From the past

stevoman · 10-06-2008 4:29pm #1

I couldnt find any good pictures of the old power station in portarlington only this one from the ESB website. For those who dont remember it was situated where sli na mona is now on the edenderry road. thats why there are train tracks on the road from when the peat trains used to bring the turf up to the station to burn to make power. i remeber being brought in there when i was very young with my grandad when he worked there before he retired. Brings back a lot of memories!!! if anyone has any pictures of it on their computers at home and could scan them it would be much appreciated or any other old pics from the town.

Steve_o · 10-06-2008 4:34pm

Theres a nice shot of it here

undecided · 10-06-2008 4:37pm

steve O thats the same pic!

stevoman cant be of any help sorry!

stevoman · 10-06-2008 4:41pm

here's another picture of the barrow bridge many moons ago. you can see travelgoods on the right hand side when it was still opened. the duke of wellington was educated there. you can see originally how big the building was, as opposed to the road that now runs through to super valu. if you look hard enough down by the river if you walk about 500 yards down to the right you can come across the old open swimming pool that was there for the kids.

Steve_o · 10-06-2008 4:42pm

undecided wrote: »

steve O thats the same pic!

stevoman cant be of any help sorry!

So it is.... my PC is very slow at loading images, i didn't see it til the post was made... my bad!!

Steve_o · 10-06-2008 4:52pm

Go to Michael Scully the photographer, he tooks a million photos of that place, before, during and after it was blown up!!!

kmart6 · 10-06-2008 5:36pm

Was it not directly where McMahons is?!

Kingdom · 10-06-2008 6:19pm

I thought it was more where MCmahons is myself, I remember taking the dogs for walks in around there before it and the housing estate were built and thought that was the spot.

kmart6 · 10-06-2008 6:24pm

The estate is much further out! The tower was def on the McMahon's side of town!

ports best · 11-06-2008 8:30am

i taught so meself, theres a book in the barbers beside the cop station that has everything about the power station in it, i think it was to commenrate the closeing of the station, its a good read to

Curvy Vixen · 11-06-2008 9:22am

I have to say that one of the things I love about Port is that the main streets really haven't changed a huge amount in the last 100 years. In Tom's bar (I think) there are framed pictures of Port 100 years ago and if you were transported there from now you would know where nearly everything is/was.

kikel · 12-06-2008 9:45am

Good thread Stevoman, as a non local i always wondered about the power station. Great to see a picture.

stevoman · 12-06-2008 5:17pm

here's one of the catholic church circa 1933.

moose112 · 12-06-2008 7:23pm

Was pretty much brought up in the power station as a child my grandfather worked on the building of it and my dad worked as a fitter in there and was one of the last men to leave before it closed.

The power station was exactly where Mcmahons is now.

My dad has the book at home great read and some funny stories and often talks about the place with fond memories, sadly not many of the lads are around anymore place was covered in asbestos and has taken most of them.

stevoman · 13-06-2008 9:24am

yeah i was up walking around there last night and realised it was by mcmahaons. funny because i was reared around that area and so much has changed now its hard to picture where things were.

stevoman · 13-06-2008 9:28am

another one folks. here's a postcard of french church street circa 1910. nothing much has changed as you can see. if anyone else had any pictures please make sure to put them up!

kikel · 13-06-2008 9:37am

Hey Stevoman,
There is more here. some are the same as you've already posted. Their's 3 pages of stuff anyway

http://www.oldirishimages.com/towns%20and%20villages/co%20laois/portarlington/portarlington.html

stevoman · 13-06-2008 9:53am

kikel wrote: »

Hey Stevoman,
There is more here. some are the same as you've already posted. Their's 3 pages of stuff anyway

http://www.oldirishimages.com/towns%20and%20villages/co%20laois/portarlington/portarlington.html

lovely pictures. well done kikel i'l paste them onto a post later one when im bored in work! we can share what we know about each picture then!

kikel · 13-06-2008 10:00am

I've being trying to find more photos of the power station. There is feck all online. Did it have a name? or just Port power station

DéiseGirl · 19-06-2008 10:07am

My boyfriend was looking up stuff on the internet about the power station before (he's really into trains and wanted to know more about the use of the train line etc) and drew a blank as well.

kikel · 19-06-2008 10:21am

Amazed their is no monument or anything in memory of the power station. The power station must of being a huge part of the community or is only bad memories people have of the place?

Ruby-J · 19-06-2008 10:42am

cough cough....

where is the power station?

(hides her head in shame! waits for ports best to throw a shoe at her for her ignorance!!!!)

kikel · 19-06-2008 10:50am

Ruby-J wrote: »

cough cough....

where is the power station?

(hides her head in shame! waits for ports best to throw a shoe at her for her ignorance!!!!)

It's long gone Ruby, they blew it up years ago. It was where Mcmahons i on the Edenderry road is now

Ruby-J · 19-06-2008 10:51am

phew!!!! i was beginning to think i WAS going around with my eyes closed!

what a shame its gone. it seems to be a priceless landmark for port.

ports best · 19-06-2008 4:18pm

:pwhere is toms bar lads:D:pac:;)

moose112 · 19-06-2008 6:33pm

DéiseGirl wrote: »

My boyfriend was looking up stuff on the internet about the power station before (he's really into trains and wanted to know more about the use of the train line etc) and drew a blank as well.

The trains were used to transport peat from the bog to the station and aslo brought the ashes back to the bog for dumping.
They still have some of the trains running on a bog in some part of offaly they bring tourists out across the bog.

Toms bar is in mountrath

Ruby-J · 19-06-2008 7:18pm

ports best wrote: »

:pwhere is toms bar lads:D:pac:;)

LMAO!!!

Ports Best "Lads il be at the first meet!!!"

At the meet...EVERYONE...."Where's Ports Best????"

Curvy Vixen · 20-06-2008 8:04am

Touché Ports Best ~ she got ya there!!!!

Steve_o · 20-06-2008 10:35am

Ruby-J wrote: »

phew!!!! i was beginning to think i WAS going around with my eyes closed!

what a shame its gone. it seems to be a priceless landmark for port.

It was also a priceless death trap... the cooling tower was becoming unstable and engineers wreckoned it was gonna come down at any stage, and you would always get people sneaking into the grounds and hangin around...

Silent Rain · 20-06-2008 10:41am

Not to mention the asbestos which was all over the place, hence the reason why the site had to be so well protected when it did eventually come down.... but hey if asbestos ridden ruins are something you're into :rolleyes:

Curvy Vixen · 20-06-2008 10:44am

Silent Rain wrote: »

Not to mention the asbestos which was all over the place, hence the reason why the site had to be so well protected when it did eventually come down.... but hey if asbestos ridden ruins are something you're into :rolleyes:

Silent Rain, are you not in a good mood today?

From the past

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