An Bord Pleanála planning Bord!

Pic: Extra.ie

A better design would be with the majority of traffic put underground there will be no longer a need for bus/cycling lanes

A whole road traffic lane converted to a completely segregated double wide 3-4m cycle lanes because our traffic is mostly in one direction during peak times could accommodate more cycling traffic and faster and slower traffic which would make it safer and more desirable to use for all users.

Photograph Nick Bradshaw/The Irish Times

www.aviewfromthecyclepath.com/2019/03/how-bidirectional-cycle-paths-improve.html

Next Transportation modular vehicles (Darts)

www.next-future-mobility.com

Instead of having multiple different types of transport vehicles Trains, Trams, Double-decker buses, taxis, etc with all the different changes required for a journey, having a single public transport vehicle that is adaptable and multi-purpose just makes sense.

Unfortunately, the NTA did not do any public consultation on what type of vehicle the public wants for its future transport needs and has decided that single-use double-decker buses are what it wants.

The current Hydrogen Double-decker bus trail is costing €2,400,000 for just 3 buses

This could buy 48 Darts

If the NTA proceeds with just the hydrogen replacement for Dublin bus and Bus Eireann fleets of up to 2500 new buses at €800,000 a pop This would cost €2 BILLION!

Alternatively, that investment could buy 40000 multi-purpose, adaptable, Next Transportation Darts that could serve the whole country where needed.

With the use of the Next Transportation modular vehicles (Darts) this advanced smart transportation system based on swarms of modular electric vehicles, each module can join and detach with other modules when joined, they create an open, bus/tram/train-like area among modules, allowing passengers to stand and walk from one module to another will make it possible to have more direct routes without changes and a door to door service with vastly improved journey times for public transport all controlled by an AI traffic management control system.

4 Darts connetted

If we had a larger system of tunnels in Dublin as proposed by TheDublinLoop they could be used by both public and private vehicles and not just trains! this revenue could help fund a free public transport service similar to the current Dublin Port tunnel. The NTMA currently owns the DPT and profits from it go into and national investment pension fund

If the public transport vehicles we choose had a secondary purpose of package deliveries when not transporting passengers this could fund Free Public Transport such as the adaptable Autonomous Electric multi-purpose vehicle's from NEXT future transport

If we poorly invest up to €15 BILLION of taxpayers and our NTMA pension investment fund on obsolete, expensive, non-performing, non-revenue generating transport services it could completely put Free Public Transport out of reach! and this is just for Dublin's transport proposals, Which could further deprive the rest of the country of adequate Transport provisions due to lack of public funds.

Why Vehicle tunnels and not rail?

Historically, Rail tunnels are really expensive to dig, with some projects costing over €1 billion per kilometer. In order to make a large Dublin tunnel network feasible, tunneling costs must be reduced significantly. 

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/nov/08/crossrail-faces-further-delays-and-will-cost-more-than-18bn-tfl

MetroLink and Dart underground 

The use of heavy rail underground is extremely expensive and nearly every project around the world has exceeded its budget and delivery date and MetroLink and dart underground will be no different.

www.irishtimes.com/news/environment/nta-revives-4-5bn-underground-rail-plan-to-link-heuston-station-to-dart-1.4539533

Estimated Dublin Loop Tunnel costs

The projected cost of The DublinLoop tunnels could be as low as €5,000/10,000 per meter with an economy of scale for comparison the Dublin Port Tunnel cost €750 Million or €83,000 per meter and the most recent Luas cross-city project cost €368 Million €61,000 per meter! 

Due to a few new startup entries into the tunneling business such as Elon Musk of Tesla with his www.BoringCompany.com and also www.HyperSciences.com being another with new cutting edge technology entry, Plus all the other current manufacturers of TBM (Tunnel Boring machines) have had to step up their game and are now trying to compete with one another for proposals such as The DublinLoop.

Busconnects map

For example instead of 230km of bus lanes as proposed by Busconnects, 

if we were to build smaller vehicle tunnels instead the estimated cost 

€10k per meter €10m per km 230km of the tunnels only cost €2.3 Billion.

Has this Urban Loop been done anywhere else?

Yes! The Boring company’s UrbanLoop test tunnel opened in Hawthorne, Los Angeles California at the SpaceX complex in 2019 with a Tesla Model X achieving a speed of 200 km an hour!

The first commercial operations.

The first commercial operation of the UrbanLoop is in Las Vegas Nevada USA was due to open at CES (consumer electronics show) but due to covid19 was canceled and opened earlier this year to transport visitors around the Las Vegas conference center.

This idea was inspired by Mr. Elon Musk of Tesla who formed The Boring Company USA.

Traffic is driving me nuts. Am going to build a tunnel boring machine and just start digging...

Elon Musk https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/810108760010043392

The DublinLoop proposal is not affiliated with The BoringCompany. 

There will be a number of  *public tenders to all interested parties to complete The DublinLoop project. 

The Boring Company and Tesla may enter the public tender process as may a number of other interested parties.

*This is a requirement of EU & Irish law

Other areas to cover at a later date will include the following

  • Directly Elected Mayor for Dublin.
  • Free public transport
  • Underground vehicle tunnels 
  • Autonomous Electric Vehicles  
  • RoboTaxi
  • Waymo
  • ZooX
  • Telsa
  • Multi purpose
  • Linkable vehicle
  • AI Artificial intelligent 
  • traffic control systems
  • Mobile phone location data 
  • used for traffic management
  • UN-ECE Autonomous driving regulations
  • Post pandemic new way of life
  • Public Tenders
  • Public consultation or lack of
  • Personal Safety crime
  • Road Safety 
  • Shared mobility
  • Car Sharing
  • PPP Time Bomb
  • Death of car ownership
  • Peak car
  • Double decker buses 
  • Hybrid buses 
  • Hydrogen buses 
  • Trams
  • Trains
  • Underground heavy rail
  • Dart Dublin Area Rapid Transit 
  • Noise pollution 
  • Pedestrianisation 
  • Rural transport 
  • Suburban transport 
  • Mental health and stress
  • Bus lanes / QBC
  • Food production 
  • UV 222 lights
  • Air Filters 
  • Tire wear and tear 
  • Air pollution 
  • Taxi & Bus Drivers displacement 
  • Jobs future  
  • Wasted Humanpower resources
  • Batteries life cycle and use
  • Motorways
  • Greenways
  • Recycling railway steel 
  • Densification of the city
  • Climate change refugees
  • Carrot and stick 
  • Deliveries 
  • Drones 
  • Brexit damage  
  • Consultant costs
  • C&AG Comptroller and Auditor General 
  • Minister for transport 
  • Transport Committee
  • Public Accounts committee
  • Your Local TD
  • Your Local councillor 
  • Your Senator
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