I'm all for developing port-rail connections, but the TEN-T "rule" is craze. How can you apply this to Ringaskiddy?
There is a railhead at Marino Point which will serve to connect the Port of Cork to the rail network
That TEN-T document has a wide scope for exemptions and derogations. It need not be fully applied.
I presume Foynes will now look to locate plants there that can use rail, look at all the trucks hauling to the incinerator in Ringsend or Duleek from across the country, a timber plant as in Waterford? I’m just not sure the port itself will lend itself to rail freight so perhaps it’s more a case of putting activity there that will use the rail, but it just happens to beside a port. Radically trucks in some sectors could be ‘taxed’ to encourage modal shift but that is a different question.
In that case organisations could have been putting plants beside any rail connection spot along existing lines anywhere in the country for years now.
Clearly there is no demand for it.
There's an IDA land bank in Askeaton also, only a few KM from Foynes. It's for sale presently.
https://www.daft.ie/commercial-property-for-sale/lands-at-askeaton-askeaton-co-limerick/2622282
The green approach is to try to cajole industry into using rail for freight but the last 60 years has seen the sector move to road based transport for structural reasons and it’s hard to fight against that.
IEs own pricing for freight access is the main deterrent to industry. They until recently had little interest in freight and did their best to discourage it
correct, however there was also the fact that road transport was cheap due to labour costs and not being expected to pay it's true costs unlike rail freight which is and probably was even in the hay day.
that is changing, drivers have had enough of poor pay and conditions and are leaving road haulage + climate change needs will force a shift.
of course you won't get all freight on the rails and even in the hay day of rail freight there was plenty of road freight as well, but that's not that big of a deal.
a couple of percentage share on to rail will have huge benefits over all including to other road users especially as there aren't going to be any more big road expansions and projects apart from probably cork to limerick and maybe finish into rosslare port.
Eh, would the river that is in between Marino Point and Ringaskiddy be a bit of an obstacle to that spur?
Access to rail at the Port of Cork will be provided at Marino Point. Given that Marino Point and Ringaskiddy are both within the overall Port of Cork, it will be rail connected at Marino Point. It would be geographically challenging to connect Ringaskiddy for the railway network and wouldn't really make sense, especially given that there are other container ports not too far from Ringaskiddy connected to the rail network at Dublin and Belview.
Same way Shannon Foynes Port will be connected to rail at Foynes itself, but that doesn't mean that the other terminals within the SPF group will be rail connected.
Ah okay. Do you mean that cargo would need to be brought on a ship from Ringaskiddy to Marino Point so?
Unlikely I'd say.
But if it made commercial sense to shunt cargo across on a barge then I'm sure they would do it.
Most likely Marino Point will only be used for bulk loads and the ship will dock there (if rail gets used at all). It seems to have a customer already unlike Foynes.
John Moran saying he would like a railway station in Adare by early 2027.
He can say what he wants. It won't make it happen though. Any decision on a passenger service to Adare would need to come from IE and the Dept of Transport and IE don't seem too enthusiastic.
There's also the issue that Adare station is now a family home and the platform is owned by that family. They've already taken out a high court injunction to stop IE raising the track bed there for the current works.
I'm assuming the family dont own the track bed , just the platform…
How much was the bed to be raised by ?
Best of luck with that one John.
NOthing gets done from concept to execution in 2 years in Ireland. I just thought it was interesting he said a time frame out loud
They should have been made sign a disclaimer conditional of IR selling that property off on a disused but mothballed line. Now typical Irish nimbyism has come back to bite them.
And what exact value will a rail station have one train morning and evening for half a dozen people with free travel or are they going to add a passenger carriage to the good train like in the US. You then take your chances when it will arrive maybe Monday Tuesday and Saturday
Politicians are amazing waste 300 million and now we will waste another 100 million
They don't own the track bed, but they are willing to litigate. IE decided against raising the track bed in the end and will run the risk of flooding closing the line.
Which means that no passenger station is going to be built in that area by 2027.
Its a few miles from the railway line but that would be mid section. It about 5-6 miles from Foynes.
If you need to put something on a truck it's not feasible to load it on a train if the distances the materials have to travel is less than a couple hundred KM. Even then you need volume and regularity. No point in picking up a truck load ( or even 5-6) in Ballina and onto somewhere else then to load similar.
No point in collecting a hundred containers in Foynes and dropping them in Dublin when half are needed in ones or twos around Wicklow Meath and Kildare. Rail is good at picking up goods in one place and dropping them 3-800+km away and not dropping small parts ( half or quarter ok) of loads here and there. Its grand loading and reloading freight if travelling distances but not a couple of containers or part of bulk loads here and there.
TBH passenger rail is similar you need volume to justify it a thing many cannot grasp
The old Adare station is surrounded by fields so it would be as easy for IE to just build a new station next door or close by. So I don't think that will be what makes the project not happen.
YYa But it will not happen by 2027. Even if it dose happen they will be ghost trains. There is not tge volume on the line to justify a train. And even if there was where will they go to.
No it won't happen by 2027 at this stage. And once the Ryder Cup is over the hype will die off.
Ide love a Raheen-Patrickswell-Adare train but ya I don't see it happening now
I woukd much prefer them to continue pumping money into the bus services. Connectivity is improving. If they could add a late bus Thursday to Friday on the routes leaving the city at 1030 or 11p. It would give people an option to go for a meal and a few drinks in the city and get home
I'm surprised that he is attaching his name to this publicly at this stage. I would have thought he was more savvy. It's a basket case and a non starter.
Well at least it is more believable than the train/LUAS/Monorail to Shannon stuff we have been hearing about for years.
To be fair, CIE flogged it in the first place. That's not the people who bought the property's fault. They did the same with the West Cork line - they sold it all as fast as they were able to so you can't really blame the people who bought it all. The fault was the decision to sell all the old lines in the first place.
