Western Rail Corridor (all disused sections)

DWCommuter

Right. Im sick of all the indecision and pathetic references in disguised threads. Can we finally have this thread to discuss the pros cons and politics of this project, inclusive of all that goes with it.

Alternatively could a mod have the decency to tell us if WRC threads are now banned? If not can we get this one rolling? Its fair to say that a lot of us want to talk about it.

When the Ennis-Athenry line does open other threads can be started to discuss services. Until then all there is to talk about is the ifs and buts of its potential from Limerick to Colooney.

If anyone wants to reference anything in the original thread it can be found at this link;

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=141318

corktina

potential...

limerick to ennis quite good
ennis to galway may be Ok
galway to tuam doubtful
tuam northward none

IMHO

westtip

DWCommuter wrote: »

Right. Im sick of all the indecision and pathetic references in disguised threads. Can we finally have this thread to discuss the pros cons and politics of this project, inclusive of all that goes with it.

Alternatively could a mod have the decency to tell us if WRC threads are now banned? If not can we get this one rolling? Its fair to say that a lot of us want to talk about it.

When the Ennis-Athenry line does open other threads can be started to discuss services. Until then all there is to talk about is the ifs and buts of its potential from Limerick to Colooney.

Here here - but i take umbrage at the word "pathetic" in terms of references in disguised threads, the less than wail collidor was for the time of year - a piece of pantomine. I shall go to that thread for a final post of interest right now...

Now where we all before we got rudely interupted (and I take it we may be again.) Actually at this point in time I don't think I've got much more to say...:)

DWCommuter

From Shane in the thread about a thread. Think it belongs here.

Ya its flooded again. I expect the line to be closed until atleast march or april next year. The water is about 2 feet over the tracks which are laid on a 2meter hign bank !

And if their is nothing done about it it will be flooded again next winter!

Can flooding on this line last that long?

westtip

What effect will the budget have on the WRC

Rail projects to be completed next year will include the Western Rail Corridor Phase 1;

but no mention of phase 2 Athenry - Tuam or 3 tuam - Claremorris

both of which I think are dead in the water (not flood water north of Athenry)

here is the full report on Transport from the IT WRC bits highlighted

O'BRIENTRANSPORT: ANNOUNCING DETAILS of the Transport budget, Minister Noel Dempsey said the 2010 provision for roads would be €1.637 billion, €280 million (14.6 per cent) down on the revised 2009 allocation.

Of this, €1.115 billion is to be used on national roads, particularly to complete schemes linking Dublin with the regional cities; and €411 million will be provided for the upkeep and maintenance of local and regional roads.

There will be €920 million for public transport of which CIÉ will receive direct subvention of €276 million. This is a reduction of €27 million (8.8 per cent).

The capital provision for public transport investment is €625 million, €3 million lower than in 2009. Rail projects to be completed next year will include the Western Rail Corridor Phase 1; the Luas extension to Cherrywood; the Kildare Rail Project; and the Navan Railway Line Phase 1. Work will continue on the Luas extension to Citywest for completion in 2011. Planning will continue on Metro North and Dart Underground.

The 2010 provision for road safety is €37.5 million, compared with €37.2 million in 2009. This is intended to help maintain the downward trend in road deaths.

Maritime transport and safety has been allocated €53 million, compared with €49 million in 2009. The principal item is the provision of a search and rescue helicopter service for €27.3 million.

The 2010 provision for aviation is €23.2 million, compared with €26.2 million in 2009.

Public-private partnership (PPP) operational payments will amount to €43.4 million in 2010. This funding is used to make annual payments to PPP operators for road projects where private investment is not remunerated by tolls.

The administrative budget of the Department of Transport is being reduced by €2.9 million in 2010.

Reductions totalling €2 million are also being made in the administrative budgets of a number of agencies, principally the National Roads Authority, Railway Procurement Agency and Railway Safety Commission.

Apart from phase 1 been completed (which in effect aside from some station work) has been done. It does not augur well for the Greens nw programme for Governmetn negotiated with FF in which a committment was made to WRC. Also highlighted what they say about what planning will continue next year - see anything conspicuous by its absence?

Any ducks on those floods south of Athenry. This one appears dead in the water.

Calina

DWCommuter wrote: »

Alternatively could a mod have the decency to tell us if WRC threads are now banned? If not can we get this one rolling? Its fair to say that a lot of us want to talk about it.

This is my view on the subject.

No, WRC threads are not now banned. However, given the general tendency for them to descend into puerile farce, they get closed with rather alarming frequency and I get reminded by just how idiotic people can be on the internet.

If this thread progresses in a constructive manner, then I don't have an issue with it. If it derails, becomes a safe haven for trolls and idiocy, regardless of what your stance on it is, then it will result in bans and a thread lock.

