Bridging The Gap

at

Tomorrow.

The new Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy bridge over the River Barrow between Glenmore in Co Kilkenny and New Ross, Co Wexford, will be officially opened.

It is now Ireland’s longest bridge at 887m.

They’ve built the bridge and gone over it! First people cross Ireland’s longest bridge in South Kilkenny (KCLR)

Pics via SkycamIreland

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31 thoughts on “Bridging The Gap”

  1. Pat Harding

    Did the Kennedy’s even contribute a penny to its construction? Quite why its named after the wife of a notorious crook like Joe Kennedy is beyond me?

    1. Spaghetti Hoop

      Well, she should be judged in her own right not by whom she married. But I agree – what an odd name / person to choose to name this fine bridge after! Are they looking for Kennedy dollars? I’m not superstitious but it cannot be denied that there is a streak of bad luck associated with the Kennedy name – so to name a load-bearing bridge after them is ‘walking under that ladder’ I guess.

      1. Paulus

        Indeed; it would be worse if named after philandering, crooked Joe.
        As to how this may bring bad luck; the opening line from the project report (linked further down by Otis Blue) is slightly ominous:
        “… there was a localised non-conformance at one of the 24 concrete downstands on the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Bridge that required corrective actions”.
        (Could F.G’s Noone be accused of “localised non-conformance”?).

      2. SopwithSnipe

        No, they’re looking for American tourist dollars. New Ross would name a dog turd after a Kennedy.

  2. Rob_G

    Dublin, bursting at the seams, can’t get a metro, and yet Ballygobackwards gets a suspension bridge…

    2. Tomm

      230 mil is a bargain to link the mega cities of Waterford and wexford . The 2,000 cars per day will certainly be thankful of the ten minute time saving.

        1. 01101101 01100011

          if it’s anywhere near as good as that recent M11 extension I look forward to riding it
          what a lovely ribbon of tarmac that one is!
          empty, not a guard for miles, perfect surface, some nice gentle swoops and great cambers – conducive to VERY illegal speed :)

    3. Slightly Bemused

      You do realise that the rest of the country exists, people live there, and are as deserving of support as those in Dublin, no?

      1. Rob_G

        For sure.

        But Dublin taxpayers pay for everything, so until we have an operational metro system (for example), I think we should put white elephants like the above on hold for a bit.

          2. Rob_G

            They do, but the taxes they pay don’t cover their outgoings – the shortfall is made up by taxpayers from Dublin. The only counties that pay for themselves are Dublin, Cork and (AFAIR) Meath and Wicklow – every rural dweller is subsidised by those living in urban areas.

            Which is fine, but when Dublin is starved for infrastructure while this type of white elephant is built, you can see why people living in cities might get a bit ticked off…

          5. Cian

            But they need to name bridges after women…. and there are 0 Irish women worth naming a bridge after… so they went to America.

          6. Brother Barnabas

            I long for the day we have a major piece of infrastructure named after twink

            the naming of this bridge – a longspanning slightly bendy erection – was, in my view, a missed opportunity

          8. class wario

            the rest of the country already suffers enough from the chronic centralisation of jobs/services in this country and now this fella wants to ensure that any public expenditure outside of dublin is postponed until a dublin metro is built. jesus wept

        3. scottser

          Ha! Rob wants to move anyone not working out of Dublin too..
          Hey Gran – get a job in Tesco or it’s off to Leitrim with ya!

    4. Otis Blue

      To be fair, its a critical piece of transit infrastructure linking the South and South West to Rosslare Europort and other locations. On the other hand the sum in excess of €200m that FG are proposing to spend on the upgrade of the 17km road from Castlebar to Wesport appears to have little justification. (The Ring Road!!!)

      The bridge is a decent bit of design and engineering, I think. Loads of interesting video updates as the project progressed here.

      https://www.n25newross.ie/project-updates/

    5. GiggidyGoo

      But it’ll speed your journey from the Dublin melting pot to the nice quiet South East, where you Dubs can mansplain to your hearts content to the locals.

    1. Brother Barnabas

      the castle in new ross is mildly interesting

      or that could have been somewhere else down that way

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