Branchline121

Found this article that says Irish Rail are considering buying Stadler Euro Dual electro-diesel locos similar to the Class 99 entering service in England, apparently to replace the 071s and 201s. Didn't think the 201s need replacing (the 071s are good too but I suppose they are almost 50) but here we are; either way, the article's worth a read.

The BBC article about the opening is here if anyone is interested. There’s a short bit about the late Noel Playfair’s son too. Hopefully the Lisburn-Antrim line reopens soon enough so the station can be filled up a bit, but overall it’s good to see it open.

This locomotive has seemingly been preserved… sort of…

Croatia and Serbia have a similar problem. The border between them was drawn up during the federalisation of Yugoslavia, but the problem lies in that Serbia claims the border follows the modern course of the Danube (thereby giving them more land), whereas Croatia asserts it should follow the original course drawn before the Danube was straightened for ease of navigation. This leads to one piece of land being claimed by neither. Naturally, this has lead to some chancers to travel to the land and claim it as their own ‘micronation’, such as a Czech man who proclaimed “Liberland” on the territory, although neither Serbia nor Croatia take him seriously. While not on the topic of unclaimed land, I feel, seen as this is a railway forum, I should mention the peculiar Belgian-German border. After the Great War, the Treaty of Versailles granted some land to Belgium as reparations — one of these is the Vennbahn, a strategic railway line that crossed the border. The Vennbahn’s path would be granted to Belgium, in the process separating land west of the line from the rest of Germany. Although the line is closed now, the irregular border remains.

It hasn’t seen a passenger service since 1995 AFAIK (albeit that was a special), but you’d think that the GNRI station could be opened in the interim for a service to Dublin to bridge the gap between now and when the ex-D&M reopens in 2036, a good 12 years from now, especially considering the line is so sparsely used now. The lack of a Navan branch platform is an issue, but a wooden platform could probably be thrown together hastily, right?

The GeoHive Maps also have satellite imagery that is, in many cases, much higher quality than Google Maps; although the satellite imagery is all pre-2015..

I used to have a large layout that covered my whole bedroom floor when I was younger, but it's all stored up in boxes now...

It’s a strange idea alright — but I’d hate to see Malahide or the other stations destroyed for quadruple-tracking like they did to all the stations between Heuston and Hazelhatch.

Interestingly, the All Island Strategic Rail Review suggest only 4 tracking up to Clongriffin, and making a new direct line that follows the M1 for fast services (Enterprise) and rejoins the northern line at Drogheda. I wonder if it would be beneficial to complete that project first?

Interestingly the review states it did study a Navan—Derry railway line but did not consider there to be enough demand.

You’d really think they’d just convert the 1.5 V DC on the DART to 25 kV AC instead of extending the redundant DC system when it could be AC from Greystones to Belfast.

Well, the CIÉ almost bought a second-hand class over from Britain in the ‘70s — the Class 251. It never came to fruition, but I’m sure they would’ve looked awesome in the “supertrain” livery.

I'm late to this thread but it's nice to see you all have such cute cats. I'd let mine near the layout if I wasn't so scared she'd flatten it...

Why did they ever get rid of the old Europort station? I was never at the old one tbh but comparing pictures of it with the present one leaves a lot to be desired — especially when there’s no real pedestrian access to Rosslare Harbour village!

Another change to the alignment I could see happening is the section crossing the Foyle. I imagine they would want to keep inside the border and avoid having a few kilometres needlessly inside the Republic; Foyle Road station isn't there anymore too so they would presumably stick to the east bank of the Foyle so they can connect with Waterside station. The alignment at Strabane likely won't be preserved either seen as the old station site is now under a roundabout. The review also recommended electrifying the Derry Road, so any over bridges or tunnels would likely be rebuilt/demolished, or alternatively the track be lowered to accommodate for the OHLE. It sounds challenging but would be great to see it happen.

Don’t forget to them the reinstatement of the Derry Road and the direct line between Clongriffin and Drogheda. Also a short spur to Limavady and railway between Mullingar and Portadown. There’s finally the electrification of most of the important lines (Dublin radial lines to Cork, Belfast, Galway and Waterford + the Derry Road). It could really transform our railways if it actually happens, so hopefully it will.

I’m excited that Meath will finally get electric trains, even if it’s only Dunboyne and not as far as Navan like in the Strategic Railway Review, I wonder when that will happen, if it happens at all?

I was having a look at the article on Wikipedia (I know it isn’t that reliable in terms of Irish railways) for the ‘UTA AEC Class’ and noticed that it is proposed to be merged with the ‘GNRI AEC Class’ page. I was always a bit foggy on all those Northern railcar classes so is the two similar enough to be one article or is it unwarranted? I personally didn’t think there was much of a difference but are they the same or are there at least slight differences?

I think the only issue with that is the Class 231 was built by Stadler, not Alstom, although I still hope we get some Irish FLIRTs as I find them to look quite attractive, moreso than that of the ICR or 29K.

Or get we could also get someone to remove the train from Red Dead Redemption 2 and replace it with a J15!

Dunleer probably.

One alternate history scenario I sometimes wonder about would be if the GSR/CIÉ decided to undertake an electrification scheme inspired by the Swiss, instead of the later dieselisation plan. I doubt there would’ve been anything close to the capital for it, but it would have been interesting to see something like that on say the Cork or Belfast route with trains hauled by something like the LNER EM1 or NZR EW classes.

I’d say it would be a likely candidate as it could also be easily retooled into one of the LMS/BR 2-6-4Ts for Accurascale, which certainly would sell a bit, considering how ubiquitous they were in Britain.

It seems the entire page is unsourced, someone ought to add a few references; talking about Wikipedia oddities, the A class is listed under 001 class, which isn’t an error, but I find it bizarre they refrain on titling it the A class, same story with the C class. It is disappointing some errors exist, but I suppose it’s a miracle we have any pages on the site at all, seen as the interest is a lot smaller than that of Britain or Germany.

I always find it entertaining to look at photos of where airships were moored when they were relevant, trains weren’t the only things unfortunately phased out by planes. Here’s 2 pictures: