Threat of rail lines being axed

Nostradamus

OneArt wrote: »

Why are they so stupid?

The railways are vital infrastructure. Even if they're not used now, they probably will be in the future.

Maybe. But they never reopened the canals for anything other than pleasure boating and then same "vital" argument was used back then when the Inland Navigaiton System was being closed.

Let's take an exmaple of why these lines about closed. Let's begin with Ballina-Manulla. For years until recently the service was hauled by filthy locomotives and badly maintained, rattling steam heating coaches. To public transport users actually living in Ballina all they saw a "an oul **** heap" in the station which was next to a brand new BE bus which cost about 2/3rds the fare and got you to Dublin in around the same time with no bizzare change waiting at Manulla for a lottery of either sitting or standing on the connecting train all the way to Dublin.

Is there a lesson in this?

Judgement Day

Nostradamus wrote: »

Maybe. But they never reopened the canals for anything other than pleasure boating and then same "vital" argument was used back then when the Inland Navigaiton System was being closed.

Let's take an exmaple of why these lines about closed. Let's begin with Ballina-Manulla. For years until recently the service was hauled by filthy locomotives and badly maintained, rattling steam heating coaches. To public transport users actually living in Ballina all they saw a "an oul **** heap" in the station which was next to a brand new BE bus which cost about 2/3rds the fare and got you to Dublin in around the same time with no bizzare change waiting at Manulla for a lottery of either sitting or standing on the connecting train all the way to Dublin.

Is there a lesson in this?

The only lesson to be learnt from that is that CIE is past its 'sell-by' date and has been for decades. It has always been beyond my understanding how an efficient organisation like the Great Southern Railways only lasted 20 years and was then turned into the bad joke that is CIE. It seems to escape most posters that CIE/IE is paid for by the taxpayer, to operate the railways and to be their custodian, instead the people at the top of the company operate it like a multi-million euro private fifedom, answerable to nobody and the God awful unions in the company have the same contempt for the public. It's long overdue that this gravy train reached the buffer stops. :mad:

Nostradamus

Judgement Day wrote: »

The only lesson to be learnt from that is that CIE is past its 'sell-by' date and has been for decades. It has always been beyond my understanding how an efficient organisation like the Great Southern Railways only lasted 20 years and was then turned into the bad joke that is CIE. It seems to escape most posters that CIE/IE is paid for by the taxpayer, to operate the railways and to be their custodian, instead the people at the top of the company operate it like a multi-million euro private fifedom, answerable to nobody and the God awful unions in the company have the same contempt for the public. It's long overdue that this gravy train reached the buffer stops. :mad:

You'll get no argument with me there...

...except the Great Southern was a complete joke in terms of providing commuter services in Dublin. It saw this as the task of the DUT with their tram network, and the GSR also closed Broadstone which was much closer to the city center than Hueston because they saw them as the enemy as well.

Judgement Day

Whatever about the GSR being largely constituted from the GSWR and consequently anti-MGWR (Broadstone) the decision to close the rather isolated terminus there was an improvement for passengers as their trains were diveretd to Westland Row (Pearse Stn) instead. As regards suburban trains, the northside ones were under the control of the GNR and I think that the GSR made a fair stab at operating the Amiens Street/Greysones and Harcourt Street/Bray services. It was after all those FF morons Tod Andrews and Erskine Childers that closed the Harcourt Street line!

Anyway we are straying a bit off topic here. What's to be done about the present proposals? As usual I will do my personal bit of whinging here, elsewhere and contact the usual political suspects, for all the use that it will be. Personally, I don't think these closures will go ahead but the way these lines are currnetly operated is a complete waste of taxpayers money and they need to removed from the dead hand of CIE/IE as soon as possible. Why not put their operation out to tender? Could it be any worse?

Good riddance to the WRC. No point throwing good money after bad.

City link go from Galway to Limerick in an hour and a half for €20 return. It should be even quicker when the next section of motorway opens.

Hindsight:
I would have much preferred to have seen the money spent on the Galway-Dublin line - removing the speed restrictions and maybe even double tracking it

bigeddie

Surely the possibility of regional authorities/local councils running/controlling some of these threatened railway routes could be explored, as in Germany, France and Italy (for example the reopened railway line along the Val Venosta west from Merano, in the South Tyrol). I have travelled around all of Ireland in recent holidays using trains and buses, including these threatened routes. I noted the sparse train service between Limerick Junction and Rosslare Europort. Irish Rail appear to desire the closure between Rosslare and Waterford ASAP, and probably the line onwards to Limerick Junction as well (the intermediate stations look very run down now). I have also travelled from Rosslare to Waterford via Wexford by bus and that was awful - bus drivers switched over halfway between Wexford and Waterford, problem was the driver heading towards Wexford then Rosslare was half an hour late. Perhaps Eire should look at the positive, forward thinking, plans in Scotland regarding railways. As a brit it appears that the Dublin area gets most of the funding and the west of Ireland gets the crumbs from the table (stage 1 of the WRC is low-cost compared to boring tunnels under Dublin and a metro system. reopening Ennis to Athenry, which will allow trains between Limerick and Galway, makes sense. The UK is still suffering from the Doctor (some say butcher) Beeching cuts to railways in the 1960s, politician's promises that increased bus services would more than compensate proved to be false.

corktina

Nostradamus wrote: »

You'll get no argument with me there...

...except the Great Southern was a complete joke in terms of providing commuter services in Dublin. It saw this as the task of the DUT with their tram network, and the GSR also closed Broadstone which was much closer to the city center than Hueston because they saw them as the enemy as well.

just to correct you there before people get the wrong impression....Broadstone services were diverted to Connolly not Heuston..which iirc is closer to the city centre than Broadstone.

munchkin_utd

bigeddie wrote: »

Surely the possibility of regional authorities/local councils running/controlling some of these threatened railway routes could be explored, as in Germany, France and Italy (for example the reopened railway line along the Val Venosta west from Merano, in the South Tyrol). ..snip..

Excellent point.
This line was closed for years and only reopened a couple of years with new rolling stock and a very frequent service, a train every hour or so.

Along with that, they have a great scheme for renting bikes to tourists. You can travel to the top (or bottom or middle!) of the valley by train, cycle along the valley to your hearts content and then in the evening drop the bike at pretty much any rail station and get the train back to where you are staying.

The one problem Ireland has is that local authorities dont have any money, they are broke. Domestic rates were abolished back in the 80s as an election promise and no proper substitute revenue fund is in place.

Tourist areas like killarney though probably should bring in a small tourist tax like you see on the Continent to help develop services and tourist facilities. And I would include provision of imaginative local transport services useful to tourists in that.

AlekSmart

The one problem Ireland has is that local authorities dont have any money, they are broke. Domestic rates were abolished back in the 80s as an election promise and no proper substitute revenue fund is in place.

If my memory serves me,this hugely populist piece of Fianna Fáillery was the idea of a Prof Martin O Donoghue who represented the cutting-edge of the Party`s "Financial "Thinking" in those days.

The package also involved the abolition of Road Tax and it`s replacement by a £5 registration charge on ALL private cars.

If one was seeking a start-point for the chain of events which has culminated in the beggaring-of-Éire one could well begin here !!