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Limerick - Nenagh - Ballybrophy railway

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Comments

  • Moderators, Business & Finance Moderators, Motoring & Transport Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 67,098 Mod ✭✭✭✭L1011


    Deedsie wrote: »
    Unfortunately CIE have the data and they control the manner and presentation of its release.

    Any other organisation who allowed a line to be run so badly would be mortified releasing such figures but thats another story.

    So there's no evidence the figures are wrong then?


  • Registered Users Posts: 12,363 ✭✭✭✭Del.Monte


    L1011 wrote: »
    So there's no evidence the figures are wrong then?


    The figures probably came from the same place as Anglo boss David Drumm used to pull his from. I think in actual fact the origin of these sorts of nonsense stats originated with a former CIE Chairman - Brian Joyce - who regularly told people that it would be cheaper to put the few passengers using the Limerick Junction/Rosslare line in individual taxis than to run the train for them. With that sort of attitude at the top and a demoralised workforce it's no wonder the railways are in a precarious state outside the GDA.

    And here's a link to the very man and the taxi topic from eleven years ago: https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=69216992&postcount=17


  • Moderators, Business & Finance Moderators, Motoring & Transport Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 67,098 Mod ✭✭✭✭L1011


    You not liking the figures or their source does not make them wrong.

    There is no evidence that they are wrong


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,575 ✭✭✭Economics101


    A significant proportion (60%+) of the Nenagh line is now Continuously Welded Rail (CWR) on concrete sleepers and basically fit for much more than the present ridiculous 50mph. There are issues with level crossings, signal sightings and other matters which need attention, but basically huge sums have been spent on the track with little or no benefit in terms of speed. The potential time savings with 70 or 80 mph running (given the excellent track alignment in places) are huge. If you give competitive services to significant towns like Nenagh and Roscrea, you will generate much greater usage. I'd like to see comparisons with usage at Thurles and even Templemore, which have competitive services.

    I could make similar remarks about the South Tipperary line between Limerick Junction and Waterford.


  • Registered Users Posts: 6,646 ✭✭✭Pete_Cavan


    Surely the greatest potential for passenger and revenue growth is in the Limerick direction? Investment should be in the Limerick end of the line, not the BB end. Commuters are consistent users and most likely paying customers. Will knocking a few minutes off the journey time to Dublin really attract many new users?


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  • Registered Users Posts: 1,943 ✭✭✭tabbey


    L1011 wrote: »
    You not liking the figures or their source does not make them wrong.

    There is no evidence that they are wrong

    You are correct, but there are lies, damned lies and statistics.
    The real problem here is that the service is so appalling that virtually nobody uses it. If tiny numbers use it then the cost per person is inevitably enormous.
    People in Roscrea and Nenagh have a choice of road services to Dublin at competitive fares, so don't use the train. If there were ICR trains running at normal mainline speed, going straight from Roscrea to Dublin by a direct curve at Ballybrophy, people would use them. It doesn't really matter that Nenagh to Limerick is twisting and a bit slow, the main trunk towards Dublin could be fast with a modest investment compared to the enormous sums spent on roads.


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,818 ✭✭✭donvito99


    L1011 wrote: »
    You not liking the figures or their source does not make them wrong.

    There is no evidence that they are wrong

    Go 'way with your rationality.

    It's a conspiracy. Jet fuel can't melt CWR and CIE are in the business of closing each and every railway. The government wants us all to live in camps inside the M50. Behind all of this of course is Jim Meade and George Soros and, if you follow the money? Big Greenway and their lobbyists.


  • Registered Users Posts: 3,488 ✭✭✭Working class heroes


    Del.Monte wrote: »
    The figures probably came from the same place as Anglo boss David Drumm used to pull his from. I think in actual fact the origin of these sorts of nonsense stats originated with a former CIE Chairman - Brian Joyce - who regularly told people that it would be cheaper to put the few passengers using the Limerick Junction/Rosslare line in individual taxis than to run the train for them. With that sort of attitude at the top and a demoralised workforce it's no wonder the railways are in a precarious state outside the GDA.

    And here's a link to the very man and the taxi topic from eleven years ago: https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=69216992&postcount=17

    I’m sorry but this is more waffle.
    If you can verify that the figures reported are wrong, share them, please.

    Also can I ask, on what do you base the “demoralised workforce” on?

    Racism is now hiding behind the cloak of Community activism.



  • Registered Users Posts: 326 ✭✭MyLove4Satan


    If the line between Nenagh and Limerick was in any other country in Europe there would be a 30 min service in both directions all day and into the evening. I go down to Nenagh and fair bit and see the size of the town. The commuting percentage to Limerick and a fine rail line right into the city centre and I always think to myself 'the last outpost of the CIE cancerous mentality is here'.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,575 ✭✭✭Economics101


    We have a Green Transport minister who might (you would think) be interested in energy-efficient public transport. But it seems that the Greens have a bicycle fetish: I can see these idiots having the Nenagh line turned into a Greenway.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 5,272 ✭✭✭Deedsie


    We have a Green Transport minister who might (you would think) be interested in energy-efficient public transport. But it seems that the Greens have a bicycle fetish: I can see these idiots having the Nenagh line turned into a Greenway.

