Railfreight

rainbowdash

yachtsman wrote: »

And this week the Government announced an investment of €600m in a 35 mile motorway between Gort (population 4000 and Tuam (population 6000) - and the mccarthyites called the investment of one tenth of that sum in a railway thoroughfare which the state already owned between Ennis and Athenry a waste of money!

More people will travel that road in one rush hour morning than travel the wrc in a full year.

Yes the state already owned the infrastructure and it was passable - they could have tried 30mph trains non stop Ennis athenry to test the market before opening new stations and rebuilding the track, without ll the tops the travel time would be around what it is now.

yachtsman

yachtsman wrote: »

I recall that when the same point was made by those arguing that the WRC was about connecting the second, third and fourth cities of the state by rail they were ridiculed. I heard mccarthy, mcdowell et al scoff at the futility of connecting Ennis, "the middle of newhere" with Athenry, "the middle of nowhere" ad nauseum. The purest of double speak and double standards!

See what I mean: below is a quote from colm mccarthy in his article in todays sunday independent!


"There have been substantial over-runs on several major projects, including the Luas and Port Tunnel schemes in Dublin, as well as failure to achieve usage targets, as with the Ennis-to-Athenry rail link. No post-project assessments, as required by the 2005 circular, have ever been published."

Losty Dublin

Judgement Day wrote: »

No it speaks volumes about CIE's mentality. They were even sending the weekly circulars out by courier at one stage - may still be.

Something to clarify here; they are sent via courier when railcars covered all trains on the line and guards weren't required on the line. The circulars have to be signed upon receipt by most staff as they are safety critical documents and drivers are not in a position to ensure they are signed and delivered. Cue the inevitable tutting and brow tugging to show disdain

Judgement Day

Losty Dublin wrote: »

Something to clarify here; they are sent via courier when railcars covered all trains on the line and guards weren't required on the line. The circulars have to be signed upon receipt by most staff as they are safety critical documents and drivers are not in a position to ensure they are signed and delivered. Cue the inevitable tutting and brow tugging to show disdain

Come off it, are you seriously telling me that the driver of a railcar is incapable of handing over the weekly circulars to a depotman. In the past the circulars were dropped off to the signalman and usually were dispensed from the cabin - the guard had no role in getting anybody to sign for them. Years ago I said it would reach the stage where the only freight carried by CIE would be their wages envelopes but it would seem even that was over optimistic. Is any wonder that the railway are fcuked. :rolleyes:

Losty Dublin

Judgement Day wrote: »

Come off it, are you seriously telling me that the driver of a railcar is incapable of handing over the weekly circulars to a depotman. In the past the circulars were dropped off to the signalman and usually were dispensed from the cabin - the guard had no role in getting anybody to sign for them.

There is nowhere store them in a railcar cab, they are hardly big enough for a driver and his own bag as it is. That aside, do you expect a driver to leave his cab to locate a depot man or other relevant staff to ensure that they are signed for? There isn't any signal man on hand to collect them anymore so merely dropping them off on the platform isn't an option.

foggy_lad

Losty Dublin wrote: »

There is nowhere store them in a railcar cab, they are hardly big enough for a driver and his own bag as it is. That aside, do you expect a driver to leave his cab to locate a depot man or other relevant staff to ensure that they are signed for? There isn't any signal man on hand to collect them anymore so merely dropping them off on the platform isn't an option.

Are you saying that the train these safety critical flyers arrive on is some kind of ghost train that appears unannounced at stations? if a regular service or even an out of service run the station staff should be aware of all train movements and should also be aware of when these scraps of paper are arriving, surely they can make themselves available to sign for them or are they expecting some type of extra payment for this?

dowlingm

in this electronic day and age there are ways to deliver documents and have verification of receipt without requiring physical pieces of paper to be countersigned, and surely IE isn't still issuing wages cheques but instead doing direct deposit? Even if it was required to hand carry them the delivering trains could carry a guard for that service who could then do ticket checking as well, with the circulars being stored in the rear cab (I think the 22s have a locker which allows IE to claim they could restore FastTrack while having no intention to?)

CIE

dowlingm wrote: »

in this electronic day and age there are ways to deliver documents and have verification of receipt without requiring physical pieces of paper to be countersigned, and surely IE isn't still issuing wages cheques but instead doing direct deposit? Even if it was required to hand carry them the delivering trains could carry a guard for that service who could then do ticket checking as well, with the circulars being stored in the rear cab (I think the 22s have a locker which allows IE to claim they could restore FastTrack while having no intention to?)

