Ennis to Limerick line reopens

1huge1

invincibleirish wrote: »

No offence but i've been hearing this UL as a potential rail base on these boards and elsewhere since i went to UL 3/4 years ago and i dont buy it, a decent bus service is all UL (and Castletroy) needs currently, UL is only at 10,000 capacity for 26 weeks of the year. maybe if a massive P&R was built servicing commuters from Tipp & Co. Limerick but even then i cannot imagine any kind of project being justified in numbers.

Cork in comparison has an ok bus service (no.5) serving UCC & CIT, together they have a combined student population of in and around 25,000 as well as the parts of Bishopstown & College Rd. on its route, even then in summer time the buses are very quite.

I suggest building a lot of green routes and buy more buses to turn Limerick into a public transport friendly city, not the Ennis line or the rest of the WRC type projects with 600 passengers a day
__________________

Your forgetting that UL is located in Castletroy, Limericks biggest suburb with around 25,000 not including the students which as you said would add another 10,000

Chris_533976

And youre forgetting that the Cork bus service is so shambolically unreliable that its quicker to walk from the bus station to UCC.

invincibleirish

1huge1 wrote: »

Your forgetting that UL is located in Castletroy, Limericks biggest suburb with around 25,000 not including the students which as you said would add another 10,000

Hmm i question your numbers 35,000? no way.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castletroy

The population in of Castletroy is now approximately 22,000 people, of which 12,000 are students

Thats more like it, Castletroy may be a large area, but its just the University and lots of semi-d's. However im open to correction if you can source something better then wikipedia.

And youre forgetting that the Cork bus service is so shambolically unreliable that its quicker to walk from the bus station to UCC.

Believe it or not the No.5 is vastly improved on when i first used it 5 years ago, no really it has!

mysterious

1huge1 wrote: »

Your forgetting that UL is located in Castletroy, Limericks biggest suburb with around 25,000 not including the students which as you said would add another 10,000

Castletroy swells too around 25,000 with students, figures show it has only around 15,000 excluding annacotty, lisnagry and parkway etc.

mysterious

A bit OT

Government are committing to upgrading the Nenagh - Limerick commuter service. In fact they want to start work fairly shortly. From local new sources.

They probably see this been a very profitable line, just as the Ennis one is now.

The upgrade is nothing to tak about, just re signilling, changing times and minor rail works. The line should be upgraded to at leasr 60miles per hour, but I don't think this is going to happen! It should be upgraded properly

Half arsed jobs should be abolished...

KC61

mysterious wrote: »

A bit OT

Government are committing to upgrading the Nenagh - Limerick commuter service. In fact they want to start work fairly shortly. From local new sources.

They probably see this been a very profitable line, just as the Ennis one is now.

The upgrade is nothing to tak about, just re signilling, changing times and minor rail works. The line should be upgraded to at leasr 60miles per hour, but I don't think this is going to happen! It should be upgraded properly

Half arsed jobs should be abolished...

This has nothing to do with Government, despite what Michael Lowry has been claiming in local media, but more to do with a lot of hard work by local people.

Local representatives (some political and some not) worked with IE and formed a Community Rail Partnership with a view to developing the line. The first results of this is the introduction of a commuter service in September, and the elimination of the 25mph speed restriction between Killonan Junction and just beyond Birdhill which should knock between 10 and 15 mins off the journey time.

IE have committed to upgrading the line to 60mph under the current 5 year safety investment programme, which would substantially improve journey times. The local representatives are trying to accelerate that process and add extra services on the route, which should be possible once more stopping services are introduced on the Dublin-Cork mainline next year.

The relevant piece from the Nenagh Guardian this week is:

CLLR Virginia O’Dowd, chairperson of Nenagh Rail Partnership, has taken issue with Deputy Michael Lowry over comments he made last week on the new commuter service from Nenagh to Limerick.

“Last week, Deputy Lowry was telling the people of North Tipperary on Tipp FM that he had received word from the Transport Minister that the service was going ahead in September. I don’t mean to steal Deputy Lowry’s thunder, but, I regret to tell him that he is months behind in announcing the new commuter service,” said Cllr O’Dowd. “In fact, I have a letter from Dick Fearn, chief executive, Irish Rail, dated May 2006, saying that Irish Rail was committed to a commuter service from Nenagh to Limerick. The partnership has worked with Irish Rail since it was set up, and following a survey that we carried out to demonstrate the need for a commuter service, Irish Rail changed the times of the trains to make the service more commuter-friendly,” she said.

“This change came about in December 2006. Irish Rail is 100 per cent behind the new commuter service. “Dick Fearn met the partnership in October 2007 and told us then that the new commuter service would be going ahead from September 1, 2008. In fact, the service is already included in this year’s timetable, which was introduced last December,” she said.

She said that Deputy Lowry, along with other TDs, had asked questions in the Dail in the run-up to last year’s general election about the level of investment in the line, and the group was grateful for that.

“I would much rather see Deputy Lowry welcome the Minister allocating the money needed to fully upgrade the line to bring speeds up to 60mph. In fact, our own estimates show that for a spend of €116m, the line could be brought up to main line standard and a curve put in at Ballybrophy so that there would be no need to change trains for Dublin,” said Cllr O’Dowd. “This would mean that very little maintenance would have to be carried out on the line for up to 30 years.”

She pointed out that the Ballybrophy line had been the original main line from Limerick to Dublin, and if the Department could be persuaded to re-instate it, then there would be greater flexibility in trains and connections.

“Now if Deputy Lowry had revealed that the Minister had told him that that work was going ahead, then we would all welcome it,” said Cllr O’Dowd.

Nenagh Rail Partnership, which has been in operation since 2004, has met Irish Rail on numerous occasions to discuss bringing in a commuter service on the Ballybrophy line. “Nenagh Rail Partnership is made up of people from Cloughjordan, Nenagh, Ballina / Birdhill and Castleconnell who have all been lobbying for the service and who have organised various events along the line to help promote the route, including the popular trip to Limerick on Ice,” she said.

Victor

A woman scorned there.

KC61

One suspects that Mr. Lowry may well keep a low profile on this one in future.....

invincibleirish

He'll take the Dart to Greystones, but leave Nenagh! now if i were a reactionary gombeen North Tipp man i'd be up in arms in my country bungalow, but im not.

Nostradamus

and a curve put in at Ballybrophy so that there would be no need to change trains for Dublin

Good idea alright, but isn't this just covert Palerail and haven't we been constantly told that Palerail is the main reason why the children of the West go to sleep every night cold and hungry, while children in the Pale sleep on beds made of gold bars and sheets made from stitched together 100 Euro notes stolen from Mayo families at gunpoint by the "Dublin Government"?

Honestly, I wish these people would make their minds up.