    There are proposals for a greenway/blueway around lough derg and a spur along the Nenagh river from Nenagh to Dromineer.

    That would be a great tourism resource for the area.

    Tearing up a trainline for it would be unbelievably shortsighted.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,042 ✭✭✭Rulmeq


    L1011 wrote: »
    You not liking the figures or their source does not make them wrong.

    There is no evidence that they are wrong
    I've already pointed out that they figures are probably correct, but it's very easy to make the figures look far worse than they need to be.


  • Registered Users Posts: 4,124 ✭✭✭goingnowhere


    Folks forget the CWR laid was not an upgrade but a replacement for life expired track. A lot of it was second hand, some is completely new.

    Railways have huge fixed costs, running the trains is fairly cheap (the marginal cost on the infrastructure for running a few extra trains is effectively nil) but having the railway setup, maintained and staffed in the case of the Nenagh line is a massive cost.

    The figures have been published on a route by route basis which shows the costs and revenue for each. It is not a case of someone said Nenagh is X, they showed all routes and the numbers sum up to match the national total.

    Any railway is profitable given enough subsidy (now who said that?)

    The question is what level of subsidy is acceptable? A decent bus service would be faster and offer a better service for a fraction of the cost, all you would need is a bit of a bus lane into Limerick


  • Registered Users Posts: 3,488 ✭✭✭Working class heroes


    Rulmeq wrote: »
    I've already pointed out that they figures are probably correct, but it's very easy to make the figures look far worse than they need to be.



    How, different font, italics?

    Racism is now hiding behind the cloak of Community activism.



  • Moderators, Business & Finance Moderators, Motoring & Transport Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 67,098 Mod ✭✭✭✭L1011


    Rulmeq wrote: »
    I've already pointed out that they figures are probably correct, but it's very easy to make the figures look far worse than they need to be.

    The main people objecting to the figures are not in the "probably correct" camp, they're in the "I don't like these figures so I'm going to insist they're falsified with no evidence" camp.


  • Registered Users Posts: 28,928 ✭✭✭✭end of the road


    A decent bus service would be faster and offer a better service for a fraction of the cost, all you would need is a bit of a bus lane into Limerick

    realistically that doesn't look to be true when you include the full infrastructure costs.
    buses run on massively expensive infrastructure, now they are lucky they are able to share that infrastructure, but that infrastructure is multiples of the cost to build and maintain then rail, especially when you have trucks and buses operating along it which require a higher standard.
    a bit of paint on a road aka a bus lane will do so much but realistically it's still more of the same and is never going to be 100% immune from the issues road transport in towns and cities can and will bring.
    L1011 wrote: »
    The main people objecting to the figures are not in the "probably correct" camp, they're in the "I don't like these figures so I'm going to insist they're falsified with no evidence" camp.

    this is incorrect.
    we are in the we have enough personal experience of CIE to come to the conclusion, and CIE have shown enough for themselves, that they can't be trusted camp.

    shut down alcohol action ireland now! end MUP today!



  • Registered Users Posts: 3,488 ✭✭✭Working class heroes


    realistically that doesn't look to be true when you include the full infrastructure costs.
    buses run on massively expensive infrastructure, now they are lucky they are able to share that infrastructure, but that infrastructure is multiples of the cost to build and maintain then rail, especially when you have trucks and buses operating along it which require a higher standard.
    a bit of paint on a road aka a bus lane will do so much but realistically it's still more of the same and is never going to be 100% immune from the issues road transport in towns and cities can and will bring.



    this is incorrect.
    we are in the we have enough personal experience of CIE to come to the conclusion, and CIE have shown enough for themselves, that they can't be trusted camp.
    I’ll ask you again. Show us proof.
    A feeling in your waters doesn’t cut it.

    Racism is now hiding behind the cloak of Community activism.



  • Moderators, Business & Finance Moderators, Motoring & Transport Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 67,098 Mod ✭✭✭✭L1011


    this is incorrect.
    we are in the we have enough personal experience of CIE to come to the conclusion, and CIE have shown enough for themselves, that they can't be trusted camp.

    And yet you have absolutely zero evidence that the figures are wrong.

    Please learn what the concept of proof is. Because without it, your "this is incorrect" claim is, ironically enough, incorrect - as your basis is insisting the figures are wrong because you don't like them, as I stated.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,670 ✭✭✭IE 222


    The line will always require funding and subsidies to operate. It's not the cost of fuel that drives the figures up. No doubt IE or whomever it was that produced previous figures likely put down every single expense they could.
    Numbers and usage has risen over the last few years and some track and other upgrades have been made so unless someone has up to date figures you are arguing over out of date figures.

    The key to making the line feasible is utilizing it to its full potential and removing as much manual operating functions of the line as possible.


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,272 ✭✭✭Deedsie


    IE 222 wrote: »
    The line will always require funding and subsidies to operate. It's not the cost of fuel that drives the figures up. No doubt IE or whomever it was that produced previous figures likely put down every single expense they could.
    Numbers and usage has risen over the last few years and some track and other upgrades have been made so unless someone has up to date figures you are arguing over out of date figures.

