Branchline121

Seen some photos showing that charging infrastructure for the battery DARTs is being installed at Drogheda on platform 3. I assume they must be getting close to entering service, provided it works. It’d seem that Drogheda is nearing the end of an era, with the commuters soon being replaced with DARTs and an electric Enterprise on the horizon.

Did Portadown station ever have a proper roof? Almost all pictures I’ve seen just show canopies on the platforms except this one: Usually the captions on these photos aren’t wrong, but did Portadown really have a roof like this? I tried looking at old OS maps but it’s hard to tell the difference between the canopies and an actual roof. Although it looks like there’s a roof behind the station in this photo: I’d be interested in seeing if there’s any other photos of it if they exist. Also on a slightly unrelated note, did Armagh have a roof? Photos of the station show supports spanning the tracks but I can’t find any old enough to confirm whether there was ever actually one there.

I’ve been thinking about this again recently and while building over the A5 in Omagh initially sounds ridiculous, if the proposed A5 upgrade/bypass ever goes ahead, I could see the A5 between the Crevenagh and Derry Road roundabouts being replaced by the railway as the road loses its importance (ironic considering the road was built on top of the railway). A similar thing could be done with the A5 in Strabane once it’s superseded. This would allow both stations to be nearer to the town centre than would’ve otherwise been possible. An issue though with the A5 upgrade is that the portion between Strabane and Derry is located on top of the optimal alignment for if the rebuilt Derry Road was to remain east of the Foyle, so it’s likely that the Derry Road will have to follow its original route. That makes a Letterkenny branch easier, but might complicate things with cross-border construction, or if they ever want to revive railfreight around Derry.

Hardly seems like a good idea… Demolishing the old station to build a smaller one marginally closer to the town? Surely having trains terminate on the main line in the way of freight (and Rosslare trains too if that ever reopens) would be in conflict with the goals of their ‘Freight 2040’ strategy.

It may have took 20 years but at least we’re (nearly) getting there.

Correct, it was an error on my part. It should be fixed now.

The coaches have been exported to GB, courtesy of Belmond. Here's a picture of them in their new life:

With the UK having invented trains you'd really think they'd be better at them. With so many gaps in their network despite the population density you would imagine there would be more projects in the last few years (all I can think of recently is the Borders Railway, EWR and HS2). Not to mention the age of their stock (many railcars around the country are '80s-era) and general lack of electrification. It's no surprise Westminster isn't funding projects in the North.

Not sure if this was posted here before but 43028 of British Rail was put into a one-off mock Irish Rail livery in 1997, to haul boat trains from Holyhead. Seemingly it didn’t last long, but it’s interesting to see nonetheless.

It’s good to see it going ahead after 20 years. I wonder how they’ll route the trains? When I was in Warsaw the services were classified with a number (R1, R2, etc.). A similar system could be useful once the DART has more than one line.

I always thought if Inchicore was ever scaled down that it'd be neat to use one of the buildings as a museum -- like an Irish equivalent to the NRM in York. There wouldn't be running costs or anything of the sort at least but there's a good chance something else could come up I suppose.

I'm looking forward to whenever it releases. I hadn't played Roblox in years but recently discovered 'British Railway' a good fun simulation game, and if this is anything similar it'll be great.

The tramway will reopen in 2027 if all goes according to plan, so it's not over yet. Source: https://www.dublinport.ie/e9-million-investment-in-rail-freight-yard-at-north-wall/

Looks like the tendering process has begun.

Can’t say I ever liked the livery — but it is sad to see it gone.