What Railfreight is Still Running

OurLadyofKnock

Can anyone make a list. Thanks.

corktina

do we have enough bandwidth?

dowlingm

Operational:
Tara Mines-North Wall
IWT Ballina-North Wall
Coillte Westport-Waterford (and Ballina-Waterford?)

Suspended:
DFDS Ballina-Belview

Anything else?

admiralofthefleet

dowlingm wrote: »

Operational:
Tara Mines-North Wall
IWT Ballina-North Wall
Coillte Westport-Waterford (and Ballina-Waterford?)

Suspended:
DFDS Ballina-Belview

Anything else?

is that coca cola?

foggy_lad

I saw a large billboard poster in Busaras yesterday advertising Irish Rail as the eco friendly way to move freight. It showed some type of factory with a train parked right beside it as if most factories have rail yards at their goods out doors! also the locomotive they showed is not exactly eco friendly, a diesel electric would most likely be better.

Anyway the reality for most factories to use the railway is the following

1. Load goods onto truck
2. drive goods to rail yard
3. unload goods in yard
4. load goods onto train
5. train goes to Dublin or Waterford
6. goods are unloaded from train to another yard
7. goods loaded onto ship or onto another truck
8. goods driven to their destination and unloaded or driven onto ship.

That is a lot more handling than most companies could ever hope to afford! it was possible in the days of the 70 hour week when men worked for thruppence ha'panny a day and there was thousands working in rail yards and docks around the country.

Those Days are Gone!

murphaph

foggy_lad wrote: »

I saw a large billboard poster in Busaras yesterday advertising Irish Rail as the eco friendly way to move freight. It showed some type of factory with a train parked right beside it as if most factories have rail yards at their goods out doors! also the locomotive they showed is not exactly eco friendly, a diesel electric would most likely be better.

Anyway the reality for most factories to use the railway is the following

1. Load goods onto truck
2. drive goods to rail yard
3. unload goods in yard
4. load goods onto train
5. train goes to Dublin or Waterford
6. goods are unloaded from train to another yard
7. goods loaded onto ship or onto another truck
8. goods driven to their destination and unloaded or driven onto ship.

That is a lot more handling than most companies could ever hope to afford! it was possible in the days of the 70 hour week when men worked for thruppence ha'panny a day and there was thousands working in rail yards and docks around the country.

Those Days are Gone!

The are gone, replaced by.......containerisation! Goods loaded once by hand into the container in a factory and then moved only by crane (single operator lifting hundreds of tonnes in minutes) between modes.

Intermodal freight CAN be done with the right attitude. IE don't have it. They have more or less disdain for their customers and don't work well with other companies (some others here will be able to report of their relationship with Dublin Port) so intermodal is doomed in Ireland do long as IE are running the railways.

Goods we buy in the shops are already being switched between several modes all the way from Chinese factory->truck to rail head->Rail to port->by sea to Rotterdam->broken down and sent on by sea to us (possibly via rail to Hamburg etc. first)->UK->Ireland->Truck to destination->load broken down->trucks to shops with other broken down loads.

Multimodal is how we get most of the stuff we own in fact. It's all about good, reliable service to the logistics companies. They are not interested in IE driver strikes and whatnot.

end of the road

foggy_lad wrote: »

the reality for most factories to use the railway is the following

Load goods onto truck
drive goods to rail yard
unload goods in yard
load goods onto train
train goes to Dublin or Waterford
goods are unloaded from train to another yard
goods loaded onto ship or onto another truck
goods driven to their destination and unloaded or driven onto ship.
That is a lot more handling than most companies could ever hope to afford! it was possible in the days of the 70 hour week when men worked for thruppence ha'panny a day and there was thousands working in rail yards and docks around the country.

well with proper planning and a company who was interested in running the railway properly instead of destroying any infrastructure to do with freight it would operate like this,
factory would be built beside the railway,
rail spurs along the docks at each port where possible,
goods loaded onto train which would take goods straight to the shipside,
load onto ship,
away you go,
it could be done but the will just isn't there.

foggy_lad

Ireland is just not a large enough country for rail-freight. Every time a container is manhandled by crane from truck to rail back to truck etc costs a lot of money(crane operators don't work for nothing!) and companies won't cover that cost when they can get their container straight from the docks by truck without that extra cost.