Ultimately, the fate of the thread is in the hands of the posters. If you collectively have a grown up discussion about it, we're okay. If you don't, we're not.

I'd advise any posters against

1) trolling
2) backseat modding
3) insulting other users
4) generally messing the thread around.

If you the community take this advice on board, I will be saved from having to do any major moderation in here. This would be a boon to be honest.

I am hopeful that this will be the case.

westtip

OK calina very interesting. Why not just open the original thread with these rules. Because that thread contains essays arguments newspaper articles links to relevant items --- the list goes on - it is in fact an ongoing commentary of everything that has been debated on the WRC in the past six and half years in one thread here on boards.ie and if new people come in to ask a question they can merely be sent a link to a previous post.

Like DW I am fed up with all this farce that is going on I actually used to quite enjoy debating issues on these boards, but this has now become a battle and clearly the heels are dug in and the thread which contains a massive amount of information on the WRC does not appear to be going to open - All you have to do Calina is open the old thread.

Derek I admire your idea but the thread that should be opened up is the one that should never have been closed, not least because of the massive amount of information it contains.

corktina

i dont agree...you can never have 100% of what you want and I think we should move forward from here.You can still access the old thread I believe and refer people to it by means of quoting can you not? Lets ALL stop acting the Maggot and behave ourselves

Calina

Westtip, cut the backseat moderating.

If you want to discuss the WRC this is where you are going to do it.

westtip

Calina wrote: »

Westtip, cut the backseat moderating.

If you want to discuss the WRC this is where you are going to do it.

Fine. Derek good luck with the thread. I take it you are not going to re-open the old thread, and this is not backseat moderating it is purely asking a question.

Rawr

I fully endorse this school, amenity, and/or discussion thread.

I'm glad to see a Western Rail Corridor thread finally up and running. I am of coarse saddened that the monster that was the original WRC thread, does not appear to be returning.

However, it remains in place, and shall continue to do so I hope. Instead of focusing on the rukus of the past weeks, I would ask (as a boardsie who loves this debate) for everyone to get back to the debate in earnest.

Having the WRC thread desend into a heated debate about itself merely serves elements of West On Track and their ilk, who seem to have a thing about negative comment regarding the corridor.

I hope for the flooding on the WRC to end soon, in order to actually see what happens. Either way, it will be a good debate in the first few days of it's running.

T Corolla

I done some rescearch on the population densities from Sligo to Limerick and was not surprised why there is no case for the WRC beyond Tuam. Here are the totals
Sligo 19400
Collooney 1000
Tubbercurry 3000
Charlestown 860
Swinford 1500
Kiltimagh 1100
Clairemorris 2600
Ballindine 800
Miltown 1500
Tuam 6900
Ballyglunin 200
Athenry 4100
Craughwell 400
ardrahan 400
Gort 1800
Ennis 24300
Sixmilebridge 2100
Compared to Sligo to Dublin which is rumoured to be a loss making services if it is there is no case for Sligo to Limerick
Dublin to Sligo
Colooney 1000
Ballymote 3000
Boyle 2530
Carrick On Shannon 3200
Dromond 510
Longford 8900
Edgeworthtown 250
Mullingar 18500
Enfield 2200
Kilcock 4100
Maynooth 10,715
There is as much of a case for a railway from Waterford to Cork or Cavan to Dublin to Cavan as there is for a railway north of Tuam
Waterford to Cork
Dungarvan 8400
Youghal 6500
Midelton 10000
Dublin to Cavan
Cavan 7900
Virginia 3190
Kells 5250
Navan 25000
Dunboyne 5400
These are the town and envoirn population as per 2006. I think of all the towns on WRC Tuam has the best chance. I intend going back to the web to find the elevation all the towns from Sligo to Tuam are above water level to see how many times it would be shut due to flodding as is the case with the Limerick to Ennis line currently and the Sligo to Dublin line. I understand that the population densities are one of the indicators of determing if a service is viable or not

dowlingm

Reopening to Tuam only helps very little (and certainly not without serious upgrades to Athenry-Galway track capacity). Reopening to Claremorris improves system resilency while creating plausible routings like Ballina-Limerick (as part of maintenance movements that will be happening anyway, via Athlone).

Claremorris-Collooney is a WHOLE different thing altogether.

corktina

in the current climate i think its academic isnt it? With cutbacks inevitable at IE, will the WRC open at all at this time? or will some other line close to allow it to open?

DWCommuter

Link to the original WRC thread if anyone wants to reference some of the very good information there. No nonsense. Just genuine stuff please.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=141318

SeanW

My view of the Western Rail Corridor is that it is funadmentally hampered by 4 factors:

1) Low population density - no business case possible North of Tuam.
2) Light railway construction North of Tuam.
3) Chronic flooding on the key Ennis-Limerick section.
4) Interchange at Athenry.