Hackers.

dowlingm

"hackers" isn't an answer. There are any number of ways to get around that from a private network like MPLS to an always-on VPN connection in stations without access to a network hardline. Once you deal with external issues you then implement Information Rights Management so that when a circular is checked out by an employee this access is recorded (and failure to do so can be followed up)

Judgement Day

Losty Dublin wrote: »

There is nowhere store them in a railcar cab, they are hardly big enough for a driver and his own bag as it is. That aside, do you expect a driver to leave his cab to locate a depot man or other relevant staff to ensure that they are signed for? There isn't any signal man on hand to collect them anymore so merely dropping them off on the platform isn't an option.

Come on Losty you're just digging a yourself a hole now. Any train I travel on is met by whoever's on duty to wave their flag (except Rathdrum which mysteriously doesn't need a flag waver) and the circulars could be handed over then - even if it would disrupt the staff banter for a few seconds.

Losty Dublin

dowlingm wrote: »

in this electronic day and age there are ways to deliver documents and have verification of receipt without requiring physical pieces of paper to be countersigned, and surely IE isn't still issuing wages cheques but instead doing direct deposit? Even if it was required to hand carry them the delivering trains could carry a guard for that service who could then do ticket checking as well, with the circulars being stored in the rear cab (I think the 22s have a locker which allows IE to claim they could restore FastTrack while having no intention to?)

There is a lot of safety critical information is included in the WTT supplement. Many grades of staff have to sign to confirm receipt of a copy as a result. Copies are sent electronically but many staff require a paper copy to hand, such as the many who are not working in offices like on board or PW staff. If there was train guards or spare drivers to deliver them then I am sure your idea would be reasonable.

Judgement Day wrote:

Come on Losty you're just digging a yourself a hole now. Any train I travel on is met by whoever's on duty to wave their flag (except Rathdrum which mysteriously doesn't need a flag waver) and the circulars could be handed over then - even if it would disrupt the staff banter for a few seconds.

You know well enough that a driver and the man on the platform have to ensure that passengers board and alight safely and that the train moves off safely. Chasing around after parcels and signing off doesn't allow for safe boarding.

end of the road

they could multi task, they watch the passengers and hand over the circulars at the same time.

Losty Dublin

end of the road wrote: »

they could multi task, they watch the passengers and hand over the circulars at the same time.

Could you see the Railway Safety Commission agree to that one?

Judgement Day

Losty Dublin wrote: »

You know well enough that a driver and the man on the platform have to ensure that passengers board and alight safely and that the train moves off safely. Chasing around after parcels and signing off doesn't allow for safe boarding.

If you seriously believe that, you should go for Dick Fearn's job as you would be a shoo-in.

Sligo Quay

Most of this discussion on circulars is a bit of a red herring, most whats in the circular anyway is generally fiction, most decisions and movements are handled on daily running notices, the weekly circular is just expensive toilet paper.

Judgement Day

Of course the weekly circulars are a red herring but as I said earlier on the thread - the delivery of the circulars is indicative of the CIE/IE mindset. They are NOT railway minded. The enthusiast community is full of the same type indviduals - some of whom even post on this forum - who never use the railway but like to photograph and comment on it.

John Denver

Sligo Quay wrote: »

Hmmm well Esso fuel and homeheating oil actually left from ''your door'' Esso's own door on Alexandra rd and traveled all the way to the Esso storage fuel depot at Sligo Quay, no double handling, I could never understand IE getting out of this particular traffic, like Tara ore, it was ''door to door'' when its not door to door, well it kind of defeats the purpose

In 2003 the Esso fuel storage depot in Sligo was e.h.s. audited by Esso itself and the site was found to have alot of out-dated and hazardous work practises and the site needed up-grading and investment which Esso Ireland wasnt willing to provide as the consensus was with the N4 been vastly improved it was cheaper to move all flows by road. It had nothing to do with Iarnod Eireann getting out of this movement.

Hungerford

Losty Dublin wrote: »

You know well enough that a driver and the man on the platform have to ensure that passengers board and alight safely and that the train moves off safely. Chasing around after parcels and signing off doesn't allow for safe boarding.

It's funny then that Translink make extensive use of their trains for passing documents etc. between stations without any resulting wave of fatalities.

davidlacey

John Denver wrote: »

Sligo Quay wrote: »

Hmmm well Esso fuel and homeheating oil actually left from ''your door'' Esso's own door on Alexandra rd and traveled all the way to the Esso storage fuel depot at Sligo Quay, no double handling, I could never understand IE getting out of this particular traffic, like Tara ore, it was ''door to door'' when its not door to door, well it kind of defeats the purpose

In 2003 the Esso fuel storage depot in Sligo was e.h.s. audited by Esso itself and the site was found to have alot of out-dated and hazardous work practises and the site needed up-grading and investment which Esso Ireland wasnt willing to provide as the consensus was with the N4 been vastly improved it was cheaper to move all flows by road. It had nothing to do with Iarnod Eireann getting out of this movement.