Also as stated the railways are not reliable enough in Ireland for many of the companies that might have enough need to use them, I remember some years ago meeting a truck driver on a trip to the west, he was heading towards Achill sound with a container full of some synthetic substance like nylon/rayon. he told me the container would usually be taken by rail but it was a bank holiday week and the schedule had been changed to allow for staff changes so the company had to make alternative arrangements and that the journey by truck was working out just slightly more costly than by rail but was so much more flexible it was being considered as a viable option.

dowlingm

Ballina doesn't use cranes though? As far as I know the containers are forklifts...?

Also, the Westport line signaling has likely been miniCTCed in the period after you had the conversation. Acrylonitrile hasn't run for quite some time, and I don't think Asahi ever blamed transport for the closure of the Killala plant.

murphaph

foggy_lad wrote: »

Ireland is just not a large enough country for rail-freight. Every time a container is manhandled by crane from truck to rail back to truck etc costs a lot of money(crane operators don't work for nothing!) and companies won't cover that cost when they can get their container straight from the docks by truck without that extra cost.

Yeah, but lorry drivers don't work for free either and a train with 40 containers is driven by one man (the line side staff must generally be there anyway for passenger trains) instead of 40 lorry drivers. It's not black and white. A single lorry driver in Ballina (or wherever) can do short runs between factory and railhead and load train of flat cars in a day. The crane driver (could be the lorry driver too if using certain types of crane) loads them and one driver takes the train to port. It's all about timing.

foggy_lad wrote: »

Also as stated the railways are not reliable enough in Ireland for many of the companies that might have enough need to use them, I remember some years ago meeting a truck driver on a trip to the west, he was heading towards Achill sound with a container full of some synthetic substance like nylon/rayon. he told me the container would usually be taken by rail but it was a bank holiday week and the schedule had been changed to allow for staff changes so the company had to make alternative arrangements and that the journey by truck was working out just slightly more costly than by rail but was so much more flexible it was being considered as a viable option.

This is the problem for railfreight in Ireland: Coras Iompar Eireann and the government. The railways can do it, the existing shower can't.

JeffK88

foggy_lad wrote: »

Ireland is just not a large enough country for rail-freight. Every time a container is manhandled by crane from truck to rail back to truck etc costs a lot of money(crane operators don't work for nothing!) and companies won't cover that cost when they can get their container straight from the docks by truck without that extra cost.

Also as stated the railways are not reliable enough in Ireland for many of the companies that might have enough need to use them, I remember some years ago meeting a truck driver on a trip to the west, he was heading towards Achill sound with a container full of some synthetic substance like nylon/rayon. he told me the container would usually be taken by rail but it was a bank holiday week and the schedule had been changed to allow for staff changes so the company had to make alternative arrangements and that the journey by truck was working out just slightly more costly than by rail but was so much more flexible it was being considered as a viable option.

New Zealand is a similar size country and has a thriving rail freight Industry.

kc56

JeffK88 wrote: »

New Zealand is a similar size country and has a thriving rail freight Industry.

New Zealand is 103,000 sq miles compared to Ireland's 32,000. Also NZ in much longer more like the size of Britain. Distances are longer and there are very few motorways or even Dual carraigways. So there are much better opportunities for rail freight given the longer distances and poor roads. They can even transport a 36 car freight train on the ferries between Wellignton and Picton.

The only real similarity with Ireland is the population.

There are almost no long distance passenger services other that a few tourist orientated ones. The country is full of disused stations. Distances are too long and air wins out most of the time.

murphaph

kc56 wrote: »

New Zealand is 103,000 sq miles compared to Ireland's 32,000. Also NZ in much longer more like the size of Britain. Distances are longer and there are very few motorways or even Dual carraigways. So there are much better opportunities for rail freight given the longer distances and poor roads. They can even transport a 36 car freight train on the ferries between Wellignton and Picton.

The only real similarity with Ireland is the population.

There are almost no long distance passenger services other that a few tourist orientated ones. The country is full of disused stations. Distances are too long and air wins out most of the time.

New Zealand is made up of 2 islands. As you correctly point out, a ferry is required between the larger and smaller island to ship goods by rail....sound like anything familiar? (Ireland and Britain are bigger than NZ and together have a MUCH bigger population. If IE were any use, they'd have partnerships with British rail carriers to intermodal containers to all over the UK direct from the quayside or on to continental Europe.

We can make up excuses all day long for why Irish Rail has failed to develop or even hold the freight they had. They are simply not customer focused enough.

Losty Dublin

murphaph wrote: »

New Zealand is made up of 2 islands. As you correctly point out, a ferry is required between the larger and smaller island to ship goods by rail....sound like anything familiar? (Ireland and Britain are bigger than NZ and together have a MUCH bigger population. If IE were any use, they'd have partnerships with British rail carriers to intermodal containers to all over the UK direct from the quayside or on to continental Europe.

New Zealand also has a government policy and a long term legacy of using railways for freight, something which isn't the case here or in the UK.

kc56

Losty Dublin wrote: »

New Zealand also has a government policy and a long term legacy of using railways for freight, something which isn't the case here or in the UK.

The also privatised the railways in 1993 which led to major reduction in passenger services. The railways and ferries were re nationalised in 2004.

As regards routing freight via the UK, I suspect it is cheaper to send freight by sea to Europe apart from non container traffic which goes by road. Even if intermodal was developed in the UK, it still might not viable to use rail this side since our population is dominated by Dublin.

murphaph

Losty Dublin wrote: »

New Zealand also has a government policy and a long term legacy of using railways for freight, something which isn't the case here or in the UK.

I did make it clear in earlier posts that it is also government's fault, not just IE's, that railfreight is essentially dead in Ireland.

Ireland had every bit as much or more of a legacy of railfreight as NZ!! Most of our lines were built to carry freight in the first place.

Losty Dublin

murphaph wrote: »

I did make it clear in earlier posts that it is also government's fault, not just IE's, that railfreight is essentially dead in Ireland.

Ireland had every bit as much or more of a legacy of railfreight as NZ!! Most of our lines were built to carry freight in the first place.

Fair point on the first bit, we are in agreement there Rail is more than capable of shifting more freight than it does but the enticements need to be made to level the playing field with road haulage; I suspect that it will come back slowly over the next decade.

On the second bit, few lines in Ireland were built to carry freight in today's terms; ie heavy loads. Railway was the first and only show in town to carry anything any distance for the 95% of the country not close to a canal or navigable river. Railways carried a lot of freight back then because it was there and quicker than horse and card and for no other reason; the combustion engine saw the end to it's dominance in this regard. Whil

Captain Chaos

Losty Dublin wrote: »

I suspect that it will come back slowly over the next decade.
l

In a decade there will be no serviceable mainline locos left in Ireland. Everything will be DMUs or EMUs the way IE are going. They will buy more MPVs for engineering trains and whatever 201s are left will be hauling ballast trains.

dowlingm

murphaph wrote: »

Yeah, but lorry drivers don't work for free either and a train with 40 containers is driven by one man (the line side staff must generally be there anyway for passenger trains) instead of 40 lorry drivers.

More like 18 containers on standard wagons or 12 pockets, given the 36 TEU length restriction.

The other thing rail has going for it is that loads are generally of a specified size and services begin when that size load is cleared over the path, whereas the road "structure gauge" varies, as demonstrated by the frequency with which hauliers hit overbridges and so on.

LivelineDipso

Dublin Port tried to make a real go of railfrieght in the late 90's and had ambitious plans. Rail companies in the UK wanted to branch out into the Irish market. Dublin Port Company was the go between who would move the containers off the ships to the IE yards - all IE had to do was deliver the trains around the country. They were looking into buying locomotives and flat wagons.

Irish Rail did not even answer their phone calls according to legend. Not sure how true this is, but I do know Dublin Port has a deep dislike of Irish Rail management. A lot of bitterness still there. So something major must of happened.


There is also a story that the NRA wanted IE to remove the spoil from the port tunnel by rail and IE wasn't interested. That could be a urban legend.

Losty Dublin

LivelineDipso wrote: »

Dublin Port tried to make a real go of railfrieght in the late 90's and had ambitious plans. Rail companies in the UK wanted to branch out into the Irish market. Dublin Port Company was the go between who would move the containers off the ships to the IE yards - all IE had to do was deliver the trains around the country. They were looking into buying locomotives and flat wagons.

Irish Rail did not even answer their phone calls according to legend. Not sure how true this is, but I do know Dublin Port has a deep dislike of Irish Rail management. A lot of bitterness still there. So something major must of happened.


