Lucan's forgotten Railway

stoneill

Article in the Lucan Newsletter

All credit to By Domhnall O Muirí

As one drives towards Newcastle across the bridge at the 12th Lock, it is hard to believe that a busy but short-lived little narrow gauge railway once crossed the canal at the same location and hugged the side of the road almost to the junction where Polly Hops once stood. Whilst the so-called Great War still raged over Western Europe another prediction of the great science fiction writer H.G. Wells had come true – war in the air. Rapid developments since the fledgling flight of the Wright brothers 1903 had seen the aeroplane develop into a military machine capable of sustained flight, facilitating hitherto impossible observation of the battlefields, intelligence gathering and of course ground and aerial attack. Naturally these new machines needed places to operate from, and with the rapid increase in numbers of aircraft came the requirement for a substantial number of airfields.

Full article here:

http://www.lucannewsletter.ie/history/frailway.html

josh59

Thanks for posting this.:)