Western Rail Corridor

Our man in Havana

Why can't the WRC be let die quietly. Reopen Ennis-Athenry if they must but let the rest rot quietly.

Victor

Bond-007 wrote:

Why can't the WRC be let die quietly. Reopen Ennis-Athenry if they must but let the rest rot quietly.

But I want it for a cycle track!

SeanW

I just want to say that I think that the reopening of Ennis-Athenry is - to my mind - a logical move as is perhaps the Shannon Airport spur proposal.

The reason Ennis-Limerick is not doing great is becuase it's just that, a nonstop train from Ennis to Limerick. Imagine if the Red Line Luas went straight from Tallaght to Connolly station without stopping, how popular would it be. Ok I know this is comparing apples and orages a little bit but there are places on the Ennis-Limerick line that could do well with a service.

120,000 passengers per year? It's not a lot but it seems better than either Limerick-Ballybrophy and Limerick-Rosslare. Finishing the job and relaying the line to Athenry would create a good quality link from Ireland's 3rd and 4th largest cities, with Ennis in the middle and some smaller towns as well it very much could work, and a Shannon spur could set it all off nicely. In theory anyway.

The final point I'd like to make here is that in relation to the costings of the Northern section, it would cost a bundle. 150-200 million for the Collooney-Claremorris section might not seem like an awful lot, but if we look at the badly suffering people of Navan, who were promised a rail link - indeed a Fianna Fail election promise in 2002 (which has now been revealed to be empty, shallow, not worth the paper they were written on), but to look at the M3 development at Caninstown etc, the violation of the Clonsilla-Navan railway alignment as proposed in the M3 project would add €50 million to the cost of the line reopening. Rail spending in Ireland is dismal esp compared to roads, so that €50M would end any chance of the rail prokect ever happening.

Think about that for a second - in this country €50million is enough to kill a badly-needed railway project dead as a doornail. That's probably not going to change unless the next election puts the Greens in majority gov't and Trevor Sargent as Taoiseach, and we all know the chances of that.

So why then, do the WRC proponents insist on spending untold millions on the Northern WRC? It has no grounding in reality whatsoever. But there is an answer, go the WOT (or West On Drugs as Ishmael calls them ) website and look around at the maps, the thrust of their maps they have, sponsors etc, and you will find a heavy Mayo focus, with everything else being secondary. Mayo is already pretty well served by rail by most accounts.

ishmael whale

Victor wrote:

Can you remind me of the definition of "social transfers"?

I can’t find a definition of social transfers in the CSO document, but it does include the comment

Transfer payments from the State; these include the imputed value of some non-cash benefits, which accrue to households such as secondary and university education, free medicines and free fuel and transport for the elderly.

So it it would to include not only, say, pensions but any service offered free to persons on low incomes.

SeanW wrote:

120,000 passengers per year? It's not a lot but it seems better than either Limerick-Ballybrophy and Limerick-Rosslare. Finishing the job and relaying the line to Athenry would create a good quality link from Ireland's 3rd and 4th largest cities, with Ennis in the middle and some smaller towns as well it very much could work, and a Shannon spur could set it all off nicely. In theory anyway.

I have no problem with the idea that reopening the line from Ennis to Athenry could be worthwhile, and if it is it should be done. But no-one has produced realistic figures, unlike the situation for Cork suburban rail or, indeed, Navan.

If Ennis-Athenry is a goer let’s see that substantiated. All we have at the moment is the kick to touch in the McCann report about passenger demand being hard to estimate, which sounds like another way of saying “too low to be feasible, but I’m not the one who’ll be caught saying it. I shone the hard light of reality on Claremorris-Collooney, what more do you want.”.Ennis-Athenry should not be reopened if its just motivated by a feeling of “God, we’d better do something because of all of that shouting over the WRC.”