There is also a story that the NRA wanted IE to remove the spoil from the port tunnel by rail and IE wasn't interested. That could be a urban legend.

You will find that it's all urban legend and exceptionally city centre urbanised ones at that.

Irish Rail actually proposed to cabinet costed plans a massive freight transfer facility in the Adamstown. The plan was for a fleet of about 12 highly powerful GM loco's to haul container trains up to 36 bogies on a 24 7 basis purely to move containers in and out of the port and to eliminate heavy freight from the city centre. Once here they could be placed onto truck and hauled elsewhere or added to liners as required whilst the regular container flows would be retained.

Dublin Port felt that they were liable to lose out on handling contracts etc so they cried foul while the government of the day were eyeing up the land banks as a possible location to Stadium Ireland. There were other issues at play here, notably the requirement to invest in the renewal of the rail network as a whole and the preference for road haulage which put it to bed.

Rail wasn't an option for the Port Tunnel spoil as virtually all of it was reused within the project on site.

LivelineDipso

Thanks. What year was the Adamstown terminal proposed?

Losty Dublin

LivelineDipso wrote: »

Thanks. What year was the Adamstown terminal proposed?

I can't be 100% sure of an exact year but as Stadium Ireland was involved you are looking at about 1994 onwards though it had nothing to do with the 201 class being purchased. Suffice to say, it was put to bed in and around 1998, the year before Irish Rail was told to began to withdraw from rail freight.

LivelineDipso

Hearing this story I get a sniff of Bertie Ahern in the air...

Sligo Quay

Losty Dublin wrote: »

You will find that it's all urban legend and exceptionally city centre urbanised ones at that.

Irish Rail actually proposed to cabinet costed plans a massive freight transfer facility in the Adamstown. The plan was for a fleet of about 12 highly powerful GM loco's to haul container trains up to 36 bogies on a 24 7 basis purely to move containers in and out of the port and to eliminate heavy freight from the city centre.

Iv been seaching the IRN and found this thread http://irnirishrailwaynews.yuku.com/reply/5688/Chunkrails-memories-of-loco-haulage-in-2000passengerampfr#reply-5688 so that Adamstown plan seem to be very much alive, Dermo was also very much alive on the IRN:D
But on a more serious note, I would have worked in Waterford Port for Bell at the time, Dublin Port would have been a different ball game, Bell had a good relationship with Rail management in Waterford at the time.

Losty Dublin

LivelineDipso wrote: »

Hearing this story I get a sniff of Bertie Ahern in the air...

No comment but I'll say this much; there is a published book that refers to him having a role in this

pigtown

According to local speculation the new zinc mine in Caherconlish Co. Limerick have plans to bring their material to the surface at Boher Co. Limerick. The plan is to buy 300 acres of land here and use the neighbouring rail line to get it to the port. AFAIK they are trying to work out which port is best to ship from, Foynes or Waterford. Foynes is closer but would require significant remedial work including double tracking the line as far as Limerick and then reopening the line to Foynes. I'm not sure what work would have to be done to use the other port.

Captain Chaos

pigtown wrote: »

. AFAIK they are trying to work out which port is best to ship from, Foynes or Waterford. Foynes is closer but would require significant remedial work including double tracking the line as far as Limerick and then reopening the line to Foynes. I'm not sure what work would have to be done to use the other port.

Who is going to foot the bill of laying all that track, it's cheaper per mile to build a road than it is to lay track in this country. Then there is the issue of rolling stock to carry ore. All current stock is in full use on the tara mines and the rest in maintenance. Sometimes the tara trains only run with 7 or 8 wagons due to a shortage when they normally run 10-12 wagons.

Can't see it happening. With all that initial cost and work, road haulage would be better.

Losty Dublin

pigtown wrote: »

According to local speculation the new zinc mine in Caherconlish Co. Limerick have plans to bring their material to the surface at Boher Co. Limerick. The plan is to buy 300 acres of land here and use the neighbouring rail line to get it to the port. AFAIK they are trying to work out which port is best to ship from, Foynes or Waterford. Foynes is closer but would require significant remedial work including double tracking the line as far as Limerick and then reopening the line to Foynes. I'm not sure what work would have to be done to use the other port.

