Mayner

There would be the usual argument over who should pay the railroad/the city/State or Federal government. The combination of speed & sudden narrowing of the traffic lanes under the bridge is potentially lethal with cars and van striking the abutment and re-bounding to the opposite side of the road. I once drove from New York through Southern Ontario to Chicago and the Mid-West the only place we were honked at or came across really agressive driving was in Canada.

The Blacksod Terminal seems to have been part of a much bigger scheme for communication between the UK and the more far flung parts of the Empire without having to set foot on foreign soil. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All-Red_Route. Its hard to know if the promoters lead by J P McAndrew and a group of English investors were genuine in their attempts or it was a speculative bubble feeding of the rampant jingoism and nationalist fever that lead to the Great War. Mc Andrew and his supporters also appear to have taken out mining options in the Arigna Valley and made two unsuccessful attempts to build a broad gauge Sligo-Arigna line. I always liked the idea of a Ballina-Crossmolina line that would have given Burtonport and the Kyle of Lochalsh & Mallaig lines a run for their money in terms of remoteness, possibly hanging on into the late 50s like Valentia or Kenmare. I just wonder how the terminal building with its concrete structure and glass roof would have held up to the salt air and Atlantic storms.

Steam tours tend to sell out quite fast, fares are expensive by UK/Irish standards. http://www.steaminc.org.nz/_brochures/South_Is_Booking_Form_2015_v6.pdf. Rolling stock and crew shortages, restrictions on trains carrying passengers through the longer tunnels are making it more difficult to run steam on the main line.

Very popular annual steam excursion along the "Coal Train Route" from Christchurch across the Canterbury Plains through the Southern Alps to Greymouth in Westland. No excursions this year due to the lack of available coaches, future of the route potentially in question due to the collapse in coking coal and gold bullion prices on the world market.

The NTA providing targeted funding for specific services seems to be an improvement on the old system. Is it feasible to provide cross platform interchange between services using the slow and fast lines at Adamstown? It would make sense to route long distance commuter trains over the fast lines between Hazlehatch and Clondalkin with Adamstown or Park West as an interchange point between Heuston & Grand Canal Dock services.

Dapol held on to the Wrenn wagon toolings and incorporated them into their wagon range. Wagons like the Dapol Cattle Wagon, Gunpowder Van and Fruit D are basically Hornby-Dublo bodies on Airfix GMR chassis rather than the original HD diecast chassis.

I don’t know whether to laugh or cry it has taken IE 25 years to finally implement its 1990 proposal to introduce a suburban rail service between Grand Canal Dock and Clondalkin. The Heuston-Kildare Arrow service seems to have been introduced as a lower cost option with minimal signalling and infrastructure costs compared to completing Grand Canal Dock for its intended purpose as an interchange between the DART and Southern and Western suburban service. A second platform opposite Platform 10 would open up Heuston & the Phoenix Park and apartments and businesses in the Island Bridge area as a destination. Terminating Northern Line outer suburban services at Connolly would improve line capacity over the Loop Line Bridge.

JHB. The GSR appear to have been plans to develop a 2-4-4T as its final steam design. The proposal is mentioned in "A Decade of Steam", the view was that it was a well thought out modern design similar in principal to the LMS 2-6-4T locos. Do you know if any drawings exist of this loco.

Possibly an amalgamation of the MGWR, GNR & DSER, the NCC absorbing the BCDR and the GSWR absorbing the West Cork. There were supposed to have been rumours of a MGWR GNR amalgamation and the DSER wanted to amalgamate with the GNR in 1924. Possibly an Irish branch of the BTC had the whole island of Ireland remained in the UK , possibly some of the lighter BR standard steam types, the NCC / UTA engineers had invented the DMU ahead of British Railways. Harland & Woolfe might have become a serious diesel locomotive builder with a potentially wider market than the County Down & NCC. An Irish Railways Executive would have to develop its own diesel loco designs as most BR classes were too heavy for use in Ireland I am not sure if the Beeching cuts would have been worse than the cuts of the 50s and 60s, CIE, UTA & Stormont were years ahead of the UK mainland in closing railways

The oil headlamps were mainly to assist the signal man to identify the class of an approaching train, though most GSR/CIE mainline passenger and goods trains used to display the UK Express Passenger code (a lamp over each buffer) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Train_reporting_number#Headcodes. The practice of using oil headlamps seems to have died out in the early 1970s when CIE introduced a computerised train control and the 1st stages of widespread CTC.