If the West would actually benefit more from, say, upgraded Dublin-Galway services, then that what should be done. And if there's no useful rail projects in the West, nothing more should be done. There seems to be a massive misconception in some minds that if there is a need for more rail in the East, this creates an entitlement to more rail in the West. That's simply screwy.

dowlingm

the other nice thing Ennis-Athenry brings is an alternate route for travellers going from Ennis to Dublin so that both northbound and southbound departures offer connection possibilities. More departures/arrivals makes travelling by any mode of transport attractive.

dowlingm

Western Intercounty Railway Committee dispute the conclusions of the McCann Report

http://www.westontrack.com/news137.doc (presented by Frank Dawson, Director of Services, Galway CC)

One can only wonder what their reaction would have been like if the WIRC and West on Track hadn't had so many representatives on the subcommittees and the likes of those cheeky Platform 11 types had been left near it. Poor old McCann told the truth and this is what he gets:

McCann asserts that there appears to be no economic justification for opening the Claremorris to Collooney section at a cost of €197.4 million, and he proposes that reopening of this section should be reconsidered in three years as the development of Sligo continues under the National Spatial Strategy.

He observed that this section would be extremely expensive to restore, at €4.3m per mile.

I would regard this as very good value compared with the of €22 million a mile estimate for the new line from Clonsilla to Dunboyne, espoused by Iarnrod Eireann as representing very good value for money.

Perhaps this is another example of the double standards which have plagued the decision making process in regard to the West of Ireland for decades.

McCann conceded that re-opening Claremorris to Sligo would be very difficult to justify except on the grounds of balanced regional development.

That’s sounds to me like our national policy towards balanced regional development is optional.

McCann also refers to the section as one characterised by low population densities with few towns of reasonable size. A bit like between Shannon and New York, but that doesn't stop Aer Lingus flying there. I thought the whole point was to connect Sligo and the North West to the rest of the country with modern transport systems, but I must be wrong.

Aside from transport economics, Mr Dawson seems to have a problem understanding Air Transport Agreements, too...

ishmael whale

A bit like between Shannon and New York, but that doesn't stop Aer Lingus flying there.

How can someone be so oblivious to reality?

Anyway, I was reflecting some more on Ennis-Athenry. The feasibility study on reopening Dunboyne is here:

http://www.meath.ie/Planning/Clonsilla_M3InterchangeLine/Clon_Dunb_M3FeasibilityReport.pdf

It estimates a cost of 156m, and forecasts 2million passenger journeys. This 156m is made up by Railway Infrastructure €68m, Property Acquisition €40m and Diesel Railcars €48m.

Ennis-Athenry is much the same cost for reinstating the line – circa 70m. Presumably there’s no significant property acquisition, as the land is still in state ownership, but some amount would need to be paid for railcars. That would suggest, ballpark, that Ennis-Athenry would need to carry something over 1 million passenger journeys to be as useful as Dunboyne. Maybe it would be, but given that WRC supporters seem to be suggesting 1.4 million journeys for the whole WRC this would seem to be questionable.

In one sense all this is academic. It looks like Ennis – Athenry is on the cards in any event, as presumably there’s a feeling of ‘we can’t do all this stuff in Dublin and not do something about the WRC.’ But I think we need to keep up in our minds the kind of volumes needed to make rail a sensible option. If one thing is certain, its that any level of patronage on this service will be presented as a ‘tremendous success’ (just like the Shannon stopover!!) and evidence that the full WRC should be opened - even if its only one or two hundred thousand passengers journeys a year.

John R

I can't comment on the possible figures of Ennis - Athenry, obviously there is a market for Galway - Limerick as well as onward connections north and south as well as Ennis to both. The bus services on this corridor are frequent and well used.

What I would question is the possibility of rail to capture a significant market of the travel between these two points.

The bus service is timed at 2 hours Galway - Limerick with stops in Gort and Ennis along with 8 other small towns served. With the service running through Shannon Airport it is 2h 15 Galway - Limerick.

Currently the train Limerick - Ennis (24.5 miles) takes 40 mns on newly laid CWR with no intermediate stops. A pathetic average speed of 37mph.

Athenry - Galway (13 miles) takes about 15 mns. A reasonable average speed of 52mph

If the reversing at Athenry is counted then the current lines will account for 1 hour journey time. This means that just to equal the bus times the 35 mile Ennis - Athenry section and stopping time at additional stations must account for less than 1 hour. Based on the running times for Limerick - Ennis that seems unlikely.

I just don't see it being good enough to attract significant custom. As for the rest of the WRC, turn it into a cycle path and it'll get more use.

enterprise

The train between Limerick and Ennis is timed to take 40 mins but often does it in 33 to 35 mins. With an increase in line speed fom the current 50mph to say 60 or 70 mph (a number of farmers level crossing currently prevent this!) the journey time could be reduced to -30mins.

SeanW

A bit like between Shannon and New York, but that doesn't stop Aer Lingus flying there.

Oh dear, seems like the author of this piece doesn't have a clue ...

1: Aer Lingus only "flies" to Shannon so much because of the Shannon Stopover as pointed out.
2: Aer Lingus "flies" Shannon-JFK - THEY DIDN'T BUILD A RAILWAY THE WHOLE WAY!!!!!

That guy must be on drugs.

PandaMania

How on earth did a feckin piece of single track railway line from Sligo to Limerick become some kind of sacred pilgrimage route for every scantimonius gob****e on these islands.

Open up Athenry to Ennis (if only to shut these muppets up) and make a new station at Oranmore a major priority and turn the rest into a cycle/walkway.

anything else would be fleecing the taxpayers and would only end up giving rail transport a bad name like the failed Limerick-Rosslare passenger service already does.

Victor

I'm wondering, is there any sense in a Dublin-Limerick-Galway service or Portlaoise/Ballybrophy-Limerick-Galway service?

spacetweek

PandaMania wrote:

How on earth did a feckin piece of single track railway line from Sligo to Limerick become some kind of sacred pilgrimage route for every scantimonius gob****e on these islands.

Here's a better idea. Build a short line from Athlone to Mullingar. This can be your route from Galway to Sligo. Sure it'll take a longer time but at least it will actually pass lots of large towns. Plus it provides a link between two Spatial Strategy towns.

Our man in Havana

spacetweek wrote:

Here's a better idea. Build a short line from Athlone to Mullingar. This can be your route from Galway to Sligo. Sure it'll take a longer time but at least it will actually pass lots of large towns. Plus it provides a link between two Spatial Strategy towns.

The line already exists.

spacetweek

Bond-007 wrote:

The line already exists.

Really?

So reopen it already and set up a Galway-Sligo service!

Sarsfield

spacetweek wrote:

Really?

So reopen it already and set up a Galway-Sligo service!

It's the original Galway route. Broadstone-Mullingar-Moate-Athlone-Galway.

However Athlone station has been moved east of the Shannon and is now not directly asccessible from the Moate line. The Midland station will need reopening or trains will have to reverse across the Shannon bridge to get into the current station.

I suspect the line will reopen eventually, but no idea when.

dowlingm

it would be nice to think that a bit of economic/population development in Athlone could make the case for both stations to be back online - does the current Dublin-Galway service along the GS&WR pass both?

murphaph

The line is not on the reopening horizon atm, however if it is to be a serious proposition then doubling the MGWR from Maynooth to Mullingar really becomes a priority.

Victor

murphaph wrote:

The line is not on the reopening horizon atm, however if it is to be a serious proposition then doubling the MGWR from Maynooth to Mullingar really becomes a priority.

Difficult in places as it runs right between the road and canal.

Of course using existing slots and passing loops could work. I wonder if diversion of the Clara - Athlone line through Moate would work?

murphaph

Victor wrote:

Difficult in places as it runs right between the road and canal.

The railway was originally double track as far as Enfield at least, the GSR singled it from Clonsilla-Enfield to save money about 60 years ago (crazy decision even back then). The section Clonsilla-Maynooth was only restored to double in 1997. The line is not constrained at all past Enfield. It would be one of the easist sections of line to double, I wouldn't be surprised if all the overbridges between Enfield and Mullingar were already built for two tracks-this was not uncommon even for single track sections.

ishmael whale

PandaMania wrote:

Open up Athenry to Ennis (if only to shut these muppets up) and make a new station at Oranmore a major priority and turn the rest into a cycle/walkway.

anything else would be fleecing the taxpayers and would only end up giving rail transport a bad name like the failed Limerick-Rosslare passenger service already does.

Shutting the muppets up is taking more than Athenry to Ennis. I'd suspect the thought process was something like this.

“I suppose we could open it as far as Athenry. Like McCann says, it won’t cost an awful lot in the greater scheme of things.”

“I don’t think that’s enough. Superficially, Ennis Athenry only looks like the kind of project that might actually be useful.”

“We could take it as far as Tuam.”

“No, same problem. People regard Tuam as something like Navan. The figures might say its only worthwhile doing Dunboyne, but intuition would suggest otherwise. I know we don’t actually have figures for doing Athenry, let alone Tuam. But, despite that, people would still think we were only doing what made sense. The Western voter is only impressed by acts of incredible gravity defying stupidity. There has to be no doubt about the pointlessness of the project.”

“Claremorris, then. Only didn’t McCann say something about doing a study of freight potential before going there?”

“It hardly matters if he did. No-one will remember that.”

“Sure, if we’re doing that why not the full Monty?”

“Erg, I don’t know. I don’t like this tram line across the bog business. What if they find a real track would only sink without a trace? The Train That Only Goes Ten Miles An Hour Or It Would Fall Into The Bog would get us on Prime Time. But Claremorris is fine. Even if only thirty people a day use it, we’ll still be able to spin how it’s a tremendous success and annually ten thousand cars have been taken off the roads as a result. You know, like we did with Limerick Ennis.”

“Brilliant. Now, how about a Luas line to Lucan.”

“Sure, whatever, it’ll never be built anyway. Run it by Liffey Valley and name a stop after Liam Lawlor.”

ishmael whale

I think this article by the CEO of the Western Development Commission illustrates the way that regional development campaigners tend to focus on advocating any old nonsense so long as it vaguely relates to their area, rather than spending any time reflecting on what actually needs to be done.

http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=GUEST%20WRITER-qqqs=commentandanalysis-qqqid=9414-qqqx=1.asp
The National Competitiveness Council reported earlier this year that, in terms of transport infrastructure, Ireland ranked 14 out of 16 developed countries, so we clearly have a long way to go.

If Ireland as a whole performs this poorly, the west of the country is at an even greater disadvantage.

This is just an advocacy position, without any analysis to back it up. Ironically, the WDC is actually contradicting itself here as on its lookwest.ie website it states that commuting times in the West are far shorter than in the East, suggesting the West is relatively advantaged. How can they be so inconsistent? Because they are just adopting advocacy positions, without any thought about what is actually an issue. This is irresponsible advocacy at its worst.

http://www.lookwest.ie/lookwest/Home/WestLiving/tabid/105/Default.aspx#Less_Time_in_the_Car_–_More_Time_for_You_
75% of people in the West spend 30 minutes or less getting to work

Only 1 in 20 spend more than an hour

Average commute time is about 20 minutes

1 in 7 people in the Dublin area have to travel for over an hour to get to work each day

In the West you can actually move – rather than sit in traffic – for most of your trip to work. Or, if you want, you can afford to live close enough to walk or cycle.

The Western Rail Corridor to Sligo serves practically the entire region and a population of almost 750,000 people.

Again, this is just an advocacy position. There is no thought given to the plain fact that the WRC will offer no time advantage over road and passes through an area of low population density. The WDC could invest its time in talking about real issues, like the social cost of one-off housing. But instead they take refuge in just adopting a stance.

The redundancy of their point of view is illustrated in the opening line of their article.

Anyone who has ever tried to travel from Roosky in Co Roscommon to Rosslare in Co Wexford by public transport will tell you that all roads and rail lines lead to Dublin.

Ironically, the western rail corridor will not have a stop in Rooskey, which simply illustrates that a settlement pattern based on lots of small towns and one-off rural housing presents a structural weakness as, on any given day, the number of people who need to get from Rooskey to Rosslare is too small to justify a service and any service you provide can only serve a limited number of locations.

However, none of this matters to the WDC as they are just beating a drum. No-one is going to ask how exactly they see a transport network linking Rooskey and every small town of its size to Rosslare, so they can go on peddling this nonsense ad nauseum. Reflecting on what Western development means and how it actually might be achieved would be much harder.

John R

Seeing as Rooskey (village of less than 1000 inhabitants) is about 3 kilometres from Dromod station (less than 10 minutes by tractor) on the Sligo to Dublin line and is served by the Sligo-Dublin and Sligo-Longford-Athlone/Derry-Athlone Interlink bus services. Not only is Rooskey-Rosslare an utterly irrelevant journey but ironically one with excellent connections. 2 rail options per day and SIX bus options, five via Dublin and one via Athlone.