The business plan has been priced up for this about a year now and includes costings for track improvements and signaling improvements in the Limerick area and some remedial/repair work on the Foynes branch that would allow it to reopen. Most of the costs in the project will be moneis that need to be spent soon so the additional costs for Foynes are not that much all told. Limerick will also require less train crews so driver hours will be easier to staff. In contrast the Waterford line is far longer, it requires more cash for improvements, it has less capacity and will likely require driver changes at some stage en route.

From a shipping perspective, zinc ore is shipped to the US or Sweden for smelting so deep sea port Foynes requires less sea travel time than inland Belview. This will also have a huge bearing as the customer will want the ore in transit for as short a time as possible to cut down on costs.

corktina

i don't know if that's spin, but the line to Waterford seems to me to be in fine condition and isn't a great distance at all. Not only that but Caherconlish is very near to the line and heading for Waterford would avoid going through Limerick City and (I think ) a reversal.

Losty Dublin

corktina wrote: »

i don't know if that's spin, but the line to Waterford seems to me to be in fine condition and isn't a great distance at all. Not only that but Caherconlish is very near to the line and heading for Waterford would avoid going through Limerick City and (I think ) a reversal.

It's in fine condition generally but for long term use for freight and passenger duties it will need to be relaid in places and for additional tamping, stone washing, packing etc to take place so it can handle the heavier loadings. It also has a lack of crossing points to take on an extra 6- daily trains unless more are added and it is somewhat longer of a trip.

The Foynes proposal would see the branch worked as OEIS and signaled by conventional CTC and Limerick Check; it will be similar to Navan-North Wall workings in this respect. The cost for work on the branch isn't huge all told, provided it's dealt with as part of renewal works in Limerick which are long overdue and which need to be done soon. There isn't a need to reverse at Limerick, the branch swings to the left before the station itselt.

roundymac

I note that Cork is not even considered, why? The Cork line is double tracked from Limerick Jct,the Cobh line is double tracked. The docks at Tivoli were rail connected, it would'nt take much to do so again. You are talking about 200 metres of track and a few turnouts. Why not go on down the line to Marino Point. It is in NAMA, a deal could be done there there, it's an abandoned site with plenty of scope for development c/w with deepwater jetty suitable for ships up to 25k tonnes.
However this being Ireland I'm sure there are plenty of people going to tell the reasons why this cannot be done.:mad:

corktina

i get the feeling that the Foynes line would cost a fortune to open. If the Waterford line needs all that work, how much does the Foynes line , which hasn't been touched for years , need? Also would not shipping services to Foynes be a lot more expensive than to Waterford?
I'd rather pin my hopes on Waterford as that would ensure the survival of the passenger services, and if some of the passing loops so recklessly torn out were reinstated, maybe a proper service could be run to the towns on that line, (not least Clonmel, which is Ireland's largest inland town btw)

Losty Dublin

corktina wrote: »

i get the feeling that the Foynes line would cost a fortune to open. If the Waterford line needs all that work, how much does the Foynes line , which hasn't been touched for years , need? Also would not shipping services to Foynes be a lot more expensive than to Waterford?
I'd rather pin my hopes on Waterford as that would ensure the survival of the passenger services, and if some of the passing loops so recklessly torn out were reinstated, maybe a proper service could be run to the towns on that line, (not least Clonmel, which is Ireland's largest inland town btw)

The line has been examined and overall it's in good nick, good enough to cope with 30 MPH traffic which is all the speed needed for lines with crew operated crossing gates. There will be some work needed in a few places and Foynes yard will need attention but it could be reopened in a few weeks if required, save for Williamstown bridge. Foynes has handled ore traffic in the past so the gantry and monkey lifts are in situ which I gather Bellview hasn't got as of yet. It's a shorter trip than via Waterford plus it doesn't have river navigation to deal with. It's also a deep sea port which opens it up to more boats than other ports here in Ireland.

I don't think Waterford even entered the equation here to be honest.

corktina

and yet you seem to think the superior Waterford line needs a lot of attention? Something doesnt add up here.

Losty Dublin

corktina wrote: »

and yet you seem to think the superior Waterford line needs a lot of attention? Something doesnt add up here.

The faster and more used the line is, the better quality your track and PW needs to be, simply put. If Foynes or indeed Waterford needed to deal with 100MPH trains the prices would be totally different.

pigtown

Losty, you seem to know a lot about this. Have you any links for the rest of us to read?

