Midleton Station - What a Beautiful Reconstruction

Nostradamus

Have not been down there - but this photo is anything to go by Irish Rail did a class job with the station. Looks fantastic:

http://finbarrsrailwayphotos.fotopic.net/p60280332.html

Chris_533976

Looks good provided they didnt do the ugly bridge/elevator nonsense they've done with the Kildare Route Project.

dowlingm

Where do people cross the line - at the Mill Road level crossing?

Personally I've no great love for the old single level stations - I'd rather see stations being mixed-use with office space above and ground floor retail to make it more of a destination. I'm not saying knock the old ones but certainly make use of the real estate on the other side of the line and at greenfield stations. In Midleton's case there should be a chance of reverse commutes.

corktina

2 platforms but no run round loop...i suppose I should be pleased there are two platforms...... looks very good to me...

Judgement Day

Yes, they have the delightful, costly and unnecessary lifts at the Cork end of the station.

Midleton is a small country town NOT Tara Street and I shouldn't think that there is much demand for high rise office developments on the station - but I am 'sometimes' proved wrong.

dowlingm

JD- 2-4 stories in keeping with the town height (am familiar as went to secondary school in the locality). Nobody's saying put Liberty Hall there.

Retail like a dry cleaners, a library and so on would be handy for people passing through.

Judgement Day

and somewhere to get spraypaint, Dutch Gold and matches.

DWCommuter

Judgement Day wrote: »

Yes, they have the delightful, costly and unnecessary lifts at the Cork end of the station.

Midleton is a small country town NOT Tara Street and I shouldn't think that there is much demand for high rise office developments on the station - but I am 'sometimes' proved wrong.

What's unnecessary about the lifts?

corktina

dowlingm wrote: »

JD- 2-4 stories in keeping with the town height (am familiar as went to secondary school in the locality). Nobody's saying put Liberty Hall there.

Retail like a dry cleaners, a library and so on would be handy for people passing through.

station not exactly in heart of town...cant see much demand for those service from people hurrying to/from work

westtip

Judgement Day wrote: »

Yes, they have the delightful, costly and unnecessary lifts at the Cork end of the station.

.

Surprised at you JD, the old and infirm, the p**ssed on their way home, the parents with buggies....come on a lift is perfectly reasonable - even if they are not that pleasing on the eye. I think this station by the way looks very attractive.

Judgement Day

DWCommuter wrote: »

What's unnecessary about the lifts?

Given that passengers are able to exit the station from Up and Down platforms why is there a need to cross the line on disembarking from a train? If there are only ticket machines on the Up side it would have been cheaper to install a second ticket machine on the Down side. Even more rational - to me - would have been to have only one platform. Massive saving all round. That's the way a private operator would have done it but then again a private operator would be trying to maximise return on their investment - you know Fastrack etc. Instead CIE/IE spend the taxpayers money on the line, fling it open and say there you, run yourself in to the ground and then back for another handout. Incidentally, what was the point of spending money on a replica (leverless) signal cabin?

Judgement Day

westtip wrote: »

Surprised at you JD, the old and infirm, the p**ssed on their way home, the parents with buggies....come on a lift is perfectly reasonable - even if they are not that pleasing on the eye. I think this station by the way looks very attractive.

Yes, sorry I forgot that lifts are a favourite toilet facility for the p**ssed on their way home.

deRanged

Judgement Day wrote: »

Yes, they have the delightful, costly and unnecessary lifts at the Cork end of the station.

do you really think they're unnecessary? that's taken in Glounthaune station the day the line opened for business.

every day people have to lift buggies over the old foot bridge. people on crutches struggle over ...

Judgement Day

deRanged wrote: »

do you really think they're unnecessary? that's taken in Glounthaune station the day the line opened for business.

every day people have to lift buggies over the old foot bridge. people on crutches struggle over ...

Nice pic but I was talking about Midleton where there is good access to both carparks and the roads on both sides of the station. Also I shouldn't imagine this type of scene happens very often at COBH JUNCTION as the amount of people changing from Cobh/Cork trains on to Cork/Midleton trains will be quite small.

deRanged

Judgement Day wrote: »

. Also I shouldn't imagine this type of scene happens very often at COBH JUNCTION as the amount of people changing from Cobh/Cork trains on to Cork/Midleton trains will be quite small.

It happens every day (not on the same scale, usually one or two people) in Glounthaune station. People coming to Glounthaune from either the Cobh line or Midleton line, people going Cork direction from Glounthaune.

They should have lifts in every station, not just Midleton. Do they have lifts in Carrig I wonder - anyone know?

Judgement Day

Yes - there are lifts at Carrigtwohill as well but precious few passengers from what I can gather.

dowlingm

corktina wrote: »

station not exactly in heart of town...cant see much demand for those service from people hurrying to/from work

I think quite a bit of the Midleton growth areas will be north of the station. As for "hurrying to/from work" - I doubt they'd prefer to drive into "town" and find parking if there was a convenient and reasonably priced alternative.

Chris_533976

Totally unrelated to Commuting or Transport, this is what we define as a "Beautiful Reconstruction" by the way, not just a random brick building





Dresden Castle btw, bombed out by the British during the war.

fh041205

Hold on a minute. The 2 platforms are already both accessable from the road but they built a lift anyway? Does seem a bit unneccessary if so. Nice station too. I've come to expect much less than that from modern buildings.

Judgement Day

I know there are issues to do with access for prams, wheelchairs etc and I appreciate that they must be dealt with but I feel just building lifts everywhere is OTT, massively expensive and, in many cases, injurious to the surroundings.

The station building at Midleton is not new - merely the original one reroofed with the brickwork cleaned up - and it is not in public use!

fh041205

Judgement Day wrote: »

The station building at Midleton is not new - merely the original one reroofed with the brickwork cleaned up - and it is not in public use!

Ha. Even more interesting. And a shame unfortunately because I like a lot of the older station buildings outside of Dublin where everything seems to be in decay.

serfboard

Are there any figures available yet as to the number of people using the service?

dowlingm

Judgement Day wrote: »

The station building at Midleton is not new - merely the original one reroofed with the brickwork cleaned up - and it is not in public use!

What are IE doing with it then? God forbid commuters have a bit of comfort.

Aidan1

I think quite a bit of the Midleton growth areas will be north of the station. As for "hurrying to/from work" - I doubt they'd prefer to drive into "town" and find parking if there was a convenient and reasonably priced alternative.

The Special Local Area Plan (SLAP! - link below) for Midleton set out the future growth areas for the town - the population is (or was) supposed to grow substantially from 10,000 now. The SLAP ties in with the CASP (Cork Area Strategic Plan), and the historical landuse and transport planning strategies for the Cork area all the way back to the original 1978 LUTS.

An extension of the recently completed Northern Distributor road across the north of the town is also proposed, along with a new road network north of the station.

http://www.corkcoco.ie/co/pdf/176646608.pdf

I used the station a couple of times last week - it's a lot less hassle than driving into Cork. The service was a lot busier than I expected, I counted over 50% occupancy everytime I used it (off peak at all times). There were Irish Rail staff present on the platforms too, showing people how to use the ticket machines, and just making themselves generally useful (including picking up rubbish in the carpark). I know the service still has a novelty factor associated with it, and a lot of the traffic will be once off, but there is a substantial pool of demand in the area. The fact that it acts as a feeder to the Cork-Dublin Service will also help - for example, my mother would never have gotten the bus to Cork, but she's going to Dublin next week with work, and she's starting her journey in Midleton. October, when the schools and colleges are back, and traffic is back to normal, will be the big test.

deRanged

I do think the Midleton line has taken a fair bit of traffic from the Cobh line. I've counted the cars at Glounthaune station and I reckon they're down to about a third. This is just my rough counting obviously. I've been getting Midleton trains home in the evening and they're pretty full so I reckon it's doing well. Another month or so will tell a lot - with schools and colleges back.

NedNew

I spoke with a Carrigtwohill resident this weekend and he mentioned very few people are using the service. The reason being is the cost, it's €6.50 to Cork station (not sure if this is single or return) plus €2 to park the car.

He said it's cheaper just to drive.