New Train Control Centre at Heuston

[Rob]

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/new-heuston-station-control-centre-to-manage-250-000-train-movements-a-year-1.4281580

[Noel]

33 minutes ago, Rob said:

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/new-heuston-station-control-centre-to-manage-250-000-train-movements-a-year-1.4281580

Looks like that building may take a big chunk out of the car park.

[jhb171achill]

Looks like it will eliminate it entirely!

How on earth are they to attract people to use the railway if they have nowhere to park? It's not as if Dublin has half-sensible public transport! Overpriced buses take the longest and slowest route to get from anywhere to anywhere, in order to serve every boreen. I only use buses as an absolute last option - and I'm PRO-public transport!

[DERAILED]

Surely there's acres of space in Inchicore Works that this "state of the art" centre could be built in without removing causing any problems?

[airfixfan]

What an ugly building!

[minister_for_hardship]

35 minutes ago, airfixfan said:

What an ugly building!

It's a wonder architects can't design a nice looking building anymore.

[Robert Shrives]

Big joke would seem to be staff parking on picture if it is 5 floors . Recent developments in slashing public transport have shown the issue of getting staff to work - most live so far away from work that cars is the go to safe easy alternative. 

I am sure that there are measures in place but putting all eggs in one basket in such a over seen place strikes me as fool  hardy.  York ROC came within inches of flooding after it was built on the flood plain in York, the river kindly showed the supidity... if lost nothing  Doncaster - Durham signalling wise and no comms Kings Cross - Berwick on Tweed, So no ECML...  I recall 3 mile island ...  It is just cost efficient when it works well but degraded and incident operation falls over and network becomes a laughing stock.

I am sorry to see Ireland will see network suffer at what to some  seems a great leap forward - at believing their own press releases!

Robert   

  

[Midland Man]

To be fair it's probably be built for the expansion of the DART so it can go as far as Maynooth and Hazelhatch which will probally leave that part of the network  Crowded and secondary line that need investment to make it more respective like the Galway and Westport lines will not come. The design is terrible but you have to remember that design was given the go to by council. It will ruin that part of Dublin for good. I hope that this virus may give us something good by stoping this in some way.

MM

[Robert Shrives]

At least one UK signalling centre is built into an equally uninspiring block house but is in a blast proof windowless bunker room   within .  Yet New st station concrete block of a signal box is now a grade 2 listed building to celebrate brutalist design, this new suggested horror for Dublin might match the rest of the redeveloped city so in 50 years time when most has been rebuilt again this will be seen as a gem...  or an eyesore to remind others of the stupidity of "designers" of the era. 

To me it has neither form or function in good light and if like Derby ROC a dead head white elephant as a carbuncle by an old friend but time will tell.    Hope funds allow an out of city emergency control centre with ability to function when this is a target. Such blatant target information is a risk to all who there and the network and thus the country as a whole.

Robert    

[spudfan]

And then there's this

https://www.railwaygazette.com/infrastructure/iarnrod-eireann-awards-national-traffic-management-system-contract/56766.article

Remember the big investment in the 201 class? Then they had an about face regarding loco hauled passenger services.

[Noel]

19 minutes ago, spudfan said:

And then there's this

https://www.railwaygazette.com/infrastructure/iarnrod-eireann-awards-national-traffic-management-system-contract/56766.article

Remember the big investment in the 201 class? Then they had an about face regarding loco hauled passenger services.

Shame 201s ended up rotting to rust in sidings at inchicore and the mk3's got scraped 10 years prematurely. But that's public spending and it seems the same all over the developed world - wasteful. Nothing compared to the waste in US defence budget. Now we are left with the hideously boring toy tram 22k yo-yos. But good to see a new central traffic management system. Had Tesla designed the new system, it may have been on a single 10ft touchscreen LCD display mounted in a giant electric RV parked at the end of the existing car park, with two operators monitoring the autonomous train driving and signalling systems.   

[hurricanemk1c]

To clarify a few matters:

• Most of the existing CTC equipment dates from DART introduction in 1984. To do auto-routing takes about two days to prepare on ancient computer equipment (relatively speaking) that struggles with the current service level without an more services. It's a dull, compact, crowded place in Connolly.
• There will be a back up in addition to the existing Emergency Control Panels around the country
• The new building is being built on what was Guinness Sidings 1, 2 and 3 (from memory). 4, 5 and 6 are remaining for stabling as required
• This is also being combined with the Garda Control Centre, so if anything it's saving money by combining what would be two buildings into one
• TMS is industry standard now, this will allow multiple different systems (that have to be separate to perform different functions etc) to work together, such as the Hacon Train Planning System to auto upload routing information to the TMS, that can then adapt said routing on a day-to-day basis to cope with delays etc
• I'm not even going to bother arguing about fleet issues, since it's been discussed time and time again with little understanding despite attempts from multiple angles

Edited June 20, 2020 by hurricanemk1c

[Noel]

The location doesn't look like it will impact the existing car park at all. Looks like the building will be energy efficient being fully powered by Solar PV from the roof (and presumably storage batteries). Looks like over 60kw capability.

[hurricanemk1c]

See, a bit of research makes the automatic "this is new it must be bad it's the end of the world" automatic response a bit stupid. As for concerns over one centre looking after most of the country, it already happens in thr existing CTC!

Edited June 20, 2020 by hurricanemk1c