Transport for Euro Chinese Trading Hub

thisisadamh

With the opening of the Asian development in Athlone, will we see Double Track on both lines, Portarlington and Mullingar? Hourly services to Dublin as well? The new development goes right through the Portarlington line so there might even be another station built in Creggan.
So maybe the suggestion above about diverting the mullingar line south to join up with the Portalington line outside outside athlone is the best option as it would come in to a possible new station at Creggan and then the central station in athlone.

coylemj

The road between Mullingar and Athlone isn't even an N road. If not enough people travel between the two towns by road to justify designating it as a national route, where is the justification for reopening the railway line?

We've seen what happens when you reopen a line at enormous expense based on ludicrously optimistic and self-serving projections. I'm referring to the western rail corridor, especially the line from Ennis to Galway which is now nothing more than a daily pensioners' picnic outing.

If the Chinese trade centre opens in Athlone, all they need is a rail link to Dublin which as you pointed out is already there with the Portarlington line passing beside the site. I hardly think there will be droves of people coming to visit it from Mullingar so I'm at a loss to see the connection between the trade centre and the proposal to reopen the Mullingar line.

Based on the current frequency of trains travelling between Portarlington and Athlone, there is absolutely no cost justification for upgrading the line to double tracks, especially as the (single track) railway bridge across the Shannon in Athlone would remain as a bottleneck.

thisisadamh

I was thinking to facilitate hourly services to Dublin. And it would give people more options to get to Athlone. Not just people from Mullingar.

At the very least I think Athlone should get double track from Portarlington to decrease the journey times and to get hourly services.

Joko

DublinBikes gets 6,000 users a day. 6,800 passengers a week for a train line is pathetic and a waste of resources.

dowlingm

thisisadamh - I feel pretty comfortable about waiting for Wrong Kong to actually happen before bothering spending a cent on Athlone-Mullingar. From what I remember the development isn't very close to either line. Fence it, send a tractor with a serious weed chopper and sprayer down it once in a while, that's about it.

EDIT: Memory fail

OurLadyofKnock

Yes, and they will also need to open the Kanturk branch for the Cylon Retail Spaceport in East Cork...:rolleyes:



You do not really believe this drunken FF gombeen wankery?

kc56

dowlingm wrote: »

thisisadamh - I feel pretty comfortable about waiting for Wrong Kong to actually happen before bothering spending a cent on Athlone-Mullingar. From what I remember the development isn't very close to either line. Fence it, send a tractor with a serious weed chopper and sprayer down it once in a while, that's about it.

In fact the development straddles the Athlone-Portlington line; the line cuts it in 2!

In the Irish Rail 2030 Vision doc, one plan is to twin track as far as Athlone.

Cookie_Monster

OurLadyofKnock wrote: »

Yes, and they will also need to open the Kanturk branch for the Cylon Retail Spaceport in East Cork...

sweet!
They're not evil, they're just misunderstood.

dowlingm

kc56 wrote: »

In fact the development straddles the Athlone-Portlington line; the line cuts it in 2!

Weird, that's not what I remember from the planning docs - better take another look.

Victor

On this image, the three diagonal North west to south east lines are the railway, the Athlone-Dublin road and the M6-Athlone Bypass. There is an indicative layout for a station, but I'm not sure that it is included in the project.

LLU

OurLadyofKnock wrote: »

Yes, and they will also need to open the Kanturk branch for the Cylon Retail Spaceport in East Cork...:rolleyes:



You do not really believe this drunken FF gombeen wankery?

Indeed. Still wondering how a 'hub' manages to end up about 50 miles from the Atlantic ocean and 80+ miles away from the main airport in the country. But never mind that, lets start building something, anything, just start building and someone else can worry about all that later.

corktina

In actual fact, the Kanturk Branch already opened. It's masquerading as our New Chinese Take Away fttb...our THIRD Chinese Take Away. Surely its plain that they are here to stay and Athlone will benefit from cheaper noodles.

Mr. Presentable

I wouldn't worry about it. There's no chance this will happen. There are also plans in the south of England for such a centre - which would you choose as a commercial entity? Kent or Westmeath?

LeftBlank

Mr. Presentable wrote: »

I wouldn't worry about it. There's no chance this will happen. There are also plans in the south of England for such a centre - which would you choose as a commercial entity? Kent or Westmeath?

I thought it was Wirral that the plans were for?

Mr. Presentable

Yeah, there's one there also.

L1011

Mr. Presentable wrote: »

Yeah, there's one there also.

I would imagine there's one planned per Chinese billionaire at this stage.

dowlingm

From the Inspector's Report and the Board's Order, it looks like the presence of either railway line hasn't made much difference to the outcome. Bus service to DUB seems to be more their worry.

EDIT: Bing Map of the area

robd

dowlingm wrote: »

From the Inspector's Report and the Board's Order, it looks like the presence of either railway line hasn't made much difference to the outcome. Bus service to DUB seems to be more their worry.

EDIT: Bing Map of the area

And rightly so give there's no rail link between DUB and Heston Station.

You'd pretty much get the person to Athone via a bus, M1, M50, M4 and M6 in the time it would take to get to Hueston and board (buy ticket and wait for next service) a train. 80 mins.

It's a bit cart before the horse to think about expanding the railline unless their is an efficient rail connection from the airport though which people will transit.

Both projects (Trading Hub, Rail link to DUB airport) seem fanciful at the moment.