Last month, 18th June 2010, the new Grand Canal green route was officially opened at a ceremony in Lucan by South Dublin County Council Mayor Cllr Mick Duff, Dublin city Lord Mayor Cllr Emer Costello, and officials from ESB Networks and Waterways Ireland. The Green Route, an 8.5km pedestrian and cycle route along the Grand Canal stretches from the 3rd Lock, Inchicore across from the Blackhorse pub & at the top of Davitt Rd, Drimnagh and continues up as far the 12th Lock, Lucan.
The Green Route is a great amenity for the people of Drimnagh & surrounding areas as the route is mostly off road, secure and safe alternative for commuters and leisure users. The route has over 300 lights along the path, which are computer monitored & have the latest dimming facilities to protect the natural habitats of the local wildlife. It also has 66 cameras installed for security with 24 hour CCTV monitored system. Personally, CCTV cameras don’t make me feel any safer when choosing to walk a route. What about you? How do you determine if a walk route is safe?
€25 million was invested in this new ‘Green route’ and while the route is a vast improvement on what was there before, it is hard to comprehend it costing €25 million & being closed for 18 months to do. It would be great to see a breakdown of the costs. I’m sure it would help people understand & appreciate what is involved in providing a service such as this to local communities. Anyhow, some parts of the walk are beautiful & really quite peaceful.
Whilst other parts are still in need of improvement as you can see below. 
Also, wonder how long this tunnel will stay white & a light in the middle of it would be good.
The path has been officially opened, however, there are still parts of it under construction. Will keep you updated on how the work is progressing. For pram users & wheelchair users the majority of the route is very accessible with just a few parts being a bit more challenging. Hopefully, it will be fixed soon enough for all to enjoy equally.
So what do you think? Have you used the new route yet? Post your comments here & lets keep an eye on this walk way. If we don’t use it, we’ll loose it, isn’t that how the saying goes.
The Irish Times wrote an anticle about it here & also Siobhan from the excellent Drimnagh Birdwatch blog wrote about the route before it was officially opened here. She has some better pictures than I , as I just had my mobile phone with me when I walked the route.
it is a very nice walk and I think I saw a few fish jumping the other evening.
However dont forget just accross the road at the luas stop is the beautiful landsdown valley park which is another lovely walk where you can get away from all the trafic noise for a while
Give it a try you might be amazed like I was having always been told never to go there
Just saw a comment from Facebook in realtion ot this post & thought it was worth posting here. Its from Finola & how she finds the route great for getting to ParkWest “I cycled it last week to a meeting in Parkwest. It was great – took less time then the car or bus. The path looks even better in reality – I would encourage everyone to have a wander”.
Delighed to see this development. I have not yet used this myself, although some people I know have cycled the new route and have been singing its praises! Long long overdue. Its a great amenity to have on our doorstop. I look forward to using it,and encouraging everyone else to do the same
Great to hear Vera. I intend to use it more as well. I guess it will take a while for people to realise it is there & how close it is for Drimnagh people.