Do the right thing and move the airport to Baldonnel or Saggart

Controller Is there a makers name stamped on the bottom of the loco? If there is, it might be worth doing an on-line search to see if there is a photo of the same type of loco with valve gear and rods. Assembling etched coupling rods and valve gear can be quite tricky, accurately matching the wheelbase can be quite difficult and there may not be enough metal in the rods to open up the crank pin holes to fit around the bosses and crank pins on your locos. Alan Gibson and most British made rods are designed to fit over a 14BA crank pin bolt and bush (very small). If you want to experiment the Alan Gibson 4M92 Universal Adjustable coupling rod would probably be the best option. http://www.alangibsonworkshop.com/Catalogue.pdf, If you have access to a small pillar drill and accurately measure the wheel centres, you could try and make up a set of rods using KS strip or rail filed flat like the Workbench photo of the GSWR A1 4-8-0. Once you are happy with the running, you can file the rods to their final shape.

Most likely the lack of resources up to the setting up of the Railway Safety Commission and Accident Investigation Unit about 10 years ago the Department of Transport employed only one Railway Inspector with very limited powers of enforcement Completing the report into Dalkey would have been low priority compared to the reports and follow up action in connection with the Buttervant & Cherryville disasters, and possibly Keeping some oversight over the DART, MK3 and major main line re-signalling projects.

Nine years later the investigation report http://www.raiu.ie/download/pdf/accident_dalkey.pdf

Proposals for privatising the road network have been kicked around from time to time in New Zealand http://transportblog.co.nz/2014/03/09/privatising-roads/ but usually dismissed as to extreme even by centre right political parties. In other words privatising the roads would be political suicide, while the majority of voters would not be too worried about privatising justice, health, welfare and education. Personally I would agree that the rail infrastructure and passenger stock would remain in state ownership, passenger and freight operation opened up to competitive bidding. Access to the network should be charged out on a similar basis to the roads and there may be justification for subsidising certain passenger services on the basis of reduced congestion, environmental or road maintenance costs. An incumbent monopoly operator whether it is the state or private tends to take a defensive approach towards running a business and abusing its monopoly position. Opening IEs passenger services to competitive tender based on service level for a given level of public subsidy might actually resulted in an improved level of service, providing tax breaks for freight forwarders and ports like Waterford or Foynes-Limerick and making rolling stock available to open access operators might actually open up the rail fright market

The US has H&S Legislation and the legislation is enforced: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIl0BM0ZEE4. There is even a similar overlap to the UK & Ireland between the rail and occupational health and safety regulators http://utu.org/worksite/PDFs/safetylawsummary/OccupationalSafetyHealthAct.pdf American H&S legislation is more prescriptive or rule based than the UK & Ireland. Workers are trained expected to follow the rules or face the consequences The less rule based performance driven legislation in the UK & Ireland may lead a duty holder to take a more cautious approach than what is actually required by legislation or would result in any real risk reduction. I suppose the big question is how IE & Network Rails injury rate for track workers compares with Union Pacific?

Like the Network Rail video, UP turnout replacement looks like a very professional operation that involved a lot of planning. The level of risk and required controls are far different the American example is on low speed trackage in a yard, the UK example the replacement of a crossover on a relatively high speed freight and passenger line. The absence of fencing and people/equipment crossing the track in the American example is not really an issue, all trains are required to stop and obtain authorisation from the person in control of the possession before proceeding. It noticeable in the UP video that all machinery movement is stopped and the crew return to a safe position during train movements.