But did IE encourage Esso to stay on rail or did they just accept this fate because just accepting it is just like getting out of it

dowlingm

Hungerford wrote: »

It's funny then that Translink make extensive use of their trains for passing documents etc. between stations without any resulting wave of fatalities.

A guard is mandated on NIR under their operating rules, isn't it? So there is no *additional* burden imposed by using hand delivery.

That said, Losty and I will have to agree to differ on the circulars - a cheap printer (let's say two because of the inevitable what if it breaks argument, and let's say inkjet because we wouldn't want to cause a H&S issue with ozone from a laser) would not only allow circulars to be printed but also for timetable updates to be printed and displayed in a timely and professional manner.

dowlingm

davidlacey wrote: »

But did IE encourage Esso to stay on rail or did they just accept this fate because just accepting it is just like getting out of it

Could you elaborate on what you mean by "encourage"? I do hope you don't mean either of

a) "go on go on go on go on go on go on go on"
b) a price cut, bearing in mind IE receive no government support for railfreight

Judgement Day

dowlingm wrote: »

Could you elaborate on what you mean by "encourage"? I do hope you don't mean either of

a) "go on go on go on go on go on go on go on"
b) a price cut, bearing in mind IE receive no government support for railfreight

And there you have it in a nutshell - the long standing laissez faire government attitude to the railways has lead to the present position where CIE gets it in the neck for losing traffic and can blame the government, and the government can say it's an operational matter for CIE and 'we are where we are'...:rolleyes:

Sligo Quay

John Denver wrote: »

In 2003 the Esso fuel storage depot in Sligo was e.h.s. audited by Esso itself and the site was found to have alot of out-dated and hazardous work practises and the site needed up-grading and investment which Esso Ireland wasnt willing to provide as the consensus was with the N4 been vastly improved it was cheaper to move all flows by road. It had nothing to do with Iarnod Eireann getting out of this movement.

Interesting, the tank wagons where also life expired as they dated from BR stock 1960s, they should have been upgraded to bogie tank cars if their was a will to stay in the business, theres always plenty of excuses to get out of rail freight, but not enough to stay in the business, the will just isn't there.
Iv actually fallen asleep listening to staff in IR giving a lonnnng list of excuses of why this and that can't be done, so so negative, Im tolded why it can't be done, but never tolded it can be done, yawn yawn, Im going for pint.

Losty Dublin

Hungerford wrote: »

It's funny then that Translink make extensive use of their trains for passing documents etc. between stations without any resulting wave of fatalities.

Of course, their trains have train guards on board to deal with such duties. Mind you, they also deliver documents to and from stations using couriers for some reason

davidlacey

Any update on dfds liners? Has it been lost the road since moving to dublin port?

yachtsman

Yes:cool:

Sligo Quay

davidlacey wrote: »

Any update on dfds liners? Has it been lost the road since moving to dublin port?

Not quite lost to road, just diverted to Dublin Port, handled by IWT, DFDS has lost the business to IWT, but still going by rail, Dublin to Ballina instead of Waterford to Ballina.

davidlacey

Sligo Quay wrote: »

davidlacey wrote: »

Any update on dfds liners? Has it been lost the road since moving to dublin port?

Not quite lost to road, just diverted to Dublin Port, handled by IWT, DFDS has lost the business to IWT, but still going by rail, Dublin to Ballina instead of Waterford to Ballina.

Does this mean there is m

davidlacey

Sligo Quay wrote: »

davidlacey wrote: »

Any update on dfds liners? Has it been lost the road since moving to dublin port?

Not quite lost to road, just diverted to Dublin Port, handled by IWT, DFDS has lost the business to IWT, but still going by rail, Dublin to Ballina instead of Waterford to Ballina.

Does this mean there is more than the regular 5 workings a week then?

Sligo Quay

davidlacey wrote: »

Does this mean there is more than the regular 5 workings a week then?

1 extra midweek each way at the moment, Ballina to Dublin on Wednesday, Dublin / Ballina on Thursday, in negotiations at the moment for more. Things move at a snail pace in these areas, the ''flying snail'' is a myth, never existed except as a symbol on the side of a bus or loco.:D