Waterford/Rosslare Strand Railway reaches the buffer stops (again)!

shamwari

Hungerford wrote: »

I am not so certain - none of this has played to IE's preferred script.

The reason why they are so desperate to shut the line appears to be the fact that the EU has allocated €17 million for the upgrade of the line. This will prevent its closure because it will end up with CTC and automated gates.

As well as that there appears to be an element in IE who want to close the line, keep it officially open for traffic and trouser the upgrade money.

Would €17m be enough to carry out the CTC and barrier work?

Hungerford

shamwari wrote: »

Would €17m be enough to carry out the CTC and barrier work?

They seem to think so - it's hardly a complex stretch of track. They might not do all the gates but they will make decent inroads.

Partizan

Judgement Day wrote: »

Don't know about official but word amongst enthusiasts seems to be that the NTA are going to give CIE/IE the nod for closure in September and the line will close the next day as notice has already been given. Although it grieves me to say it, and I sincerely hope that I'm wrong, but I think all the speculation about private interests taking over the line will come to nothing. Interestingly a well known face in the railway fraternity has been appointed to the Board of the NTA see here: http://www.nationaltransport.ie/board.html

well according to Himself over at RUI, the line is practically saved.

Who's doing the spinning here?

purplepanda

So let me get this straight.....:rolleyes:

IE Don't want the line anymore but don't mind it being given to a "heritage" operator but obviously not to a private rail operator whom they would then presumably be in competition with.

IE want to close the line before any EU money is allocated for upgrades of level crossings & signaling:eek:

IE instantly dismiss professional surveys carried out by regional bodies & others & still undermine any proposals but forward by those campaigners interested in preserving the line & running an enhanced & viable service for passengers.:mad:

IE doesn't want to run freight cargo on this line even though a reported four companies are interested in doing so across the Rosslare Waterford Limerick Jct rail link:rolleyes:

Seems to me that IE don't like the prospect of others being given the chance to run a railway which they have no interest in whatsoever.

IE is nothing but a vindictive dinosaur that is destroying railway transport in Ireland.

They can't seem to upgrade infastructure to enable faster train times for passengers to compete with road journeys, they can't make full use use of railway stock despite having been given a new fleet of trains, they have mothballed a fleet of trains which are still good enough for UK operators to use while existing services are often overcrowded & they have failed to promote & run their freight business with much success at all.

All the above whilst receiving millions in subsidy & grants from the government & EU:mad:

Please abolish this pathetic excuse for a national railway operator ASAP!!!

Cookie_Monster

purplepanda wrote: »

...
Please abolish this pathetic excuse for a national railway operator ASAP!!!

don't forget they don't even fully own that line either

thomasj

Judgement Day wrote: »

Don't know about official but word amongst enthusiasts seems to be that the NTA are going to give CIE/IE the nod for closure in September and the line will close the next day as notice has already been given. Although it grieves me to say it, and I sincerely hope that I'm wrong, but I think all the speculation about private interests taking over the line will come to nothing. Interestingly a well known face in the railway fraternity has been appointed to the Board of the NTA see here: http://www.nationaltransport.ie/board.html

Correct me if im wrong but isnt the notice invalid and could be a subject to a challenge in court?

Our man in Havana

Correct. But it needs someone with standing and the money to challenge them in court.

shamwari

Quote:
Originally Posted by Hungerford
Anyway, the closure notice under the 1958 Transport Act is legally unsound in a number of unexciting but significant ways, meaning that any attempt to shut the line using it will wind up in the courts.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Shamwari
Provided someone has the time and means to pursue it that way.

Haddockman wrote: »

There will be.

Did you just state previously that you believe a challenge will occur?

Southsider1

purplepanda wrote: »

So let me get this straight.....:rolleyes:

IE Don't want the line anymore but don't mind it being given to a "heritage" operator but obviously not to a private rail operator whom they would then presumably be in competition with.

Of course they don't and neither do the Government want any competition on it either.Imagine the scenario where a Michael O'Leary type get's the franchise and tells the unions et al to **** off and makes a big success of the line. Every town will want him running their local service. It'll be like Aer Lingus all over again. Waste vast pots of cash and be protected by the Government.

dowlingm

Is there a source for the EU grant? I read on RUI that 17m was allocated but not that it was from the Eurocracy.

