The Strategic Rail Review will consider how the rail network on the island can improve sustainable connectivity between major cities, enhance regional accessibility including to the North West and support balanced regional development.
Electrification: Decarbonising Ireland's Railways - Paul Hendrick - April 2023
One very interesting point be notes is that all of Ireland's main railways used to be double track!!!
The picture above is very near the end of the video.
The 4 tracking on the Northern + Cork lines is vague on purpose. The extant of it will depend on budgets etc which are too far away to know.
What is the source of this document? It is very vague in places (4-tracking Cork mainline and Northern line - for how many kms?).
Stuff about decarbonisation and implicit references to hybrid rolling stock. But nothing explicit or meaningful about electrification, a matter about which official bodies seem to have a total mental blockage.
The current plan for Cork-Dublin-Belfast is 4-tracking and the 'unofficially' rebranded Dart+ Tunnel. Given the likely cost of such a tunnel, I don't think it'll ever happen.
A revitalised Metro-West plan would be far cheaper and allow direct interchange between Cork and Belfast as well as the airport, while avoiding the congested inner city Dublin network.
I was responding specifically to the claim that such a route would deliver vast benefits to DARTl. The bottleneck on the northern coastal line is almost exclusively an issue for non-DART services so removing the bottleneck would only marginally improve DART capacity along that stretch and would hardly improve DART journey times. So the cost/benefit analysis of a new inland alignment would have to stand on the basis of delivering utility to intercity/regional services. I don’t mind arguing the latter separately but such a project would not significantly improve either northern DART capacity or speed.
that is a no brainer and puts several larg towns back on the rail network too.
I started my post with "If the goal is to improve rail connections between Derry (and by extension Donegal) to the rail network in the south", so I was clearly posting in a specific context. I wasn't saying it was a priority or that it was more important than other potential investments.
I was saying how improvements could be made on that line and increase its catchment using minimum amount of new rail. Building a whole new 100km line isn't realistic, I was speculating on alternatives.
A new line from Coleraine to limavady would have to tunnel or zig zag up the section of sperrins that separates the roe valley from the bann.
There is a reason the original railway line ran along the coast - it was not for the sake of scenery.
the goal should be to maximise catchment using minimum amount of rail - adding separate redundant lines just means more maintenance and logistics issues. A high speed belfast to Cork spine with services feeding into that should be the goal. Its the most efficient allocation of rail resources - with this in mind, a 2nd line to derry or a line bypassing belfast both make no sense.
If the goal is to improve rail connections between Derry (and by extension Donegal) to the rail network in the south, the best option would be a link from east of Lisburn to the Antrim town to Lisburn line at Ballinderry. That could be done with about 6km of new track. To go from Derry to Dublin, it would have to be train to Lisburn and then change to the Enterprise but the journey time would be better than going to Belfast.
If a longer section of new track was to be built, a new route from Coleraine to the existing Derry line west of Limavady (and actually serving Limavady) would knock a decent chunk of the journey from Derry to just about anywhere. A new route to Derry the other side of the Sperrins would be at least 3 times longer.
There is a lot that can be done to improve the existing network that doesn't require mega-projects which will take decades to deliver (if at all realistic). Hopefully the AIRR looks at the lower hanging fruit to optimize the existing network rather than just proposing a future fantasy network.
The population of Dungannon, Omagh and Strabane is bigger than Armagh, Monaghan and Enniskillen. That's without considering Derry, which realistically can't be reached from Enniskillen. And the terrain between Portadown and Enniskillen is extremely difficult, if its easier than going from Portadown to Derry, it certainly isn't by much. There is no case to be made for creating a new rail line to Enniskillen based on either on population or geography, and certainly not so ahead of a new route to Derry.
There's an argument that such a route shouldn't even be reliant on the Portadown connection to the Northern Line. If there was joint up thinking, it would make more sense to connect it up via the future Navan line. Makes the business case for both more solid and doesn't add another degree of pressure onto the already congested northern line.
You can normally spot the disused lines very easily on a satellite map, however it's almost impossible to follow the disused line between Portadown and Omagh.
I can see a spur south of Portadown to Armagh, and a line south of Omagh as far as Dungannon. But there are buildings and whole towns on the old line.
For example, someone has built a very long shed along this particular section. The line is to the left of my dashed line:
It will not reopen 100%. The old alignment isnt up to modern requirements anyways, would be too slow. Any new alignment would suffer the same obstacles from certain large landowners as the A5 road project has in Derry and Tyrone.
Besides, a new alignment would be better from portadown to Enniskillen via Armagh, Monaghan town and clones. Makes far more sense based on population density than trying to run a rail line through the Mourne river valley
Partition is what killed off most of the lines in the north and north west. Firstly because of the need for customs posts on every crossing, which wasn't feasible. Secondly because the administrations in NI were vehemently anti-rail so were closing lines left, right and centre. CIE tried to keep their parts going but weren't able to. The UTA even wanted to single the Dublin-Belfast line from Portadown to the border at one point.
How realistic is the portadown to Derry line chances of reopening? Is the old alignment there (doubtful) or will it be new build? Spur to Cavan and Monaghan also needed. Was so idiotic all these lines were closed to start with
There's no beef yet!
https://youtu.be/Ug75diEyiA0
Double tracking & line speed improvements from derry to belfast to Dublin would be better return.
Letterkenny to Dublin via rail in 3 hours is achievable, and also benefits derry to Dublin and derry to belfast services.
But it is the most direct to Belfast...
They could but it's not the most direct route. There once was a line from Portadown to Derry via Omagh but it was closed in favour of the indirect route, believed to be because that route served the Protestant population better.
The crazy thing is that they're talking about a new line from Portadown through Omagh to Derry/Letterkenny ...did they not consider just extending the Derry line to Letterkenny instead?
I mean I'd be all for Derry to Letterkenny trains, it'd make more sense than trains to Claremorris but brand new lines can come before making the current network modern and fit for purpose
We don’t actually know what is in yet other than the drip feed of information.
Let’s wait and see the actual report?
So it's a Strategic Review, which omits electrification. In this day in age it's like Hamlet without the Prince.
Its a report about the network, no reason for it to mention electrification, which is happening anyway (albeit slow af)
Latest in the IT about the all-Ireland Strategic Rail Review.
While selective, it seems clearly related to Eamon Ryan's rather loopy views on rail transport, not only involving Ballina-Rosslare (again!), but also railways to Denegal. For a minister who is leader of the Green Party, no mention of decarbonisation of the rail network (aka electrification).
Bizarrely the piece by Martin Wall was written from New York. It sounds more like it was written from Outer Mongolia. Irish Times coverage of transport issues is truly dreadful.
Well that’s at variance with what DART+ says.
The fact remains that even if those trains happen they will have to chug along behind an all stations stopper between Clongriffin and Connolly.
The four tracking is essential for any outer suburban semi-fasts to overtake stopping DARTs between Raheny and Connolly and v.v., and to be competitive with the coaches.
Just to clarify, I am quite aware of the trade-offs regarding the new down main platform. My post was a response to a previous poster who seemed to advocate cross-platform transfers for all, something which has been lost as part of the tradeoff.
Also I was not referring to a second bay platform beside the existing Down main, but rather beside the existing bay platform. I am aware that there are technically 2 platforms on thexisting bay, but this imposes restrictions on order of arrival and departure.
Overall, no utopian solutions for Limerick Junction.
Barry Kennedy said the opposite recently on newstalk saying that there will still be semi-fast services from Drogheda.
Once electrified the electric traction will surely knock a few minuets off the journey time.
If the same train is doing Limerick-Limerick Junction and Limerick Junction-Limerick, some people are going to have to use the footbridge, assuming the Dublin/Cork and Cork/Dublin trains both arrive/depart at the same time, which is the optimum performance that you want.
It’s impossible to be all things to all men.
I can see a scenario where they might add a bay to the southern platform but it would still require some people to use the footbridge.
The current bay has two platforms which allows for both Waterford and Limerick trains to board simultaneously, the Waterford train departing once the Limerick train has cleared Limerick Junction pocket loop.
It is a while (over 5 years) since I was in LJ.
![Photo of [Deleted User]](https://w6.vanillicon.com/v2/62877c35768f143f69acd7bb6cd43f3c.svg)