Guards vans on Adelaide-Dundalk goods trains rings a bell. For some reason keg traffic from the Harp Larger brewery to Belfast was worked for several years in loose coupled trains after other freight services on the Dublin-Belfast line went over to liner operation. Not sure if it was something to do with the loading arrangements at the brewery or an industrial relations issue.

How will the Government raise the Billion + € needed to build the DART underground? Higher taxes or congestion charges in the Greater Dublin region? Traffic figures on similar schemes in Sydney & Brisbane have not lived up to expectations with the Government having to step in with a much higher level of subsidy than originally planned. Accepting EU or World Bank funding could leave Ireland even more indebted and economic policy subject to the whims of the Trokia.

BR Vans & TPOs on Galway Night Liner/Mail were piped to run with 62'9" air braked container wagons.

TL suffix dating from the early 70s for conventional coaches fitted with Train Line lighting system powered by a generator in the guards van rather than battery and dynamo under each coach. Suffix carried by BR & Dutch Vans, Brake Generator Steam Vans, Cravens, Park Royal, some Laminate & Buffet cars.

What happened in Melbourne and Victoria in a nutshell In 1999 three concessions were awarded to private operators, two of 15 years for the urban area and one of 10 years for the country trains. One of the urban concessions was awarded to a French group trading as Connex, and the other two were awarded to National Express (UK), each on the basis of a range of management criteria and of minimum subsidy requirement. The operators improved service quality, added some additional off-peak services, and introduced some new rolling stock. However soon they were bogged down in disputes including revenue allocation, and they failed to negotiate major productivity improvements with staff. Patronage growth, a healthy 3 percent per annum, was much less than the over-optimistic forecasts. Within two years the companies were in financial distress and at the end of 2002 National Express exited, taking a large financial write-off. A new (2004) contract, under which Connex has a concession over the whole system for 4-6 years, draws on the previous lessons and appears to be more successful. The country train concession also awarded to National Express was not successful and was handed back to the Government.

The main risk with privatising uneconomic road or rail passenger services is poorer service levels than under state control or threats to shut down operations unless the government increases the level of subsidy. This tends to happen when an operator puts in a low bid to take on the contract for a set level of state subsidy and revenue growth does not reach expectations or simply signed the contract intending to farm the subsidy by providing a minimal level of service. To quote a World Bank Paper on Australian & New Zealand Railway Privatisation ƒ Passenger rail concessioning is more complex than freight rail privatization because there are multiple aspects to address (for example, subsidy levels, performance, risk allocation, end-of period issues) and because governments typically remain closely interested in day to day operational effectiveness. ƒ There should be more emphasis on the operational and financial robustness of bids and less on the best financial outcome : RESULTS OF RAILWAY PRIVATIZATION IN AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND 53 - Governments cannot contract out of its obligation to ensure continuation of urban rail passenger services. If a private operator fails, the government is politically or legally obliged to intervene. Having the operator on the hoop If the operators get into ‘survival’ mode, or are distracted by continuing disputes, management effort and focus is taken away from improving service performance towards managing for survival – which often will mean managing the funder of last resort – i.e., government; ƒ If the private sector is to deliver efficiencies, it must be given the capacity to effect reforms.

There was no real union or staff resistance to the ending of the elimination of goods brake vans on fully fitted trains, the loco cab was safer and a lot more comfortable than a standard CIE 20 & 30T van at 50mph. Fully fitted freights with brake vans were restricted to 35mph A guards van was sometimes used on Foynes Byrytes trains so the guard could close level crossing gates without having to walk the length of the train when the crossing keepers had finished their shift. CIE seem to have been quite cunning in their dealings with the unions in the 50s and 60s, eliminating the requirement for a fireman on diesel locos years before BR by placing the train heating boiler in the van. A lot of IEs labour relation problems arose as a result of worker frustration with the large general unions after ASLEF withdrew from Ireland and the lack of long term Government commitment to retaining the railways. IE was able to offer better terms and conditions and re-deploy 'redundant" staff to other roles after the EU Working Time Directive and a buyont economy freed IEs hand to negotiate with the unions