Irish Sea fixed crossing

The distance from Hollyhead to Dublin is 76 mile.
The Thirlmere tunnnel is 95 miles long and completed in 1895.

Looking at the details I can't see the relevancy between the scale of a dual track train tunnel and a water Aqueduct no matter how impressive the engineering.
 

Pangur

Donor
To be fair in order to make the type of harbour I have in mind viable (200 MTons of shipping capacity), building a new decided freight line to the Tunnel would be the best move. You could specify it for double decker trains and such rather than sinking money in modernising the existing line and network.

I rather like the idea of a Europort as suggested. However the double decker trains idea does bring an issue which is weight, be that on the tracks or on bridges. I would very surprised if the current infrastructure was up to it.


Funds for such a project would have to come from external sources like Europe. You could also create a tax free zone in the harbour to attract more businesses and have them paying for part of the initial investment costs.

That may be feasible

I know that Ireland already has a good industrial base. But I stress the world heavy industry I was using, something which Ireland has very little of.
There would easily be enough space near the harbour to develop steel mills, aluminium mills and large refineries and chemical plants. Energy for the complex could be provided by two nuclear reactors cooled by seawater.

Very imagitive for sure. Space should not be an issue, the big however would be the EC and its plans as well as the NIMBY's

The general aim of such a project would basically be to create a Rotterdam on Shannon from scratch. Such a scale of development is needed in order to make the tunnel profitable.

Agreed
 
I'm not certain about the transit numbers to be fair, rough guess you are talking about 250 Ro-Ro's a week in combined truck freight and passenger, that's not even counting Container ships. So there's plenty of traffic on the route.
Problem is, there's way more across the Channel, and the Chunnel is still not much better than breaking even.

Looking at some CIE figures the limerick line can only handle 36 TEU's. the max in Ireland is the cork Dublin line at 46 TEU'S so there would have to be significant work done on the line I think.
And while they're working they could probably start dual-gauging it.

The distance from Hollyhead to Dublin is 76 mile.
The Thirlmere tunnnel is 95 miles long and completed in 1895.
And the Channel Tunnel is only 31 miles long, but took 6 years to complete starting in the late 1980s.
 
At the end of the day I wouldn't be shocked if SOMETHING happened this century, but my money would have to be on it not. Maybe it could happen in some sort of scenario involving a dieselpunk inspired empire that is a good deal more nationalistic, verging on fascist as well as considerably richer and more inward looking than OTL. Something of a mega project to secure continued control of all of Ireland, but we're really getting into something much more about fictionalized style than a serious TL here.

That said, would anyone have thoughts on a TL examining the completion of the 1880s channel tunnel? I can't imagine in opening much before 1904, but there's definitely room for some interesting butterflies, particularly once you start looking at Dunkirk and whatever postwar efforts at reopening the thing there would be.
 
And while they're working they could probably start dual-gauging it.

And the Channel Tunnel is only 31 miles long, but took 6 years to complete starting in the late 1980s.

Again though it comes back to taking the main line to half the South out of commission for an extended period of time (given CIE's work rate you're talking years of work at the very least), I'm not convinced that they would allow such an impact on the line. I'm not even sure when CIE last even broke even with general operations let alone such a huge undertaking.

As for the time frame even assuming slight improvements you are still talking at least 15 years based of the Chunnel time, given the other spending demands on the Irish Government from the late 80's onwards I just can't see them being able to spend what would be at least all the National Infrastructural funds on this project while the rest of the country suffered roads that were unfit for the volume of usage.
 
Problem is, there's way more across the Channel, and the Chunnel is still not much better than breaking even.

And while they're working they could probably start dual-gauging it.

And the Channel Tunnel is only 31 miles long, but took 6 years to complete starting in the late 1980s.

True but it should be remembered that infrastructure isn't meant to be profitable. Its meant to enhance the economy it serves.
The channel tunnel has done this for the south east of England and Calais.

I doubt a Irish sea tunnel would do this anywhere near enough to warrant construction but still, that it wouldn't be profitable in itself is a bit of a given imo.
 
There are some major problems with this I think, first I can't imagine Holland being to eager for Ireland to take trade from Rotterdam and given that the EU would be picking up all of the cost for this that's a problem.

This is a problem indeed, since the EU core economic region is the Rhine valley and Ireland is a fringe country lower on the priority list for investments.

Second building a new Port of that size would probably need to go further down the Shannon increasing the length of track for freight only, as to building a new purpose build track off the top of my head there's about 120km been built in the last 20-30 year maybe even further back. Laying a new line probably of different guage to try and reduce costs if you started in the 80's you'd might be out of planing by now.