I wonder would the works result in a faster journey time between Limerick and the junction? It is painfully slow.

corktina

whats the speed limit on the waterford line? I can't beleive it's 100 mph . How many trains a day are we talking ? One? I would have thought the current line quite adequate, given it only has (soon) two return trians on it. Loading facilities wouyld eb a factor, but is it economic to send a ship 50% of the way around this island to load?

Hungerford

corktina wrote: »

and yet you seem to think the superior Waterford line needs a lot of attention? Something doesnt add up here.

I think that the issue is that the costs involved in adapting the Waterford line for ore traffic would be greater because (a) it's a longer line so there are more potential points where reinforcement is necessary and (b) there are significant interactions with passenger services including Dublin-Cork, Limerick-Waterford and Dublin-Waterford.

The Foynes line is in a worse condition but the work involved is arguably less and the interactions with passenger services minimal. It appears that the main works would be possibly doubling Killonan to Boher and replacing the viaduct on the Foynes branch. Because the branch would be freight only, you would save significantly in terms of gatekeepers (you don't need any) and signalling.

Hungerford

corktina wrote: »

whats the speed limit on the waterford line? I can't beleive it's 100 mph . How many trains a day are we talking ? One? I would have thought the current line quite adequate, given it only has (soon) two return trians on it. Loading facilities wouyld eb a factor, but is it economic to send a ship 50% of the way around this island to load?

If you read the previous posts, you would have seen that the number of proposed extra trains is 6 per day and that the destination of the ore would be Sweden or the US, both of which are closer from Foynes than from Waterford.

The current line speed on Limerick to Waterford is 40 mph IIRC.

corktina

i read that, but can't see 6 trains a day materialising.

I also don't see much need for re-inforcing the line. If it can take ballast trains (which it does) then it can presumably take ore trains.

How many crossing keepers extra would you need on the Waterford line? aren't they already there?

I can't get this to add up in my head.

Losty Dublin

pigtown wrote: »

Losty, you seem to know a lot about this. Have you any links for the rest of us to read?

I wonder would the works result in a faster journey time between Limerick and the junction? It is painfully slow.

I've no links as what I know is mainly from internal sources. The long and short is that resignaling works for the Limerick area are overdue along with renewal of the freight and carriage yards. The preference was to double track the line towards LJ if permitted, to eliminate any remaining staffed crossings, to facilitate a crossing loop on the WRC and to increase the speed limit on the access loop into the WRC in order to allow better timings on it.

Speed limit on the Waterford is generally 50 MPH though it's capable of up to 60 MPH in places since some it was relaid and tamped in places.

corktina

I can't see how you can run 6 return trips to Foynes on a speed restricted freight only route, stopping to open and shut crossing gates. I can see each trip taking at least 4 hours including loading and unloading, To run more than one train on the branch at a time, you would need quite sophisticated signalling and extensive layouts at both ends, plus possibly a passing loop halfway.

Losty Dublin

corktina wrote: »

I can't see how you can run 6 return trips to Foynes on a speed restricted freight only route, stopping to open and shut crossing gates. I can see each trip taking at least 4 hours including loading and unloading, To run more than one train on the branch at a time, you would need quite sophisticated signalling and extensive layouts at both ends, plus possibly a passing loop halfway.

It's intended for 3 trips in and out of Foynes, not 6. 6 would be on the Waterford branch, 5 under the proposed new timetable.

There isn't any sophisticated signal system needed on the branch under OEIS rules. The train is locked in by the controling signalman and the crew can operate it's own points if required. When Kingscourt Gypsum trains were in service, 80 minutes was allowed to and from Drogheda with 2 hours to load and it was ample. It's crews operated all but 2 gates beyond Navan, set any points required and shunted the train for the loading and unloading to take place. There won't be any need to cross trains; this can be done in Limerick yard if it's needed; it's been done before.

dowlingm

roundymac wrote: »

I note that Cork is not even considered, why? {snip} However this being Ireland I'm sure there are plenty of people going to tell the reasons why this cannot be done.

roundymac - here's a practical reason. Freights are generally restricted to 50mph I believe. Pathing 100mph services around 50mph services would be onerous. On the other hand the Foynes relay could be done using track panels from the Cork line relay to 40-50mph, and the Waterford line is already 50mph. See where I'm going with this? As far as Tivoli is concerned my understanding is that the Cork docks people aren't too enthused about reconnecting to the rail network, but I think part of this is because of favoured solutions to the redevelopment and relocation of Cork port. The issue with Marino Point is that it is rail connected but not well road connected. I don't say this to rain on the idea, just being practical.

