Limerick - Nenagh - Ballybrophy railway

I couldn't agree more. These lines could be so much more useful if there was any kind of sensible timetable put in place, and say 120km/h line speeds.

It's very difficult for instance to travel from Galway to Waterford using public transport, with the best possible time that can be ever achieved being 4 hours, and that is only when you get lucky with services lining up perfectly so you can transfer straight from a Waterford - Dublin train to a Dublin Galway train in Kildare. Usually it takes 5 hours.

Surely if there were decent line speeds and a synchronised timetable you could cut this down to 3 hours using the Western Rail Corridor. I know there'd be plenty of students going up and down from college that would avail of it, even just going from Waterford to Limerick.

The same could definitely be said of students travelling up to Limerick or Galway from Nenagh or Roscrea.

The main problem is the gate keeper crossings. They need to be automated and then it will be much easier to make changes to the timetable. Introducing additional services, more than one train on Sundays, public holidays etc. The manned gates are the main obstacle to positive changes now.

Poor sightlines or other safety issues. Every crossing on the network is assessed individually from a safety perspective and an appropriate speed limit set.

The user worked crossings need to be eliminated, and the rest of the crossings automated.

Additional problem is how do you go about getting ring fenced funding to automate these manned gates. How many million euros would it be to automate 12 gate keeper crossings? You could get a lot of bike sheds for that scratch.

There are 13 gate keeper crossings on the line. 10 of them are between Birdhill and Killonan Junction and I think the elevation around there would preclude a bridge as an option. 2 of the 10 have some degree of automation in place already as far as I know but for whatever reason gate keepers are still required at both of these gates. So it's a lot of gate keepers along a relatively short section of the line that is the biggest obstacle to any real improvements for the timetable on this line. The other 3 gate keepers are 1 shortly after Cloughjordan(this one could possibly be closed with a new section of road. One just after Roscrea could be automated and one near Borris in Ossory. Automation the obvious solution here.

1 million euro to install one of these LC?

1 million………………..!!!!

I can't see it.

No, that doesn't surprise me at all. The tech n equipment prob costs a couple of hundred thousand alone. Then there's specialists required for installation, additional labour, materials, H&S, traffic management and testing.

It all adds up.

That wouldn't even include timetable changing afterwards. That's a big expensive task.

Curvature is not a problem for most of the line, especially between Ballybrophy and Nenagh. Up to the 1970s the line speed was 70 mph, and the sectional running times for passenger trains between Ballybrophy and Nenagh were close to 60 mph average. The vast majority of the present 30mph restrictions on this section are for user-operated and farm crossings. The visibility problems should not be too great if the line is not tightly curved.

Other jurisdictions manage with less expensive crossings than the full-Monty 4-barrier CCTV fully signalled variety. For example there are AHB crossings on the main Belfast line south of Lisburn. Such crossings are good for 80 mph.