Frankly considering the scale of the project we are talking about, building 120km of railway track is a piffle.

As for your ideas about building up industries, Steel, Irish Steel is going to get stroppy about that if you are talking pre 2000 and they are still around (given the crap they left across the harbour from me I wouldn't wish it on anyone else). Chemical, that's in the Cork area so you are just moving the employment around. Refineries, you have Cork for Ireland and besides the main Irish tanking point is on Whiddey by Bantry. That's already a sunk cost depending on the timeframe you are talking about. Aluminum, maybe pair it with Auginish but Ireland's energy cost would impact that. Leading on to forget about a pair of nuclear reactors, it's not going to happen. the only position that has ever been floated is on the other side of the country from Limerick and would never get through planning.

We are talking about wholy new industries there, so Irish Steel might very well invest in such a project considering that we would be talking about a top notch integrated plant here and not a small mini-mill.

Same for chemicals, we are talking about building up a new industrial base here. If a 15 millions tons per year capacity refinery would be established near the harbour, a petrochemical industrial base could be established. It would make Ireland fully self sufficient in refined products and allow for shed loads of refined chemicals and fuels to be exported as well, bringing currency in.

The idea is to couple the harbour with a "Chinese style" industrial park where everything could be built from scratch using the latest techniques and standards. Lowering production costs and making sure that all the other costs are kept as low as possible by a favourable tax regime and low energy prices, is part of the package as well.

A "can do" attitude would be required to make this work. So nuclear power is a must, as are easy planning processes. I sadly doubt that Ireland has such an attitude at the moment however.
 
Frankly considering the scale of the project we are talking about, building 120km of railway track is a piffle.

Given that 120Km is all that Ireland has laid since the 60's I think it is relevant, you are talking about a whole different spending priority for this, with lines taken out of commission for upgrading, new rolling stock etc. The Mind set in Ireland for supporting them.

We are talking about wholy new industries there, so Irish Steel might very well invest in such a project considering that we would be talking about a top notch integrated plant here and not a small mini-mill.

Same for chemicals, we are talking about building up a new industrial base here. If a 15 millions tons per year capacity refinery would be established near the harbour, a petrochemical industrial base could be established. It would make Ireland fully self sufficient in refined products and allow for shed loads of refined chemicals and fuels to be exported as well, bringing currency in.

The idea is to couple the harbour with a "Chinese style" industrial park where everything could be built from scratch using the latest techniques and standards. Lowering production costs and making sure that all the other costs are kept as low as possible by a favourable tax regime and low energy prices, is part of the package as well.

A "can do" attitude would be required to make this work. So nuclear power is a must, as are easy planning processes. I sadly doubt that Ireland has such an attitude at the moment however.

What you are talking about is trying to move existing industrial bases from one area in Ireland to another with the impact to the work force. Irish Steel was dead long before this, a suggestion otherwise isn't taking it's reality into account, from memory it was sold for a pound from the State to some Indian company, (consider the committed resources from the State to this mega project they aren't getting anymore funding). By 2002 it was shut and given the toxic/radioactive waste they left behind nobody in Ireland would agree to a new plant being set up anywhere.

As for the Refinery idea again it's not taking into account the sunk costs of the Whiddy Island and the upgrades to the Cork Refinery. I'm not sure how Ireland's tax regime would be more favourable particularly given the large need for tax to cover the capital costs of the tunnel. As to your nuclear suggestion just no, it would not, could not happen, it's not a runner, selling the New Ireland plan would be more of a possibility.
how much would 2 reactors and all the other costs at the same time as joint funding the tunnel, rebuilding the rail network, new rolling stock? At no time even at the height of the Tiger could Ireland afford all the capital outlay that you are suggesting.

If you have this idea floated in the late 80's early 90's the capital investments of the chemical/pharmaceutical industries have already been made else where in the country, you can't just put that aside for a second mega project to make the first Mega Project viable.
 
With a tunnel in place, nazi Germany could launch an invasion of Ireland and then use the tunnel to invade Great Britain...
:D:D:D
 
With a tunnel in place, nazi Germany could launch an invasion of Ireland and then use the tunnel to invade Great Britain...
:D:D:D

It's a cunning plan. Surely getting to Ireland would be easier than going across the channel. In the words of top gear how hard could it be?

But seriously to underline my point about the viability of this in terms of Ireland, it's just come out that the survival of CIE in total is in threat right now. A massive expansion such as this would have made the situation worse before now and certainly reduces the chances going forward.
 
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