    The key to making the line feasible is utilizing it to its full potential and removing as much manual operating functions of the line as possible.

    It will be interesting to see if the timetable changes much or at all when the service resumes. The times and speeds between Birdhill > Nenagh > Cloughjordan and Roscrea should improve a little bit anyway.

    The Birdhill > Castleconnell > Colbert section wont change at all unfortunately.

    If you zoom into Castleconnell on this map and switch on level crossings and bridges you can see the extent of issues on one tiny stretch of the Western end of the Ballybrophy line. And then compare that section to the Cork Dublin mainline.

    https://www.irishrail.ie/en-ie/train-timetables/live-train-map


    I just noticed if you click on the individual nodes on that map some of the crossings have an (A) in brackets and some dont.

    Might answer the question of which ones are automated already and which ones are still manual. Some of the more informed here might be able confirm.

    Some have CX, U, A and then I am assuming the names of the gate keepers for the individual gates.

    Guessing as I go along here but U might mean unattended


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  • Registered Users Posts: 4,124 ✭✭✭goingnowhere


    CX
    Gates normally open to road traffic, these are staffed

    U
    Is user worked


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,272 ✭✭✭Deedsie


    CX
    Gates normally open to road traffic, these are staffed

    U
    Is user worked

    So would user be a farmer for example or would it be a gate keeper?


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,575 ✭✭✭Economics101


    A User would be anyone who uses the crossing. Typically such a crossing might provide access to one or two houses and nearly all users would be residents of those houses or at least locals. There would normally not be any through traffic and most such crossings are on rural cul-de-sacs (or is it culs-de-sac, or s that a bit rude?)


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,272 ✭✭✭Deedsie


    A User would be anyone who uses the crossing. Typically such a crossing might provide access to one or two houses and nearly all users would be residents of those houses or at least locals. There would normally not be any through traffic and most such crossings are on rural cul-de-sacs (or is it culs-de-sac, or s that a bit rude?)

    Never understood how houses get planning permission in situations like that. Presumably the speed the trains can pass these gates is reduced?


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,943 ✭✭✭tabbey


    Deedsie wrote: »
    Never understood how houses get planning permission in situations like that. Presumably the speed the trains can pass these gates is reduced?

    These user crossings were provided by the railway builder to accommodate existing residents and farmers. It was a requirement of the act of parliament under which the railway was constructed.
    If someone got planning permission to build a new home, it was because the old house no longer met modern standards.

    The presence of a crossing should not be a factor in determining the railway speed limit, unless there is a bad history of accidents. Even at Ballymerrigan, between Wicklow and Rathdrum, where an uncle and nephew died in separate incidents decades apart, the regular line speed applies.
    Where a rail speed limit is raised, then it's sometimes desirable to close the crossing, replacing it with a bridge or diversion to a different route. For example, in England, the east coast line has had crossing closed. It is not desirable to have trains running at 125 mph through a crossing, potentially obstructed by a stationary car due to mechanical failure or criminality.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,575 ✭✭✭Economics101


    Apart from User-operated crossings, there is a big problem with CX-type crossings, namely the expense of a crossing keeper's salary, for. what might be as few as four gate opening operations a day. Added to this is the standard for "modern" crossings to replace CX types is 4-barrier, signal-protected CCTV monitored crossing, monitored and operated from a central control point (usually Athlone of Mallow). The capital cost of these crossings is quite high.

    Other countries (including the UK) often use AHB (automatic half-barrier) crossings, which are much cheaper to install, but our health and safety culture (i.e our litigious culture) seems to rule out the AHB.


  • Registered Users Posts: 8,412 ✭✭✭Markcheese


    If only there was a way of providing a fast ,frequent, flexible public transport ,link between limerick and nenagh ,largely on existing assets, ???
    3 or 4 coaches maybe ?

    Slava ukraini 🇺🇦



  • Moderators, Business & Finance Moderators, Motoring & Transport Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 67,098 Mod ✭✭✭✭L1011


    Half barriers are not installed new in the UK anymore, and they aren't that much cheaper - the power, telecoms provisioning costs and design/planning costs are the same for half or full so you're only saving on the kit


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,575 ✭✭✭Economics101


    It's not just the half versus full barriers: there is the signalling as well. AHB crossings are operated automatically when a train passes a certain point about a minute or two before crossing. There a tens of thousands of them in Europe and North America.

    Maybe the problem would be with Irish drivers misusing them.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 28,928 ✭✭✭✭end of the road


    Markcheese wrote: »
    If only there was a way of providing a fast ,frequent, flexible public transport ,link between limerick and nenagh ,largely on existing assets, ???
    3 or 4 coaches maybe ?


    it already exists for those that want it, and i would suspect it is enough coaches for the demand for coach transport.
    however it does not get us out of investing in the rail line, since the likely hood of the rail users transferring over in the event of the railway being no more is probably nil, and even then it's cutting road transport we need to be doing and not increasing it.

    shut down alcohol action ireland now! end MUP today!



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