IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

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Enceladus
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IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by Enceladus »

This major road project, part of the N22 Cork city to Tralee route in the South-west of the country, linking Cork to County Kerry, has been in the planning for about 25 years.

The 22km scheme, costing €280 million, will involve a 2+2 Type 2 dual carriageway with grade separation of junctions and crossings and will act as a bypass for the West Cork town of Macroom, currently a major traffic bottleneck with its long, narrow Main Street on a very important national primary route. The N22 scheme will also involve a completely new alignment west of Macroom, replacing the dangerous and sub-standard alignment passing through the Gaeltacht villages of Ballyvourney and Ballymakeery.

Construction commenced at the beginning of this year and since then, despite the Covid-19 lockdown and work proceeding more slowly in April and May, progress has been very good with major earthworks in progress along the entire route and the construction of the major structures now underway. It is thought (and widely hoped!) that the eastern part of the N22 scheme - involving a northern bypass of Macroom, may be opened ahead of the remainder of the route to provide much-needed relief to the town. Completion of the N22 Type 2 DC scheme is expected in late 2022.

As with the other major road improvement schemes currently under construction, the N4 Castlebaldwin to Collooney in Sligo and the N5 Turlough to Westport, Transport Infrastrucure Ireland (TII) are the principal govt agency managing the project.

Here is a 7 minute film showing the principal works taken by drone footage last week:
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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by Chris_533976 »

Its a transformative route this is. The current road between Cork and Killarney can be an hour long, for 50 - 60km worth of road. This will make a 20 minute difference easily to the journey.

Without driving it, its hard to put into words just how awful and twisty the route currently is.
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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by Enceladus »

Tremendous progress being made on this important new scheme, as can be seen in this drone footage taken a few days ago. :)

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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by bothar »

A recent drone update or perhaps a future one as it is dated September! Some sections well developed, others less so in part because material is being moved from one place to another.

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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by Enceladus »

The best drone footage to date of the N22 Macroom to Ballyvourney 2+2 DC project - with the sheer scale of the earthworks in places very evident.
The footage was taken on Jan 15th and shows the entire scheme from one end to the other. :D :)




All going well, it looks like the N22 project will be completed and open to traffic in late Autumn of this year! :driving: :driving:
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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by spacetweek »

Enceladus wrote: Mon Jan 17, 2022 16:25 All going well, it looks like the N22 project will be completed and open to traffic in late Autumn of this year! :driving: :driving:
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news Enceladus - but it's Autumn of 2023 this will open, not this year :(
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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by Enceladus »

Superb progress has been made on the eastern section of the new road project, with wearing course and tarmac being laid from where the new scheme starts east of Macroom to the Millstreet Road. :)

This indicates that the N22 Macroom-Ballyvourney by-pass scheme will open in two phases, with the eastern section bypassing the bottleneck town of Macroom that is most badly needed opening in the Autumn of this year, with the remainder of the project west of Macroom opening in 2023.

This latest drone footage shows the scheme looking very advanced.

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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by Enceladus »

Excellent full-length drone footage from back in May of the N22 Macroom bypass project, clearly showing how advanced the Eastern section of the scheme is compared to the Ballyvourney bypass part where much work remains to get done.

It is expected that the Eastern section will be open to traffic in the Autumn. :driving:

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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by Enceladus »

The Eastern section of the N22 Macroom/Ballyvourney bypass is very close to completion and these is speculation that it will open to traffic around the end of October, but nothing has yet been confirmed by TII.

As you can see from recent drone footage, the scheme is very close to completion in the Eastern section bypassing Macroom but the Western
section is still probably 9 to 10 months or so away from being finished.

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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by Enceladus »

Eastern section of the N22 Macroom/Ballyvourney bypass scheme will open later this Autumn, the latest drone footage below shows the road markings, central crash barriers being put in place.

It cannot come a minute too soon for the denizens of very congested Macroom. There will probably be a temporary tie-in with the old N22 road at Carrigaphooca.

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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by wallmeerkat »

As per Type 2 DC, presumably awaiting the continuous white lines along the central lane segregation barrier?

https://www.tiipublications.ie/library/ ... 059-01.pdf

At least it's not a Type 3, never liked them, basically an S2+1 with a barrier, traffic can get held up (eg. slow moving tractors) on the 1 lane side with no overtaking opportunity.
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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by Herned »

Has this design of road ever been proposed this side of the Irish Sea? It seems a very cost-effective way to build a dual carriageway, it must be barely wider than S2+1 with a dividing strip like the Caernarfon bypass
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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by bothar »

wallmeerkat wrote: Thu Oct 06, 2022 10:29 As per Type 2 DC, presumably awaiting the continuous white lines along the central lane segregation barrier?

https://www.tiipublications.ie/library/ ... 059-01.pdf

At least it's not a Type 3, never liked them, basically an S2+1 with a barrier, traffic can get held up (eg. slow moving tractors) on the 1 lane side with no overtaking opportunity.
The 2+1 has been more or less abandoned as an idea, for that reason.
Future projects, for example on the N2, will be similar to the above Macroom bypass.
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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by wallmeerkat »

Herned wrote: Thu Oct 06, 2022 11:17 Has this design of road ever been proposed this side of the Irish Sea? It seems a very cost-effective way to build a dual carriageway, it must be barely wider than S2+1 with a dividing strip like the Caernarfon bypass
Indeed probably only slightly wider than the old Irish N road format of an S2 with shoulders eg. https://www.google.com/maps/@52.9299396 ... 312!8i6656

Up North (NI) I can think of a few S4s that could do with being converted to this (Ballyrobert to Bangor A2, Saintfield Road A24).
There was an S2 that was recently converted to DC with a narrow strip of median https://www.google.com/maps/@54.6851379 ... 384!8i8192
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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by Enceladus »

The Eastern section of this scheme, bypassing Macroom, will open to traffic on December 9th. :driving:

Taoiseach Micheal Martin is expected to open the section, the fact that he is a TD from Cork city having nothing to do with his presence. Lol :D
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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by murphaph »

Are there any longer term plans for continuous DC from Ovens to the start of this new scheme?
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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by Enceladus »

murphaph wrote: Fri Nov 11, 2022 07:36 Are there any longer term plans for continuous DC from Ovens to the start of this new scheme?

Yes there are, as currently the Ovens to Macroom bypass is a largely wide S2 with a high accident rate. I think the plan is for 2+2 but the time horizon is likely at least a decade away. It was much lower priority than the Macroom bypass scheme.
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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by bothar »

There seems to be a plan to open before Christmas the section of this route bypassing Macroom with temporary tie-ins where it comes near the existing road. Work will continue on the section further west for some more months. The original plan was for it all to open in Q1 2023.

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Re: IRL: N22 Macroom and Ballyvourney By-pass

Post by KrisW »

The opening date will be 9th December at 2pm; the road is ready - the two-week delay is largely due to a political representative's diary conflicts, according to local rumour.

The whole scheme was planned to open all at once, but expected opening for the full scheme is now September/October 2023. The project was delayed by Covid-19, but those delays hit the western section more than this eastern one (which is actually running slightly ahead of the original schedule)
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