Western Rail Corridor / Rail Trail Discussion

The predictable glass-half full brigade out in force here - unable to focus on the positive aspects of the report relating specifically to the WRC. Too busy talking about cycle tracks and lines in other parts of the country.

Great to see WRC being included in phase 1 of schedule of works. Looking forward to seeing the line up and running in the years to come.

Demand, most likely. One train would handle as many passengers as four or five coaches.

You would have maybe one direct train e/w a day, but otherwise have to connect at least once, possibly twice.

Two changes would not be required.

I presume the services would be as follows:

Westport-Claremorris-Athone-Dublin, like now.

Ballina-Claremorris-Athenry-Galway

One change required, at Claremorris.

Before we can start talking about this, Galway to Athenry must be doubled.

What containers ?

Port of cork container terminal was rail connected , and had a large rail container yard at north esk , its all been off rail for decades , i'm not sure how connected dublin port container terminal is , but i doubt if it is , bellview in waterford is still connected

, containers are used exclusively for import / export , the ports were set up for this , but got out of it decades ago- before our motorway system was anyway decent ,

a study of freight types, its origins and destinations might be wise, theyre not going to be collecting milk or delivering the shopping by train

What do you mean what containers? Containers transferring from road to rail by industry that's what.

Couldn't follow the rest of your points between the lack of full stops and punctuation. You had me lost a long time before you said something about milk and shopping.

My point was how much industry,or commerce is there in the north west ,or in wexford that uses containerised, or bulk transport.

Obviously anything in wexford is already near Belview .

And theres already one freight service in the north west,

This report, if implemented (lol), would be as good as could possibly be expected for the west. Double track, hourly service Galway to Dublin and Westport to Dublin, greatly reduced journey time. Sligo to Dublin also benefiting from hourly trains double tracking and a bypassing of the DART from Maynooth. New connection from Clarmorris to the south. What more could be possibly sought? There isn't really even a reasonable business case for what is proposed, never mind additional improvements.

ARR ?

Not just that, but running trains through Dublin rather than having them all finish there would free up space in Connolly and Heuston. When you consider that Dublin was a terminus originally because various unconnected lines ran into the city from different parts of the country: Heuston, Harcourt St, Pearse, Connolly and Broadstone. The loop line was built to connect them , but then the railway closures of the 1950s & 60s meant fewer trains were running into the city.

Now things are turning around again, and we need to create more space in the two remaining terminals. The easiest way to do so would be to amalgamate lines, running trains through Dublin and on to a distant destination. Of course the train drivers would have to be involved in the discussions if this was to work, but long-term it will become a necessity. Remember that the population of the country, north and south, has increased by over 50% from the era of line closures, and most of this increase has gone into our cities and our bigger towns, making the market both larger and more urban, meaning more people in the catchment areas of the remaining railway lines.

These are all good projects and should be supported.

However, I cannot see that the Ballina-Rosslare was a "failed alignment" any more than Harcourt St-Bray was a failed alignment. They were both closed for perceived financial savings. Times have changed - how can it be a mistake to re-lay the tracks from Athenry to Tuam, one of Connacht's largest towns? How can it be a mistake to connect Claremorris (a not insubstantial town, and in previous times an important rail hub, connected to 6 different destinations) to Tuam, and on to Limerick, Limerick Junction and on to Waterford and hopefully eventually to Roslare too?

Remember that this is not a new line: it is merely laying down new tracks and associated infrastructure, along with whatever other modernisation might be required, a fairly simple process compared with the planned twenty-five km of undersea tunnels being planned in the Faroes to connect the island of Suðuroy and its 4,600 people to the rest of the Faroes.

We really need to get over ourselves in this country, our infrastructure is very, very cheap to build compared to many other countries.

Isn't it funny how many people are against the reinstatement of this line from Rosslare to Mayo? It will (re-)connect Mayo to two, no, three important ports - Limerick, Waterford and Rosslare - relieving pressure on Dublin port.

Who would not be in favour of this, and what rationale could they have?

The car lobby, of course; those who think the country outside the M50 is really just there for them to visit but doesn't exist in its own right; those who run Dublin port and want to expand it, and capture all the available resources - these are three sets of people who have some vested interest in stifling development outside Dublin. I'm sure other posters could can add to the list.

In many ways they remind me of the people who stymied the development of tram lines in Dublin for over a decade. I'm not sure that that was ever properly explained, but there are certain key people in Irish public life whose foreign bank accounts I'd be very interested in examining.

And the nightmare that is driving into Galway city from the M6, and then of course trying to park there. The same applies to other Irish cities, Dublin, Cork, Belfast ...

some people are just wedded to the old style thinking that the railway is still in decline and is being operated as a managed decline.

we are slowly shifting that mindset but it is going to take time.

even irish rail management still have that mentality with a couple of lines even though usership is increasing dispite **** services.

we will get there, but it is going to take a big push and we will succeed in that push.

One of our problems is that we seem unable to think outside the box.

Do trains need to be five carriages long? Could we not have shorter, more frequent trains, depending on demand on a given line, of even just two-carriage railcars? I've travelled on these on the continent, and for improved frequency on low-demand lines they are hard to beat.

No, the trains do not run to Dublin.

Are you aware of what freight services actually exist?

Shorter, more frequent trains? You would need extra line capacity for that (more crossing loops, shorter block sections). You would also nee many more train crews. Furthermore an existing 4 ot 5 carriage ICR train may do four to six trips in a day. Some of these will be fairly empty, but one or two will be at peak times, and full. You can't tailor train size to always exactly meet demand.

Having said that, I would love to see greater frequency on the Limerick Jcn-Waterfors and the Nenagh lines. On the Limerick-Ennis-Athenry line, there is a dire need for a passing loop at Sixmilebridge before you can do much about frequency.

Very true, and while the current infrastructure doesn't allow everything we might like, surely the whole point of the discussion is to suggest alternatives that we could plan for?

More passing loops, more train crews? Well I never!

You seem to be saying things should stay the same, and we should not try to improve the service. At least that is what I'm reading here.

You remind me here of the lost opportunity to get the Luas up and running in the 1990s.

So what smaller measures were you thinking of? Did you actually intend to propose more trains crews and more passing points? Re the latter, there are lots of closed down stations, and many if not all of them would have had a siding that could be turned into a passing point at no great cost.