How many LCs are there on the route? I think they usually clock in at 250k a shot.

save the rail

According to the SERA report (page 71 of the pdf version),

'the future investment under the next phase of the rail safety programme (identified as €17.6 million in total)'

has already been budgeted by Irish Rail for the Rosslare Waterford Line.

http://www.sera.ie/media/MaintenanceofRosslaireWaterfordLimerickRailCorridor.pdf


The Rail Safety Programme is funded by the Government under Transport 21 and the next phase has survived cuts.

Breaking down that 17.6 million would be enough to replace all the level crossings on the route, to automate the signalling and have some change left over to upgrade the service in general.

A review of the last tranche of funds for the rail safety programme meant that automating gates etc equalled savings in staffing costs of 500k per annum.
http://www.transport.ie/upload/general/11293-1.pdf


Of the 1.9 million euro to run the present service, staff costs for the line are 1.1 million euro. The vast bulk of these costs are associated with manning the unautomated level crossings (13 staffed crossings, numerous unstaffed farm crossings).


The SERA report identifies an untapped market which Irish Rail has almost completely failed to exploit.

The funding is already budgeted for the upgrading of the line with its associated reduction in staffing costs.

Interreg funding is being sought for the employment of a Community Rail Officer. Initial twinning has been confirmed with South Wales Community Partnership.

All the pieces are in place to ensure the viability of the Rosslare to Waterford Rail Line.

Lifelike

I know of a former rail line in North London whose operations ceased in 1996, however it was never officially closed as British Rail didn't want to go through the costly process of officially closing the line. Therefore one "rail replacement bus" is run every month to officially keep its' status as an open railway line, even though the track very much lies in a derelict and overgrown state today.

Could IÉ do something similar to cease operations on the Rosslare/Waterford line, without officially closing the line?

Or am I just giving them ideas?

EDIT: That rail line in London - http://underground-history.co.uk/croxley.php

L1011

Without managing to get a reason for a rail replacement bus (the Croxley Green line has a road cutting its trackbed!) I don't think a bus is valid under UK rules for classing as not closed - which this line would have to meet. One train a week seems to, though.

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

foggy_lad

So Irish rail have already sought and have been granted 17million for signalling and level crossings on this line which will reduce its running costs to minimal manageable levels but instead of operating a railway these prize turkeys want to close it down and pocket the money?

Is that not stealing? The money is there to do the work but Irish rail management obviously want it for something else?

dowlingm

Lifelike, the difference is that I don't believe BR had a fully fledged bus company acting in direct competition, not only in state ownership but in the same corporate group. It is proposed to essentially hand over the South Wexford services to BE but with no continuing connectivity to the rest of the network or ticketing thereto, not that BE run service on IE's behalf. If I was head of IE, I'd want Expressway tossed out of Limerick and Galway stations and told find somewhere else - they are just as much a threat to IE as Aircoach, and I believe the railway was there first.

dowlingm

foggy_lad wrote: »

So Irish rail have already sought and have been granted 17million for signalling and level crossings on this line which will reduce its running costs to minimal manageable levels but instead of operating a railway these prize turkeys want to close it down and pocket the money?

I think it's more, this is what we're willing to tell Finance we'll forgo. Just because they have been allocated the money doesn't necessarily mean the cheque is resting in the IE bank account, Ted Crilly style

corktina

dowlingm wrote: »

Lifelike, the difference is that I don't believe BR had a fully fledged bus company acting in direct competition, not only in state ownership but in the same corporate group. It is proposed to essentially hand over the South Wexford services to BE but with no continuing connectivity to the rest of the network or ticketing thereto, not that BE run service on IE's behalf. If I was head of IE, I'd want Expressway tossed out of Limerick and Galway stations and told find somewhere else - they are just as much a threat to IE as Aircoach, and I believe the railway was there first.

BR didn't because the railways were opbliged to divest themselves of road operations in the Transport Acts of the late 40s /50s and the road services then competed against the Railways and in most cases won. Nowadays you have the First Group situation were buses and trains operate alongside each other, I didn't hear of any competition problems.