These people are so fukking dumb they can't even manage to pick a village without good rail/bus services to make their utterly stupid point.

ishmael whale

Oh, god.

The Ba’ath party are starting looking like a reasonable alternative government.

http://www.westernpeople.ie/news/story.asp?j=28045
Kenny pledge on rail link

Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny has pledged that his party will complete the Western Rail link during a first term in Government.

Said Deputy Kenny: "I can now go further in regard to a timescale, as I will assure the people of the West that this project will be dealt with and completed in the first term of Fine Gael in Government.

Fine Gael gave its full approval for this project prior to the last election and that commitment stands and will be honoured by me.

"Cllr Murray’s comments on radio are to be deplored about a fellow Mayo man’s intentions. I could remind him of his Party’s associations with IRA elements that for years blew up railway lines in this country…..

dowlingm

Remember indakinny has Olivia Mitchell as transport spokesman - distinctly odd views, that one.

westtip

Victor wrote:

But I want it for a cycle track!

Right on - it would make a fantistic tourist attraction as a long distance cycle track and footpath. Take look a the Tissington Trail in Derbyshire - a huge success. Trouble is we don't do footpaths too well in this country. Another option is to open the track and use it for steam trains - again a fantastic tourist opportunity.

Make the N17/N18 a dual carriageway the whole way from Cork to Letterkenny as proposed and upgrade some of the dangerous regional roads we have (N59 Sligo to Ballina for example).

MG

I find this analysis both simple and simplistic. It does not touch deeper issues or even constitute a reasonable analysis of the figures. A brief look at the stats throw up some interesting questions which need to be addressed for a rounded discussion – not that a rounded discussion is likely.

Net tax is a poor measure and should not be used .
Where is the surplus going?
Why is self employed income per capita (a possible entrepreneurialship measure) so low in Dublin & surrounding areas?
Why is unearned income is much higher in Dublin than the rest of the country?
Why are social transfers per capita for Dublin almost the same as Mayo?
How can we take account of the invisible transfer to Dublin from the centralisation of Dublin, both in terms of government and other national organisations ?
How many public & civil servants are employed by county, what is the average salary by county?
Why do some counties lag behind? Is it because of inferior transport infrastructure?
Do we live in a country where taxes are transferred directly back to those who pay them? Quite obviously not - all the elected parties espouse as a general principle that taxes are transferred from the wealthy to the poor. Can we therefore expect tax take to equate to infrastructure spend on a regional basis?
Why is pay in Dublin so much higher than anywhere else in the country? Is it linked to higher productivity or the "capital"/centralisation effect?
Why are unemployment rates higher in Dublin than in the West, South West or Midlands? (CSO household survey)

PandaMania

I once saw a site were Toilken fans had developed a mass transit system for Middle Earth with light rail for the Hobbits and TGVs for the Wood Elves to get to Rivenedell, but there was only a bus service to nasty Mordor.

It was actually was more feasible and reality based than WestonTrack and their supporters ideas for rail transport development West of the Shanon.

Which begs the question are people stuck in congestion who live in Dublin really just a shower of Orcs who deserve it and the Western Development Commision is run by Gandalf and Frodo?

Would certainly explain the fantastical and incredibly imaginative nature of the press releases.

mysterious

Well its obvious, when you are comparing Mayo and Dublin, I mean seriously why answer all those questions when you know the answer.

Dublin is the big city
Mayo is the arse end of nowhere, pretty much like other countries for example

French alps to Paris, why compare them, duh:rolleyes:

A terminolgy,
Reason why the living standards are higher in Dublin than anywhere else,,,
More people > more Markets> MORE money> More industry, then More people and more tax giving the city more money, so more people come here , ta da !well the cycle is something like that anways,

MG

MG wrote:

not that a rounded discussion is likely.

PandaMania wrote:

MGs you're a funny guy.

I once saw a site were Toilken fans had developed a mass transit system for Middle Earth with light rail for the Hobbits and TGVs for the Wood Elves to get to Rivenedell, but there was only a bus service to nasty Mordor.


It actually was more feasible and reality based than WestonTrack plans.

QED