Were the 90s the greatest era in Irish Railways?

[declan64]

Just came across these videos in my feed. The sheer variety of locomotives, rolling stock and train configurations was incredible in the 90s - so much more interesting than today. Was this the Golden Age of Irish Railways which we are now recreating in the Golden Age of Irish Railway Modelling?

Video#3  - I never appreciated how physical a job it was to be a signalman in those days!

 

[jhb171achill]

For sheer variety - which is what I am assuming you mean - the 1950-65 period had many times the amount of variety the 1990s did, plus twice the mileage and then some......

That said, today pales in comparison to the 1990s, indeed!

[Rob]

Great videos- definitely a great era just slightly too early for me.  Push forward just one decade and you have the greatest era in lrish Railways!!!!!  (Am sure l will be in minority though )

[Mayner]

While Irish Rail were a lot more pro-active than CIE in terms of pursuing both passenger and freight traffic, the rail system became increasingly un-reliable and close to a state of collapse (breakdowns, derailments, extended journey times) as a result of the run down nature of the infrastructure during the 1990s.

1900-1914 is probably the closest to a "Golden Era" in terms of Irish Railways both in terms of sheer variety, standard of service and standard of maintenance of equipment and infrastructure.

IE in the 90s and early 2000s is an ideal period for modelling a run down railway with weathered locos and stock and poorly maintained track, signalling and infrastructure

The "Big Companies" (GSWR, GNR, BNCR (NCC) and MGWR) were prosperous even by UK standards, all introduced large modern locomotives and bogie stock with dining car service for main line services (all in distinctive liveries) during the early 1900s.

IE was still attempting to run main line service on track laid by the GSWR,GNR & Midland 70-90 years later!

[Noel]

Possibly? Back in the 1990s you could still dine properly on the main cork and Belfast trains. 

[jhb171achill]

 

33 minutes ago, Noel said:

Possibly? Back in the 1990s you could still dine properly on the main cork and Belfast trains. 

I took the train to Belfast & back yesterday. It was a case of “bring your own kitkat”…..

[murphaph]

Sad state of affairs. I ate a nice cooked dinner on the train (The Berliner, running from Hamburg to Prague, operated by CD) down to Dresden yesterday. There's nothing quite so civilised as eating a proper meal on the train, cooked in the galley. 

Edit: a loco hauled train too!

Edited August 21, 2021 by murphaph

[Noel]

2 hours ago, murphaph said:

Sad state of affairs. I ate a nice cooked dinner on the train (The Berliner, running from Hamburg to Prague, operated by CD) down to Dresden yesterday. There's nothing quite so civilised as eating a proper meal on the train, cooked in the galley. 

Edit: a loco hauled train too!

Unfortunately all we seem to get nowadays are the occasional sandwich from a trolly on the Triang Hornby 22k class DMU rattle cans. A far cry from city-gold loco expresses trains to cork in years gone by before catering was outsourced. You'd get better food from one of the stalls at a Leinster match in the RDS. Remember good food on the Enterprise 20 years ago, no ideal what its like nowadays. If the 201/CAF sets are ever replaced on the cork route by 22k plastic yoyo with their disgusting WCs i'll be taking the car to Cork and Kerry in future.

1990s is a good period to model because there was a lot of modern era rolling stock and good variety of coaching stock including Cravens, Park Royals, Mk2 and M3, and the beauty is they were all loco hauled, so good operating potential with loco run arounds, therefore stations needed loops and more points for interest. Goods/Freight stock as busier than todays boring liners only, but IRM have that era so well covered with cement, 42ft, tara's, ferts, etc, all that's really missing for RTR are double beet wagons for 1990s. MM 141/181/121/071/201 have the era well covered in Tippex IR/IE liveries. Personally as you all know its the late 1960s and 1970s that stirs my imagination for nostalgia reasons as I witnessed it first hand before the 1970s modernisation program that replace the divers and interesting operation of 2 axle goods wagons with modern era fitted bogie freight wagons. But nostalgia can hide some truths, the hardship and manual labour involved in shunting and loading/unloading those old wagons was from another bleak century. Fork lift trucks and containerisation put all of that in the past. But on a model railway one never witness the toil involved in the old pick up goods wagon era. Mind you more tonnage of freight was moved between 1922 and 1970 than ever since, especially since the demise of cement traffic in all forms, powder, bags, gypsum, etc. If I had to choose another era other than pre 1972 it would be the early 1990s when those new fangled 201s arrived but would break down every autumn when the leaves fell or there was a hard frost.  