Stonewolf

Whenever I've talked about how CIE should be broken up I've always talked about grouping the replacement units by service rather then by what type of vehicles they used. Buses and trains shouldn't compete, they should be synergistic. The reason why railway companies of old had large bus and truck* fleets is that they realised motorised road vehicles were a way of bringing the payload to the railway rather than bringing the railway to the payload. Closures of small branches with road replacements were a part of this because those branches served to bring the railway to a place it wouldn't make a profit for the purposes of feeding a bigger line.

IE would have you believe that the closure of the Rosslare line is a continuation of this policy. In fact this is a line that links two important ports running between the ends of two main lines and with links on to other lines which with a properly considered service in passengers and freight would prove an asset to the company. Rosslare to Limerick represents a rail line that poses a counterbalance to the Dublin centric layout of the railways in a way the WRC can only dream of. Why IE percieves this as a threat mystifies me.

* You can't just discount freight when talking about railways, a lesson IE should now have learned because it's definitely been to their detriment.

Hungerford

dowlingm wrote: »

I think it's more, this is what we're willing to tell Finance we'll forgo. Just because they have been allocated the money doesn't necessarily mean the cheque is resting in the IE bank account, Ted Crilly style

The SERA report (p79) indicates that IE have identified three sets of cost savings that will be achieved for it as a company by shutting the line:

* Running costs
* Maintenance costs
* The €17.6 million investment under the rail safety programme

The third suggests that while the money isn't resting in their account at the moment, they appear to have been taking accountancy lessons from Crilly.

Cookie_Monster

Hungerford wrote: »

The SERA report (p79) indicates that IE have identified three sets of cost savings that will be achieved for it as a company by shutting the line:

* Running costs
* Maintenance costs
* The €17.6 million investment under the rail safety programme

The third suggests that while the money isn't resting in their account at the moment, they appear to have been taking accountancy lessons from Crilly.

and station staff, driver and guard costs...

oh no wait, they still need all of them for some reason, silly me

foggy_lad

Surely if they use this 17million their running costs will drop significantly while maintenance will always cost more with Irish rail. But to claim they will save on the 17million is just creative accounting! This money is not theirs so it can not be saved for Irish rail!

Also it appears that 17million is earmarked for that particular line so unless it is misappropriated in some way it will surely be LOST with the closure of the line?

Hungerford wrote: »

The SERA report (p79) indicates that IE have identified three sets of cost savings that will be achieved for it as a company by shutting the line:

* Running costs
* Maintenance costs
* The €17.6 million investment under the rail safety programme

The third suggests that while the money isn't resting in their account at the moment, they appear to have been taking accountancy lessons from Crilly.

Hungerford

You may remember that a while ago someone was asking which of the two rival spins on the current situation were the truth - IE's that the line would be shut in September or RUI's that the line is almost saved?

Well, we might have an indication if Cyril Ferris's latest column in Today's Railways UK magazine is anything to go by. Ferris was CIE's spindoctor for many years.

Anyway, parts of the piece read like a child's tantrum as Ferris expresses his outrage that it is taking the NTA three months to shut a line with 25 passengers before seemingly expressing contempt about the alleged political nature of the opposition to the line's closure.

It's hard to reach any conclusions about what's going on at NTA level based on his piece but it certainly appears that things are not going to plan for IE.

save the rail

This is only the start if IE get their way on closing the Rosslare/Waterford line, you can bet that they will go on to close every line that is not a direct link to Dublin. We know that the Waterford - Limerick is next on the agenda and also the Rosslare - Dublin line. IE have been talking about stopping the Rosslare - Dublin line only having it go to and from wexford - apparently not enough passengers travel from or to Rosslare. Hmm wonder if it has anything to do with the fact they don't connect with anything in Rosslare, once again crap timetables..........:mad:

save the rail

Foulksmills, Raheen,Taghmon Clongeen,
Rochestown, Templetown, Tintern, Saltmills, Carrig on Bannow, Rathangan, Baldwinstown and
Bridgetown are all going to lose their rural bus services IF IE get permission to close the line. :eek: This is a disgrace loads of people in those areas depend on this service, for some its the only social outing/contact they have all week. IE/BE should be ashamed of how they are treating people.:mad:

Judgement Day

Travelled on 13.20 ex.Wexford today and the train was quite well filled on arrival from Rosslare Harbour and there was a large crowd at Wexford too. At least it gave the former Fastrack man something to do, running about with his flag and checking tickets no less (!) - this is one of very few stations with too many staff.

dowlingm

The whole issue about the money depends on who's fronting it. If it's EU money specifically for Rosslare that would be one thing. I have my doubts - Rosslare-Limerick rail is not a TEN as Belfast-Cork is so unless it falls under another program... this is why I asked if there was an opensource confirmation. There's a bit of conspiracy theory here, which I get - CIE is far less open about its plans than a company supported by tax money should be - but the reality is that IE aren't doing this work out of operating funds but out of a capital grant which is likely to get smaller and smaller over the next five years. That 17m may simply not exist anymore by order of DofF and maybe money pencilled in for other things too.

dowlingm

IE have been talking about stopping the Rosslare - Dublin line only having it go to and from wexford - apparently not enough passengers travel from or to Rosslare. Hmm wonder if it has anything to do with the fact they don't connect with anything in Rosslare, once again crap timetables

Severing at Wexford would also put a stop to interesting notions like reinstating Killinick Junction for more direct Wexford-Waterford service.

TBH the fact that the Rosslare line connects to the ferry is one of the less interesting things about it. I actually agree with IE that foot traffic alone will not sustain rail to Rosslare short of another Icelandic volcano which lasts a decade or a tunnel to South Wales - the odds on either of those events are long. It doesn't hurt mind, and it makes IE look like clowns when the ferry is sailing in as they pull out.

What will sustain it is services that run when people need them to including offering realistic connectivity between Waterford and the southeastern GDA. A continuation of the south Wexford morning service up to Carlow would get passengers there 90 minutes faster than the bus leaving at the same time and transferring in Waterford.

More importantly, due to the seriousness of landslip on Bray Head and the frequency of line interruptions along the Wicklow route generally, it is sheer madness to consider isolating this line from a convenient back door to the rest of the network and which would be viciously expensive to reinstate were the Barrow Bridge to be fully decommissioned.

I read about the Woodfab fire the other day and thought - where's that in relation to the railway line? Turns out Aughrim is 7km from the Wicklow railway line whereas if that plant was in Arklow you could look at railfreighting in wood or product out. Similarly, the wood plant near Belview has no rail connection but practically has a view of it.

If we want to make railway lines work in this country, county councils and the IDA have to be obliged to locate industry beside them, and government obliged to support railfreight to the degree common in other EU member states. Where there are jobs there are people, and therefore the means to support passenger service.

It may seem unlikely, but let's face it, who apart from rail enthusiasts would answer "Ballina" to the question "which is the only town or city in the island of Ireland which sustains scheduled rail freight container service"?

save the rail

dowlingm wrote: »

The whole issue about the money depends on who's fronting it. If it's EU money specifically for Rosslare that would be one thing. I have my doubts - Rosslare-Limerick rail is not a TEN as Belfast-Cork is so unless it falls under another program... this is why I asked if there was an opensource confirmation. There's a bit of conspiracy theory here, which I get - CIE is far less open about its plans than a company supported by tax money should be - but the reality is that IE aren't doing this work out of operating funds but out of a capital grant which is likely to get smaller and smaller over the next five years. That 17m may simply not exist anymore by order of DofF and maybe money pencilled in for other things too.

It comes under the future investment under the next phase of the rail safety programme (identified as €17.6 million in total)

dowlingm

save the rail wrote: »

It comes under the future investment under the next phase of the rail safety programme (identified as €17.6 million in total)

That doesn't tell us whether this is Dublin money or Brussels money. The distinction is important, because Brussels money is external investment - Dublin money competes with schools and hospitals and the cellphone bills of loaded former Taoisigh.

save the rail

dowlingm wrote: »

That doesn't tell us whether this is Dublin money or Brussels money. The distinction is important, because Brussels money is external investment - Dublin money competes with schools and hospitals and the cellphone bills of loaded former Taoisigh.

It's Government money under the Transport 21 rail safety programme & It survived the cuts. It may have some EU element not too sure yet. Its seperate from the EU TEN funding.