jhb171achill

. Meanwhile our friends discuss tomorrow’s cattle fair alongside the empty cattle wagons which came in today….. ”Has anyone heard from the Dalys, how many beasts they’ll have?” ”Depends how many they sell! That dealer fella from Athlone was in O’Donoghues last night. He bought about twenty milch cows the last time he was here!”

On a pleasant spring morning in 1965, the goods ambles into Dugort Harbour…

I wonder did anyone ever actually get put in prison for smoking on a train...................... or, indeed, fined £400? Let alone both.......

OK, here we go. This is 13.1.1986 until further notice; turns out I don't have 1987, but it's likely exactly the same. Trains in BOLD run every day; others are just paths and may or may not run. Down trains: 00:25 Shelton - Abbey - Galway fertiliser PATH dep. Mullingar 05:50, arr. Athlone 06:46 Loco: 001 09:35 Shelton Abbey - Ballinasloe fertiliser PATH dep. Mullingar 15:30, arr. Athlone 16:41 (Stop scheduled moate 16:07-16:230; reason not apparent, probably to fit in with paths west of Athlone) Loco: 001 18:50 North Wall - Ballina Asahi Liner Pass Mullingar 20:43, arr. Athlone 21:36 Loco: 001 21:45 Connolly - Galway Mail Dep. Athlone 23:07, Moate 23:36-23:51 (Crosses up train), Athlone 00:16. Loco: 121 On Saturdays, this runs earlier, dep. Connolly 19:50, dep. Mullingar 21:14, arr. Athlone 22:15 Up trains: 22:35 Ballina - Shelton Abbey Empty Fertiliser PATH dep. Athlone 00:40, arr. Mullingar 01:30. leaves at 02:25. Loco: 001 02:25 Ballina - North Wall Asahi Liner (Tues - Sat) dep. Athlone 05:27, pass Mullingar 06:19. Loco: 001 22:00 Galway - Connolly Mail dep. Athlone 23:20, Moate 23:45-23:48 (crosses down train), arr. Mullingar 00:18 Loco: 141 SUNDAYS No regular trains, but three DOWN paths and two UP paths for Knock specials from PEARSE, motive power not specified for any of them. Note: Two down paths for ferts, butn only one up; the other obviously going via Portarlington when it runs. Also, the WTT shows a 121 for the down mail and a 141 for the up working. Of course, these could be interchangeable. These two mail trains, which crossed at Moate between 23:36 and 23:51, were the only trains on the line by then (and for quite a few years earlier), which carried passengers. Hope this helps. JB

A most interesting vehicle!

Correct, as Mayner points out the date of the last REGULAR services. But also, there were indeed many one-offs, excursions, diversions and the like; RPSI, Knock & GAA specials. These would be in weekly circulars rather than timetables, and sometimes at a moments notice so not even in them! I’ll post 1987 WTT details later.

I want 1880s six wheelers….. and 4.4.0s in front….. guess I’m an oul relic!

On the turf loco? Tis Michael the driver (right) and me sister (left)!

I have to say I don't mind ICRs.... they're less noisy than 29s or 26s, though I agree with them being airless, which always leads to the toilets being less than pleasant. We can't blame the ICR itself for the lack of catering.... In terms of comfort, the AECs back in the day (before the survivors got plastic seats) were by FAR the most comfortable railcrs ever to run here - but they were noisy too - like a 29 full of marbles in an echo chamber, going down a tin staircase...... AEC railcar seats in the 1950s, with yours truly in it, on the Harkitstreet Line...........

You've the patience of a saint! But the results are always worth it................

Given the chassis, might some sort of 0.6.0 tender engine be a bit longer?

Notwithstanding all that, since this is an "Enterprise" thread, here are some Enterprises, between 1962 and the early 1990s. One picture is not an Enterprise. Can anyone guess which? (Pics 2, 3 & 5; jhbSenior)

I told the lizard in the pizza shop all about it. I think he caused some consequences. I walked into that one, didn't I...............

In the 1990s, I was on a local NIR train, when a walking tracksuit type started smoking. Two passengers reported him. The conductor appeared. This was the LAST train out of Belfast for Portadown. The train happened to be slowing for Finaghy stop. Smoker wouldn't stop and was giving conductor a mouthful of abuse. Conductor opens the door for people getting out, grabs yer man and tried to push him out onto the platform. Smoker attempts to resist, whereupon conductor physically KICKS him out onto the platform, slams the door, and gives the driver the green. Being the last service, about 23:30, there were none following, and it may have been too late for a following bus. In all reality, one can invoke human rights, and respect-for-the-person and so on, but like it or not, if railway staff and security men on board trains were able to do that now, the quality of life for the many who increasingly feel unsafe on public transport would be much better; also, the junkies and pond life who causes scenes like this would learn fast. Personally, I would have no problem with it.

Black with a yellow end was on quite a few (though not all) but one of them for a short time carried (as an experiment) a yellow buffer beam too. Also - I think there was just this one example - C231 received the dark green with a line round it, just as one "A" (or maybe two) did. All the others were the standard lighter green used after 1955 on rail vehicles. It seems, also, as an aside, that while the earlier "C"s were delivered in silver, the last few were green from the outset.

Perfect locos for a wide range of prototypical uses. For late 1950s, they were to be found on branch lines and all over the Wisht Caark system. They made it to places like Cavan on goods via the MGWR route, Ballina branch train, Loughrea after 1964-ish. All through the 1960s, they had been displaced from branches (bar Loughrea and Ballina) by closures, and displaced from passenger services by unreliability and 121s / 141s, but were to be found snuffling round goods yards, shunting, and keeping in their practice on passengers at Loughrea when the G's were out of action, or requisitioned in the autumn to shunt Tuam beet factory sidings. I remember them on ballast trains too - I got a cab run in a ballast from Clonsilla to the North Wall in one in the mid-70s. Then in the 1970s and 80s, until withdrawal, as we know, they graduated to Dublin to be used on push-pulls. Add to that the several that went to NIR in the 1980s, and worked into the 1990s on ballasts on that network. So they were very versatile and to be seen in a wide variety of locations and uses, over almost four decades. Thus, WELL worth a model. Eleven potential livery variations, too, although two of these only applied to one locomotive that I'm aware of. Good for collectors as well as operating layouts.

Some workings at Malahide this week…. 1. Light engine comes back from Drogheda. 2 & 3. Drogheda - Connolly locals formed of 29s. 4. An overscale thing, operated by DCCCC.

That’s a B-and-a-half class….

Tell me what year you want. I have most WTTs for that period.

Anyone got an oul bogie chassis with whels suitable for the above, for a rough freelance thing? Needs to be 171mm long or cabable of being altered to that length. Nothing fancy. Carriage rather than wagon bogies.

Enniskillen, circa 1952, c/o Senior.

I've two of those and they look OK. An IRM one, or equivalent, would be on a different plane altogether, if we dare hope!

You'd see it in the papers next day, on a scorched football pitch in some sink estate with a crowd of blue-bag-sniffers round it..... and it would be alight.............

Probably Senior's last PW job IN the station; maybe he got tired of looking at the shabby old stuff right outside his office window.......!

Those dolphins can be very dangerous all right...........