1) is self explanitory. 2) has been well discussed on these forums. 3) Means that you either need to spend a good deal of money raising or adding drainage to the Ennis-Limerick section or accept the continuance of this regular and prolonged flooding.
4) Is where things get interesting and its where the case for any WRC North of Tuam truly falls apart.
If you have a train coming from North of Athenry, you hit the junction there which is a good journey outside Galway City, do you send trains down to Limerick, bigger city, or Galway, which is closer and probably has more commuters?

• You can't send the trains into Galway and then double back for Limerick because that would add a significant delay for Mayo-Limerick passengers, i.e. the bus (and the car) would just go straight through the M17(M6)M18 junction at Rathmorrisey and beat the train.
• You can't split the trains half to/from Galway and half to/from Limerick because both destinations would have too few services.

So the service pattern and target markets all would have to be carefully defined and it would likely transpire that the only viable combination would be:
1) Galway-Limerick
2) Tuam-Galway COMMUTER services.
With a guaranteed connection of meeting trains at Athenry station for those who might want to travel betwee Tuam or Mayo and the Southern part of the line.

That's my take on it anyway. Unless the country hits a major jackpot and we have the money to build a totally new line STRAIGHT between at least Limerick and Galway (circumventing the flooding and Athenry interchange problems, as well as preferably taking in Shannon Airport) we may as well dispatch the track lifting machine to everything above Tuam.

corktina

i think that splitting/joining trains at Athenry would be the answer there...

Hungerford

T Corolla wrote: »

Compared to Sligo to Dublin which is rumoured to be a loss making services if it is there is no case for Sligo to Limerick

Ahem. Weirdly enough, Sligo to Dublin is one of IE's busiest and fastest growing Intercity routes even though they've done their damnest to alienate the route's passengers in the past.

Sponge Bob

SeanW wrote: »

My view of the Western Rail Corridor is that it is funadmentally hampered by 4 factors:

And hampered even more by your specifically accusing me HERE of supporting lines with an even worse business case than the WRC rather than address any points I made and taking that thread way off topic with frivolous rubbish

T Corolla

SeanW wrote: »

My view of the Western Rail Corridor is that it is funadmentally hampered by 4 factors:

1) Low population density - no business case possible North of Tuam.
2) Light railway construction North of Tuam.
3) Chronic flooding on the key Ennis-Limerick section.
4) Interchange at Athenry.

1) is self explanitory. 2) has been well discussed on these forums. 3) Means that you either need to spend a good deal of money raising or adding drainage to the Ennis-Limerick section or accept the continuance of this regular and prolonged flooding.
4) Is where things get interesting and its where the case for any WRC North of Tuam truly falls apart.
If you have a train coming from North of Athenry, you hit the junction there which is a good journey outside Galway City, do you send trains down to Limerick, bigger city, or Galway, which is closer and probably has more commuters?

• You can't send the trains into Galway and then double back for Limerick because that would add a significant delay for Mayo-Limerick passengers, i.e. the bus (and the car) would just go straight through the M17(M6)M18 junction at Rathmorrisey and beat the train.
• You can't split the trains half to/from Galway and half to/from Limerick because both destinations would have too few services.

So the service pattern and target markets all would have to be carefully defined and it would likely transpire that the only viable combination would be:
1) Galway-Limerick
2) Tuam-Galway COMMUTER services.
With a guaranteed connection of meeting trains at Athenry station for those who might want to travel betwee Tuam or Mayo and the Southern part of the line.

That's my take on it anyway. Unless the country hits a major jackpot and we have the money to build a totally new line STRAIGHT between at least Limerick and Galway (circumventing the flooding and Athenry interchange problems, as well as preferably taking in Shannon Airport) we may as well dispatch the track lifting machine to everything above Tuam.

I am in agreement with the thread. There is no business case for services between Limerick to Galway as the population outside Ennis is low.
To be brief
(1) Limerick-Sixmilebridge-Moyross-Ennis
(2) Galway-Athenry-Tuam.
Unless the line is brought up to 70mph speeds and 22k Intercity services is used on the Limerick-Galway line it will not yield returns justified to pay for its construction and future maintenance. Final point to IR work on the commuter traffic first then think of the intercity traffic as population and demand builds

SeanW

Sponge Bob wrote: »

And hampered even more by your specifically accusing me HERE

which I've dealt with in that thread.

taking that thread way off topic with frivolous rubbish

And with this post, you're doing ... what exactly?

dowlingm

Hungerford wrote: »

Ahem. Weirdly enough, Sligo to Dublin is one of IE's busiest and fastest growing Intercity routes even though they've done their damnest to alienate the route's passengers in the past.

I'd like to see numbers for north of Mullingar/Longford though. There's also the issue that the air alternative has ended up in Sligo Harbour at least once

The Ennis-Athenry section was refreshed rather than rebuilt so 50mph running plus the inexplicable addition of stations between Gort and Athenry which I can only attribute to TD interference. What it comes down to though is this is what DofT allocated money-wise. If you give Dick Fearn a few bn euro he'll build you a TGV - but you're not going to give him 10bn, you're giving him 50-100m and telling him get on with it. Add some IE bloody mindedness by not putting enough dynamic loops north of Ennis and no day-1 passing loop at Sixmilebridge because the Limerick signalling commissioning was not synced to the project schedule and all sorts of caveats start appearing.

It's all very well to say we should put the 22Ks on at 75mph but the strengthening and straightening of the route required will likely mean tearing up at least some of the recent relay, plus 75mph is no good if you're stopped at a signal because there isn't a passing loop.

Athenry could be the Limerick Junction of Co. Galway, except that (a) IE still haven't figured out how to deal with the Limerick Junction of Co. Tipperary and (b) the bridge immediately east of the station makes some improvements impossible like an east-facing bay platform.

Here's how I could see it though - train comes down from Tuam in the AM and stops in Athenry at the north platform. Two joined sets (say 6+3) arrive from Galway to the southern platform. Tuam passengers for Dublin and Limerick transfer and the Dublin train (now split) moves off, followed by the Galway train and the Limerick train. Similarly the evening Galway-Tuam could pick up passengers coming up from Limerick or out from Dublin if platform and track occupancy could be worked out.

However, the free riding of the WRC would have to stop and that means Galway and Mayo Co. Councils providing direct support to any further enhancements to the Ennis-Claremorris alignments. By free riding I mean not that the Wesht doesn't deserve investment, but if you have no "skin in the game" and your re-election as a councillor depended on the perception of having wasted money on a train with no passengers, you might do something about planning policies and look at ways to aid the project by donating land for park and ride or local shuttle buses to the station.

corktina

can someone who knows comment on the feasibility of joining trains with passengers onboard...i'm not sure that this would be allowed as there is always a risk of a heavy shunt and to do this you effectively have to have two trains in the same section, which is not desirable on a single line..

Ham'nd'egger

corktina wrote: »

can someone who knows comment on the feasibility of joining trains with passengers onboard...i'm not sure that this would be allowed as there is always a risk of a heavy shunt and to do this you effectively have to have two trains in the same section, which is not desirable on a single line..

It is being done on Westport/Galway services and some railcars on the Ballybrophy line with no issues whatsoever in terms of safety. It was always done in the days of locos on Waterford services at Kilkenny, again with no problems.

corktina

good to know, i know it was always the practice in the Auld days but in this health and safety concious time, i wondered if it might be a problem.

T Corolla

dowlingm wrote: »

I'd like to see numbers for north of Mullingar/Longford though. There's also the issue that the air alternative has ended up in Sligo Harbour at least once

I would also like to see the number. I would also like to see double tracking between Edgeworthtown and Mullingar and not have trains waiting in Edgeworthtown for 10 mins to 30 mins awaiting a train from Dublin to pass by. I say 20 to 30 million would lay tracking between both stations and vastly improve the service and maybe bring the travel time from Sligo to Dublin by 15 mins. If the capital budget for the entire WRC was taken and spent on Limerick to Galway to bring the line up to 70-75mph speed limit it has more of a chance of survival that at 45-50mph. IR should think of quality rather than quantity. Limerick to Galway will have the highest population density and Tuam and a decent rail service in these times is not much to ask for. I could go on about carbon footprint and the envoirment but IMO take the money for all WRC and spend on Limerick to Galway.

Calina

corktina wrote: »

can someone who knows comment on the feasibility of joining trains with passengers onboard...i'm not sure that this would be allowed as there is always a risk of a heavy shunt and to do this you effectively have to have two trains in the same section, which is not desirable on a single line..

I believe it's still done typically on the continent quite often so not sure why it should be an issue here.

Sponge Bob

We have an overdeveloped compo culture is why

However the units of 22000 class lend themselves to such an arrangement where the older trains did not.

T Corolla

The 22k trains are the best thing IR has invested in a while. When the green railcars used to be the main train on the Sligo line the loading were alot lower than they are now. I was on one of the green railcars in Nov 2007 on a wintry cold day and everytime we stopped at a station the cold that came into the train was noticeble. Each week I take the train to Dublin and whether it is 3 car or 6 car the train is 70-80% full at Mullingar and sometimes you have to stand until you get to Maynooth or Dublin. I will pay tribute to the green railcar as it was one of my mode of transport until I started driving but it was not for the fainhearted on a winters day

Tableman

I done some rescearch on the population densities from Sligo to Limerick and was not surprised why there is no case for the WRC beyond Tuam. Here are the totals
Sligo 19400
Collooney 1000
Tubbercurry 3000
Charlestown 860
Swinford 1500
Kiltimagh 1100
Clairemorris 2600
Ballindine 800
Miltown 1500
Tuam 6900
Ballyglunin 200
Athenry 4100
Craughwell 400
ardrahan 400
Gort 1800
Ennis 24300
Sixmilebridge 2100
Compared to Sligo to Dublin which is rumoured to be a loss making services if it is there is no case for Sligo to Limerick
Dublin to Sligo
Colooney 1000
Ballymote 3000
Boyle 2530
Carrick On Shannon 3200
Dromond 510
Longford 8900
Edgeworthtown 250
Mullingar 18500
Enfield 2200
Kilcock 4100
Maynooth 10,715
There is as much of a case for a railway from Waterford to Cork or Cavan to Dublin to Cavan as there is for a railway north of Tuam
Waterford to Cork
Dungarvan 8400
Youghal 6500
Midelton 10000
Dublin to Cavan
Cavan 7900
Virginia 3190
Kells 5250
Navan 25000
Dunboyne 5400
These are the town and envoirn population as per 2006. I think of all the towns on WRC Tuam has the best chance. I intend going back to the web to find the elevation all the towns from Sligo to Tuam are above water level to see how many times it would be shut due to flodding as is the case with the Limerick to Ennis line currently and the Sligo to Dublin line. I understand that the population densities are one of the indicators of determing if a service is viable or not

Claremorris only 2600? And Milltown 1500? Where did you get these figures from? Added together, they may make sense but town by town, you should not go by these figures.

The advantage of brining it north of Tuam is to link it to the Westport line (In Claremorris). No advantage bringing it north of Claremorris

T Corolla

http://cso.ie/Census/TableView/tableView.aspx?ReportId=75478

Kingdom

Why is there no rail line to Shannon?

T Corolla

You would think they would align the railway to areas of high population densities. It would make scence to have the airport on the line instead of some of the smaller towns

DWCommuter

T Corolla wrote: »

You would think they would align the railway to areas of high population densities. It would make scence to have the airport on the line instead of some of the smaller towns

Comes back to the point I made about the WRC only making a semblence of sense if it had been realigned to make it more viable. Of course Government would never have considered it at the higher cost. Instead we get the results of mere whims and fantasies.

corktina

T Corolla wrote: »

You would think they would align the railway to areas of high population densities. It would make scence to have the airport on the line instead of some of the smaller towns

no it wouldnt....where would air passengers be going to and from in Ireland? Are there direct fast rail links to those places? To have a sucessful airport link that means anything you would need a frequent service direct from Airport to a very large centre of population...the west of Ireland does not have this....in fact Dublin barely qualifies.

Sponge Bob

Those population numbers are too crude , they leave out the likes of the Tuam Rural ED while showing only the Tuam Urban. The population over each ED within 5 miles of a station is what should be counted.

Craughwell with only 400 is wrong, is that the Craughwell ED only or the village only?? What about nearby EDs ???

Hungerford

Kingdom wrote: »

Why is there no rail line to Shannon?

The technical reason is that it would require a six-mile spur off the Limerick to Ennis line, which is single [with no double track sections] throughout. As for the political...

corktina

Hungerford wrote: »

The technical reason is that it would require a six-mile spur off the Limerick to Ennis line, which is single [with no double track sections] throughout. As for the political...

or a park and ride at 6milebridge with a bus link....either way though there simply wouldnt be the traffic density necessary.

dowlingm

Kingdom wrote: »

Why is there no rail line to Shannon?

Because Shannon was created as a New Town in an era (late 60s) when the car was deemed to have replaced the need for rail. The notion of rail-focused districts like Adamstown was unimaginable and politically a non-starter I'd say - especially when large scale developments were almost exclusively driven by the public purse and not private developers. The current layout of the town might make finding an alignment today which isn't deathly slow or away from demand centres tough.

The time to build the rail line was years ago when the Free Zone was still doing a certain amount of trade - it could have formed a long passing loop or simply slewed away from Sixmilebridge completely - but the line would still likely be electric staff not CTC and subject to all sorts of capacity constraints, cheaping out of grade separation and being generally labour intensive to operate. It also would have been industrial policy and as we saw in Foynes that's not how IE sees their role - especially when money isn't forthcoming for investments that will pay their return (increased economic activity, reduced road maintenence costs, reduced CO2 emissions) largely outside IE's coffers.

dowlingm

Craughwell-Galway by No.20 Bus Eireann or Citylink - 25mins.
How long from Craughwell to Galway by train in the 2010 timetable? We don't know for sure yet but to beat the bus it's got to be less than 10 minutes from departing Craughwell and departing Athenry (assuming an average of the timetabled inbound and outbound times) - which let's face it, it won't be, since it's six miles plus acceleration and deceleration and changing ends - and from an environmental perspective you've done that to haul someone about one third faster in distance terms.