Hungerford: I don't claim Pallasgreen-Waterford could be done for zero euros, but any upgrade to existing trackage or signalling in that corridor helps existing service when freight isn't running - any full or partial doubling of Killonan-Limerick Junction will help with pathing Dublin services passing over the direct curve. Foynes is only justifiable for freight - the chances of passenger service to Adare is surely remote.

As you say, some reinforcement east of Limerick Junction might be required but at least the relaying of the last few years will have given IE a good sense for the alignment's condition - there would be a question mark on Cahir viaduct given the history there obviously. You are right about freight paths impacting Waterford but surely the Waterford terminal area signalling is due for replacement as surely as Limerick. A crossover could permit double track miniCTC operations with ETS termination at Carrick on Suir (at least) while providing improvements to existing services like allowing two Cherryville Jct services to cross further out the line if there is no conflicting traffic coming in/going to the Limerick Junction direction. Surely that wouldn't break the bank.

While Foynes is unquestionably closer to the US, this Sea Lanes Calculator (using Limerick and Rosslare to Gothenburg) indicates that the most likely routings are shorter for Sweden via Waterford. I would submit the distances involved are more significant in the shorter trip to Sweden. Additionally, it is possible that existing IE Waterford staff could be used to do any IE-required duties at the terminal - Foynes is a good deal more remote from Limerick.

LivelineDipso

Cahir Viaduct?

corktina

Losty Dublin wrote: »

It's intended for 3 trips in and out of Foynes, not 6. 6 would be on the Waterford branch, 5 under the proposed new timetable.

There isn't any sophisticated signal system needed on the branch under OEIS rules. The train is locked in by the controling signalman and the crew can operate it's own points if required. When Kingscourt Gypsum trains were in service, 80 minutes was allowed to and from Drogheda with 2 hours to load and it was ample. It's crews operated all but 2 gates beyond Navan, set any points required and shunted the train for the loading and unloading to take place. There won't be any need to cross trains; this can be done in Limerick yard if it's needed; it's been done before.

Hungerford said 6 extra, thats what I was going on...even three on my broadly correct timings would be pushing it, although it would get away from crossings and signalling I agree.

Sligo Quay

Losty Dublin wrote: »

The line has been examined and overall it's in good nick, good enough to cope with 30 MPH traffic which is all the speed needed for lines with crew operated crossing gates. There will be some work needed in a few places and Foynes yard will need attention but it could be reopened in a few weeks if required,

Don't think so, most of the line looks like this http://www.flickr.com/photos/frankcawley/3862399510/ and this http://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2012Photos/October-2012/25706657_D8Bt52#!i=2134879125&k=SGM5XQM&lb=1&s=A in some places you can't even find the line with all the jungle of undergrowth, whoever examined the line will need to go to specsavers, an entire new relay with major engineering works is needed.

LivelineDipso

The more I think about this Foynes thing the less I believe it. Makes no sense when the waterford line is ready to go. As for load handling at port - there is none at Foynes either. A couple of sidings.

Be amazed if that ore traffic is going by Foynes. It seems to be looking for an excuse to reopen an old line for the sake of it. Be nice if it happened though and either way be great to see the mine use rail. My money is on it going to Waterford.

dowlingm

LivelineDipso wrote: »

Cahir Viaduct?

(Interim)RSC Report (big PDF)
Cahir Viaduct Rebuild (PDF)

In brief: at 0600 7 Oct 2003 a laden cement train of 22 wagons derailed while on the Cahir Viaduct (first built 1852) en route from Castlemungret to Waterford. 12 wagons were destroyed, fortunately the locos (a 121 and a 181) and driver had reached the far side and were not taken with them.

murphaph

Sligo Quay wrote: »

Don't think so, most of the line looks like this http://www.flickr.com/photos/frankcawley/3862399510/ and this http://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2012Photos/October-2012/25706657_D8Bt52#!i=2134879125&k=SGM5XQM&lb=1&s=A in some places you can't even find the line with all the jungle of undergrowth, whoever examined the line will need to go to specsavers, an entire new relay with major engineering works is needed.

It looks fine..............in a Cassandra Crossing fine kind of way