thewanderer

After spending a long weekend in the Manchester area, I arrived back into Ireland to find my train home to Thurles would have vehicle 22516, which is the first of the new 22000 Class B2 type cars to enter service last Friday. So click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2024-Photos/February-2024/i-9xMS6T5 to view pictures from Heuston on Sunday evening including interior pictures of the new B2 car layout with its multi-purpose bike storage / standing area.

Yes it is. Just select the non-member ticket options if you are booking.

30 years ago today, the 2600 class fleet was delivered to IE. It seems rather appropriate so that the tickets for the 30th anniversary railtour for the class went on sale this morning! https://www.rte.ie/archives/2024/0124/1428391-japanese-trains-for-ireland/

An outing has been arranged to travel to Mallow and Listowel to see the Mallow Level Crossing Control Centre (LCCC) & South Cabin and visit the Lartigue Monorail and Museum on Saturday 16th March 2024. The outing will travel from Dublin to Mallow & Tralee by Iarnród Éireann service train and between Tralee & Listowel via private coach. Due to the limitations on the number of people that can be accommodated in the LCCC at a time, this outing is limited to a maximum of 40 people. The visit to the LCCC and South Cabin will be conducted in small groups, lasting for 10 minutes at each location. Munster Branch members may join and leave the outing at Mallow. Full details, including timings and prices can be found on our booking page at https://irrsouting160324.eventbrite.ie

You do also have the option of returning to Cork on the Saturday evening by IE service train (2100 Heuston - Cork) if you only want to do the Saturday of the tour.

You have no argument from me there on that point! To be radical make Dublin Airport work on the same lines as Manchester Airport Station with regional services to all over Ireland.

Why would you duplicate an already existing rail corridor? The whole point of the original DART underground was to run southside of the Liffey opening up new areas to rail. Heuston to SSG in about 6 or so mins for example. Not possible today in any form of transport. The line then curves to Pearse (interchange with DART + Commuter) and then Docklands area (another large growing area) and then goes onto the East Wall branch to rejoin the GNR line at East Wall Jct. Your proposal wouldn't work with the big 90 degree curve (hampers speed) around Custom House / Busaras.

The "Time’s Arrow” railtour has been arranged for Saturday 18th & Sunday 19th May 2024 to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Tokyu Car Corporation 2600 Class Railcars, which entered service on Monday 16th May 1994. With thanks to Iarnród Éireann, we are going back in time to the 1990’s by taking a 2600 Class railcar to Dublin to explore the suburban system, visiting old haunts and new locations, including Dublin Heuston, Adamstown Bay Platform, Grand Canal Dock Bay Platform, Dundalk, Howth, Dublin Connolly, Maynooth and M3 Parkway. But that isn’t the end of it. Following an overnight stay in Dublin, on Sunday we will recreate the famous 1220 Heuston – Cork non-stop "ARROW" express of the late 1990’s from Dublin Heuston to Cork, but with the added bonus of a nonstop run from Dublin Heuston to Cobh. After a short break at Cobh to stretch our legs from the 177-mile journey, we will retrace our steps as far as Cork where the tour will conclude. See https://irrstimesarrow.eventbrite.ie for full information.

What shite have I just stumbled upon!!!! 073 is still in IR livery. The retro liveries are well liked within the company.

Evening all, The backlog of photos has been cleared and the website has been updated with the end of January and the start of February. The January gallery can be viewed at https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2024-Photos/January-2024/i-TMHxfJm and contains: * Pictures from Portlaoise on Monday 29th January. * Pictures from Cork on Tuesday 30th January. The February gallery contains images from Killarney, the closed stations at Clonakilty and Bandon plus two visits to Thurles. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2024-Photos/February-2024/i-rv6BdMD to view. All the images can also be accessed from the 2024 folder at https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2024-Photos

After receiving an invite to attend the event at London Waterloo for the return of 4VEP 3417 "Gordon Pettitt" to the terminus for the first time in 18 years, I made a flying visit to London on the Friday night to attend the event on Saturday before returning back to Ireland on Saturday night. I have to say it was a fantastic day out and full of emotion for me as well. Hopefully it won't be too long before we see "Gordon" at heritage railways and eventually mainline running before too long. All the photos from the visit, including the event at London Waterloo can be viewed at https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/International/2024/A-night-in-London-26th-27th-January-2024

Good evening all, Photos from Nenagh, Ballybrophy and various locations in the Dublin area from Monday and Tuesday. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2024-Photos/January-2024/i-2DMKW3n to view.

A rather hastily arranged trip to England was put together for early January as I needed to head to Norfolk for a family event. As is usual with me, I extended the trip a few days either side and managed to fit in a few more bits I had wanted to tick off. * Belfast to Birkenhead Ferry. * Merseryrail 507001 in its BR Blue & Grey Retro Livery. * Newcastle Tyne and Wear Metro * South Western Railway Class 455's. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/International/2024/UK-Trip-8th-14th-January-2024 to view all the individual galleries.

The January 2024 gallery kicks off with: Thursday 4th January 2024: Pictures from Nenagh of 3ICR 22060 working the evening branch service. Friday 5th January 2024: Pictures from between Nenagh and Belfast. Saturday 6th & Sunday 7th January 2024: A weekend in Belfast with visits to Derry, Portrush, Coleraine, Bangor, Lisburn, City Hospital and Titanic Quarter. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2024-Photos/January-2024/i-6WL5J8C to view.

My 2023 Year in Review Gallery has now been published. Containing over 500 photos from throughout 2023. The highlights from the year in review contain: * Limerick station refurbishment and new bus station. * Views of NIR. * Visit to Downpatrick & Co. Down Railway for their diesel gala * Trials and re-entry to service of MTU stage v powerpack and ZF transmission set 22063. * Connemara Railway at Maam Cross. * Tegral Branch at Athy being converted into the Athy bypass. * ICR B2 car trials. * Loco hauled ICR B Car transfers. * RPSI, IRRS and Talite Railtours in 2024. * IRRS visits to the new National Train Control Centre & ICR B2 vehicles. * Railtours Ireland Emerald Isle Express charter. * MKIV coach 4114 dumped at Mallow after suffering a seized axle. * Loco 218 running on HVO fuel. * DART+ mockup at Inchicore. * Foynes line rebuilding. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/FeaturedGallery/2023-A-year-in-Review/ to view.

Afternoon all, Two updates to the website this afternoon. The main one concerns the Foynes Line rebuilding in Co. Limerick and features photos from between Ballingrane and Patrickswell showing the latest progress on the work to reopen the railway for Freight to Foynes Port. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/Officialevents/2023/Foynes-Line-Reconstruction-/i-ThN4SZF The 2nd update is in the December gallery with two pictures from Killarney during a visit to the station to drop a person off. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2023-photos/December-2023/i-VQ9FDMB

Evening all, Pictures from around Dublin and Thurles during an overnight trip to the capital city. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2023-photos/December-2023/i-mTR68BC to view.

The December gallery has been updated with: Wednesday 6th and 12th December 2023: Views of Laois Depot where a trio of the new ICR B2 cars have visited for modification work to be carried out on the vehicles. To shunt the vehicles in the yard, an 071 class locomotive was provided, an unusual sight in a DMU depot. Saturday 16th December 2023: A day spent in Dublin to photograph and travel on the RPSI Santa Specials between Connolly and Maynooth. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2023-photos/December-2023/i-bkR4r6p to view.

The November gallery comes to an close with images around Nenagh and a 3 day visit to Dublin. Saturday 25th & Sunday 26th November: Images around Nenagh. Monday 27th - Wednesday 29th November 2023: November comes to an end with 3 days in Dublin. Photos come from: * Thurles * Inchicore * Heuston * LUAS * Pearse * Tara Street * Clontarf Road & Fairview * Bray Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2023-photos/November-2023/i-mDDdrHG Also while at Inchicore I took a look at the DART+ mockup. The new DART+ fleet is being built by Alstom in Poland to the X'trapolis design. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/Officialevents/2023/DART-mockup-at-Inchicore/

Latest photos from the week so far are now online at https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2023-photos/November-2023/i-RBkZqR3 Tuesday 21st November 2023: Pictures come from Ballybrophy, Portlaoise, Limerick Jct. and Limerick. Wednesday 22nd Novemeber 2023: Pictures today come from Thurles, Portlaoise, Heuston and Abbey Street.

The November gallery has been updated with: Friday 17th November 2023: While in Galway for the night, I stopped off at Oranmore to see the 1305 Galway - Heuston passing through non-stop. Saturday 18th November 2023: After a lovely evening in Leenan in the wilds of Connemara, we decided to head over to Westport to spend a few hours in the town and at Westport House which I had never been to before. Later in the afternoon while heading back to North Tipperary, I stopped off at Manulla Jct. and Balla to view the 1245 Heuston - Westport passing. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2023-photos/November-2023/i-wxJTdHC to view all the images.

Evening all, The November gallery has been updated with: Wednesday 15th November 2023: The new Track Recording Vehicle 701 travelled on the Nenagh Branch on Tuesday and Wednesday and I photographed it passing Nenagh on Wednesday morning. Thursday 16th November 2023: Loco 218 has been converted to run on Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil (HVO) as part of a trial to reduce carbon emissions and after a number of trials on non-passenger work it was released to work passenger trains from Thursday 16th November 2023 where I managed to catch up with it at Thurles in the afternoon. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2023-photos/November-2023/i-KHMDsj5 to view all the images.

Monday 13th & Tuesday 14th November 2023: A busy two days of travelling to Dublin, Cork and Limerick. Travel plans on the Monday were somewhat disrupted by Storm Debi but the highlight was seeing Ballast Cleaner 781 leaving Limerick Jct. for Kildare. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2023-photos/November-2023/i-q8Fvgvv

Saturday 11th November 2023: A Saturday afternoon spent in the Cratloe area which afforded some pictures of Western Rail Corridor services between Limerick and Ennis at Cratloe and Sixmilebridge. Click https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2023-photos/November-2023/i-JF4pt4r to view.

Evening all, Photos from the past week have now been uploaded to the website at https://thewandererphotos.smugmug.com/2023-photos/November-2023/i-xNMfZ5d Saturday 4th November 2023: During the first week of November the Nenagh Branch received the new NTA funded wayfinding signage. I popped into Nenagh Station on Saturday to view the new improved signage. Wednesday 8th November 2023: Pictures from Thurles and Portlaoise. Thursday 9th November 2023:L Pictures today come from Ballybrophy, Portlaoise, Heuston, LUAS Red Line at Rialto, plus Blackrock.