At least one third of the catchment is going to be in the direct path to Galway so you can forget about that, plus some of the rest will be impinged by the proximity of Ardrahan. The projections for catchment growth in WoT/mayoireland.ie documents probably involved estates which either have tumbleweed blowing through them or are flooded fields "with Full PP".

I don't say this to knock you Sponge Bob personally, I know it might read like that but it's time for the Church of Fr. MacGreil to be replaced by the Church of Harsh Reality as it is being in other areas and in a year of reduced PSO and no fare hike losses suffered by this line will directly impact service to existing IE customers because something somewhere will be cut.

I take my cue on these issues from this guy who says in a year of cutbacks the ethical approach is to defer new services not cut existing ones to jam in the new one.

This is the Transport 21/Irish Rail business case for Ennis-Athenry from February 06 (PDF). That the line speed would be about 50mph with a maximum of 60mph is covered on page 14.

"Due to the inherited configuration of the line there will be speed restrictions on the line, with maximum speeds of 60mph, subject to the elimination of crossings. These restrictions will reduce the competitive advantage of rail travel relative to road based travel when the N18 is fully upgraded. [...] A maximum line speed of 50mph would result in a two hour journey between Limerick and Galway."

It explicitly says that the 22Ks will not be used but rather will provide surplus 27xx sets when deployed to Kerry. The DofT knows well that this is a warmed-up track, not a high speed shuttle. Senator Fidelma Healy Eames should have known, not least before writing this on December 3. I have posted a reply to her site and I'm sure it will be through the moderation process in no time...

The Project Appraisal on page 17 is a joke because most of the high scoring items are ones that IE has no responsibility for and/or will not supply and the item in respect of integration to the Intercity network is not true because the 2010 timetable makes no effort whatever to link in to Dublin services and the disjointed nature of Ennis-Limerick-Limerick Junction service is continued. Meanwhile the economic return gets a minimum score.

The danger here of course is that while Brian Cowen had no direct personal interest in the WRC - some might say that indeed if the resources allocated to Ennis-Athenry had been rescheduled to fall behind Galway-Oranmore-Athenry and not in front, Clara and Tullamore would have *better* service to the West and fewer delays of trains heading eastward to Dublin - the Leader of the Opposition can feather his own nest by promising rails to Mayo.

It is time for Ireland to get out of the industrial and social policy business of rail expansions because it is nothing but a front for political interests over cost-benefit analysis and instead commit to Irish Rail a sum of money over 10 years which they must spend and account for the benefit thereafter. If that means it is spent on improving services being taken rather than instituting new service while running a sardine service with inadequate track paths, so be it.

T Corolla

Sponge Bob wrote: »

Those population numbers are too crude , they leave out the likes of the Tuam Rural ED while showing only the Tuam Urban. The population over each ED within 5 miles of a station is what should be counted.

Craughwell with only 400 is wrong, is that the Craughwell ED only or the village only?? What about nearby EDs ???

I have my supscions about those figures. Clairemorris with only 2,500 people I assumed Clairemorris would be in the same size region as Tullamore. I checked it up again and on the mayo.ie website the pop of Clairemorris is 3170 and the pop of Mayo is 130,000. They are a bit spread of and this is one of the issues with the WRC

dowlingm

Census 2006 - http://beyond2020.cso.ie/Census/TableViewer/tableView.aspx?ReportId=75472
Mayo 123,839,
Claremorris 3170
Claremorris rural area incl. Claremorris and Ballyhaunis 14177.
Tuam urban 2697 rural 4622 rural area incl. both 30772.

Galway County/City 231670 (City only: 71,983)
Gort district has ended up with two halts in an area total of 12540.
Athenry and Craughwell are part of the Loughrea district (not surprising since they are only six miles apart) at 4042 and 1363 respectively.

Kingdom

dowlingm wrote: »

Because Shannon was created as a New Town in an era (late 60s) when the car was deemed to have replaced the need for rail. The notion of rail-focused districts like Adamstown was unimaginable and politically a non-starter I'd say - especially when large scale developments were almost exclusively driven by the public purse and not private developers. The current layout of the town might make finding an alignment today which isn't deathly slow or away from demand centres tough.

The time to build the rail line was years ago when the Free Zone was still doing a certain amount of trade - it could have formed a long passing loop or simply slewed away from Sixmilebridge completely - but the line would still likely be electric staff not CTC and subject to all sorts of capacity constraints, cheaping out of grade separation and being generally labour intensive to operate. It also would have been industrial policy and as we saw in Foynes that's not how IE sees their role - especially when money isn't forthcoming for investments that will pay their return (increased economic activity, reduced road maintenence costs, reduced CO2 emissions) largely outside IE's coffers.

Much appreciated.

dowlingm

I'm a bit unsure about wading back into this. I have to say I'm very pleased with how things have progressed in here over the past 3 pages, and I restrained myself from posting before because I beleived it risked derailing (hey hey!) the conversation.

But....

dowlingm wrote: »

Craughwell-Galway by No.20 Bus Eireann or Citylink - 25mins.

Not necessarily. You're not allowing for traffic on the Dublin road from the city at peak times (yes, there should be QBCs, but as of right now, there aren't. Until they are physically there, we must couple best-case scenario times with worst-case scenario ones) You also discard those who need a table for those 20 minutes to get some work done, or have a bike, or have heaps of shopping....

dowlingm wrote: »

At least one third of the catchment is going to be in the direct path to Galway so you can forget about that...

No you can't. It's reduced, but it won't be a 100% slice of catchment area. like I said, shoppers, workers needing tables, bikers, even those who prefer trains.

dowlingm wrote: »

...plus some of the rest will be impinged by the proximity of Ardrahan.

Fair enough. But that just means they're taking the train from Ardrahan instead, which is the same difference.

dowlingm wrote: »

I take my cue on these issues from this guy who says in a year of cutbacks the ethical approach is to defer new services not cut existing ones to jam in the new one.

Interesting, but completely irrelevant. By the same logic, SIPTU (wasn't it?) were right to call for the scrapping of construction work on Terminal 2 so that the DAA could keep existing services running. My company has me on a 3 day week because DAA isn't paying as much, but do you think I'd like to see the terminal mothballed? Not in a month of Sundays.

dowlingm wrote: »

This is the Transport 21/Irish Rail business case for Ennis-Athenry from February 06 (PDF). That the line speed would be about 50mph with a maximum of 60mph is covered on page 14....

...It explicitly says that the 22Ks will not be used but rather will provide surplus 27xx sets when deployed to Kerry.

It's been 4 years. I think they'll have a little more leeway than what's on a 4 year old report.

dowlingm wrote: »

The Project Appraisal on page 17 is a joke because most of the high scoring items are ones that IE has no responsibility for....

So, you use the report as evidence when it supports your theory, but rubbish it elsewhere? Also, might I add that it is 4 years old.

dowlingm wrote: »

.....the 2010 timetable makes no effort whatever to link in to Dublin services and the disjointed nature of Ennis-Limerick-Limerick Junction service is continued.

There. That, is a good point. That is something that needs to be looked at, petitioned by residents of the catchment areas involved. I'd like to know what you guys think of the idea of Dublin-Athlone-Limerick services?

dowlingm wrote: »

The danger here of course is that while Brian Cowen had no direct personal interest in the WRC - some might say that indeed if the resources allocated to Ennis-Athenry had been rescheduled to fall behind Galway-Oranmore-Athenry and not in front, Clara and Tullamore would have *better* service to the West and fewer delays of trains heading eastward to Dublin - the Leader of the Opposition can feather his own nest by promising rails to Mayo.

It is time for Ireland to get out of the industrial and social policy business of rail expansions because it is nothing but a front for political interests over cost-benefit analysis and instead commit to Irish Rail a sum of money over 10 years which they must spend and account for the benefit thereafter. If that means it is spent on improving services being taken rather than instituting new service while running a sardine service with inadequate track paths, so be it.

Now all that's just political soapboxing.

Politics is terrible isn't it? What? A politician looking to his constituents? Oh, a real travesty of justice.

dowlingm, do I have it right that you're currently in Canada? you're not listening to our radio, using our rail services, experiencing our weather, reading our local news, talking to people who know people who might be using the service soon? And yet you do nothing to qualify why you state what is, in essence, your opinion as a given fact? I'm not saying you've no right to, but basically the last two paragraphs read like an election pamphlet.

On paper, of course it's bloody expensive. On paper, the LUAS costs 96m per mile. But neither of these are on paper. They are reality. Making lives easier for people. The Luas does this for enough people to justify itself. The Ennis-Athenry extension isn't open, the trains haven't been scheduled yet (I'm on about changes that may be made between now and opening, I'm aware that schedules are printed) so we do not know that it will or not. We can guess, we can plead, we can look at reports by various people and censuses and everyone else but, just like any bsiness setting up, we won't know until the doors open.

dowlingm

@SeaSlacker - through the wonder of the internet and the telephone I can, in fact, do many of the things you mention in your last paragraph, plus the occasional return journey (most recently eight weeks ago). I am not sure, however, what the fact that Canadian snow rather than Irish rain falls on my head this particular week makes my opinion on the reopening of stations in tiny catchments invalid.

As for bikers, they can in fact bring their bike on board a bus (PDF). There are exceptions but that's true of Irish Rail too.

You ask about Dublin-Athlone-Limerick. I don't see that happening tbh, although GAA specials from Ennis should work if Clare get their hurling act together, but someone should lean on Dick Fearn to see if the 2700 being shuttled from Ballina-Limerick every Saturday for maintenance can't run in service as Ballina-Athlone, Athlone-Athenry, Athenry-Limerick if this isn't already planned. Ticket checking etc. might be an issue but surely it wouldn't be insurmountable - in my view frequency is a great motivator for passenger choice of rail and I have a hobbyhorse about trains running out of service when they could be carrying passengers.

The bus timetable may be optimistic, yes, but under the first services start running we can't be sure what the rail timings will be - as seen when IE had to rewrite the Nenagh-Limerick commuter schedule.

As for the politicians, perhaps I struck a nerve SeaSlacker. Yes, it is so very terrible. To advance a local/personal interest over the national interest is terrible, it's got us where we are today and we have to snap out of it. West on Track and their tame politicians have a Field of Dreams approach to regional development - lay down a rail track (a 50mph line speed rail track) and prosperity will follow, one one-off house at a time. In the rest of the country there has to be development levies and urban planning but not in the West - just build us that choochoo and money will fall from the sky.

Also - Terminal 2 is a nightmare that should never have happened. Rebuild a terminal with a forward-planned modular design (like, ahem, Toronto Pearson Terminal 1) and you could look to an ultimate capacity in the 35m pax/year range - which Dublin will have trouble hitting anyway while Portmarnock lawyers are under 10L/28R's proposed flightpaths. Alternatively Baldonnel could be civilianised with a terminal connected by a peoplemover to the Kildare line, and Ryanair kicked out there into the tin shed they like to provide to their passengers. Instead we're getting the PD Palace. Whoopee.

westtip

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=63204723&postcount=2862

Whats happening here - this was the last post on the real thing - does this make this post post 2862+46 which means we have now unofficially gone beyond 3000 posts?

Anyone got any pics of the latest boating opportunities on the WRC, or is there any sign of the branch line emerging from the flood.

Hungerford

Details of current boating opportunities on Limerick-Ennis stretch detailed below:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2009/1216/1224260761169.html

THE ENNIS to Limerick railway line is likely to remain closed until February after a large section of track became submerged in flood water.

The line has been closed since December 1st. However, while flood water has receded in most parts of Co Clare, levels at Ballycar near Newmarket-on-Fergus continue to rise and are not expected to abate for up to eight weeks.

:eek:

westtip

Can we then call this lunatic project, "Dead in the water" or perhaps reading that IT article and the galloping enthusiasm there seems (not) to be from either the OPW or IE to fix the flooding issues we can confidently say it is in been "drowned at birth" A convenient death for IE, saying to OPW its not a our fault govnor and OPW saying we ain't got no money and its not our priority. It seems the whole farce is in fact being allowe to (sorry folks another watery pun) to "sink without trace"

All I can say is what a waste of bloody public money. And we can argue the toss about critical mass and timetables versus buses and the wesht needed it - lets face it - from the reports over the last few weeks it seems the whole thing is an engineering joke with its own in built water safety feature.


Perhaps that last post on the legendary thread was the best way to sign off

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=63204723&postcount=2862

corktina

it sums it up really...if a road gets flooded the bus goes another way....if a bus breaks down, they send another bus....if a the Train breaks down or the line gets flooded , what do they do? They send a BUS!!!!

Judgement Day

Now Westtip stop making waves although I have to agree with you it is crazy all the money that has gone down the drain on the WRC project. Somebody in CIE is going to be in deep water over it - hopefully John 'photo-opportunity' Lynch who is already out of his depth before a Dail committee. He must be hoping that there will be some other distraction soon and that the flooding will soon be water under the bridge. Let's just hope that the useless politicians don't throw the baby out with the bath water as we urgently need investment in the railways just not this one.

ClovenHoof

Why is there such a hatred of the people on the West of Ireland on this board? It is depressing to come on here and see the mocking of our rail line. After decades of neglect by the Dublin Government we finally get a tiny piece of the railway pie. Firstly, Irish Rail banjax it with not putting in proper drainage (wink-wink) and then outsiders make fun of it.

Look at the money wasted on that Dublin Airport Metro. Billions for nothing. Have you any idea how many miles track in the West and North West that kind of money could have reopened. The entire line to Derry from Cork. Just think of the jobs that would create outside The Pale. We need this.

Get a life!