[Galteemore]

It’s probably fair to say that the 1990s was the last gasp of the classic Irish railway as we knew it - a railway that would attract the English enthusiasts seeking a world they had lost. That no longer applies - IE and NIR are effectively diesel tramways. At least we still have them. I’m just glad I experienced the bang and thump of a GM with Cravens over jointed rail, under semaphore signals. One thing I don’t miss is the toilets…..

[Noel]

4 minutes ago, Galteemore said:

It’s probably fair to say that the 1990s was the last gasp of the classic Irish railway as we knew it - a railway that would attract the English enthusiasts seeking a world they had lost. That no longer applies - IE and NIR are effectively diesel tramways. At least we still have them. I’m just glad I experienced the bang and thump of a GM with Cravens over jointed rail, under semaphore signals. One thing I don’t miss is the toilets…..

100% feeling very fortunate to have ridden behind green A classes and grey 121s in my youth, when rail activity was an assault on the senses of a young buy watching the movement, and activity in every station, the noises, smells, clanking, vibrations, wind blowing through the open windows, the tump of sliding compartment doors. Passing packed goods trains in loops at every intermediate station. Wonderful. Now just Luas+ with 22k toy trains. Fischer price land.

[jhb171achill]

1 hour ago, Galteemore said:

It’s probably fair to say that the 1990s was the last gasp of the classic Irish railway as we knew it ………

Mind you, while I agree 100%, Senior said exactly the same thing about the demise of steam in the 1960s, after the Stormont government did away with much of the GNR, and Andrews killed off the Wisht Caaark system and most branchlines…..!!

Edited August 21, 2021 by jhb171achill

[Galteemore]

19 minutes ago, jhb171achill said:

Mind you, while I agree 100%, Senior said exactly the same thing about the demise of steam in the 1960s, after the Stormont government did away with much of the GNR, and Andrews killed off the Wisht Caaark system and most branchlines…..!!

Yes I do understand that. I do think however that we have now lost a great deal more. Insofar as one can analyse these things with any degree of objectivity, the CIE network of the 60s-90s was effectively a steam age railway without steam. Most Victorian railway staff, bar the loco crews, would have seen the essentials of their daily tasks going on much as before. I have often tried and failed to analyse what I like about railways. But I think much of it has to do with the inherent tension between a fixed system and the world of chance. This is at its most obvious in the steam age. The train ran to a timetable but depending on the fettle of the loco and the character of the crew you could have a run to remember. A degree of that persisted into the 90s. Would it be a 141 or a 121? What odd stock might appear? What freight might you see on the way? Would the tablet exchange be smooth ?And those fascinating glimpses from the window of long closed branches, rusty rails trailing off into the wild green yonder. All that has gone, sadly. 

Edited August 21, 2021 by Galteemore

[amdaley]

I remember in the early seventies myself & a mate coming in on the Liverpool ferry one morning.
Gave the Taxi man an extra few bob if he could make the first train to Cork out of Heuston.
I never though a car could move so fast through Dublin 
Had the full Irish in the dining car on the way down.
What a way to come home 

Haven't travelled by train in years now.

Tony.

[jhb171achill]

41 minutes ago, Galteemore said:

Yes I do understand that. I do think however that we have now lost a great deal more. Insofar as one can analyse these things with any degree of objectivity, the CIE network of the 60s-90s was effectively a steam age railway without steam. Most Victorian railway staff, bar the loco crews, would have seen the essentials of their daily tasks going on much as before. I have often tried and failed to analyse what I like about railways. But I think much of it has to do with the inherent tension between a fixed system and the world of chance. This is at its most obvious in the steam age. The train ran to a timetable but depending on the fettle of the loco and the character of the crew you could have a run to remember. A degree of that persisted into the 90s. Would it be a 141 or a 121? What odd stock might appear? What freight might you see on the way? Would the tablet exchange be smooth ?And those fascinating glimpses from the window of long closed branches, rusty rails trailing off into the wild green yonder. All that has gone, sadly. 

That's an interesting take on it, with which again I agree.

I wonder about one aspect, though, which without delving too deep into psychology might be another background to it.

When we are young, or "fledgling" enthusiasts, we know we are drawn to the railways, but we don't fully understand what they do and why. We might wonder at the more deadpan attitude taken by those we see actually working ON the railway and IN the trains; there's no "wonder" to them, they've seen it all before. THEY know that when we get to Ballygobackwards, we cross the up goods, and they also know that the 141 normally allocated to it broke down in Cork yesterday morning on the Bantry goods. So they know it'll be something different, and they've a good idea that it will be the pilot engine from Drumnagortihacket, which happens to be the pair of 185+134. And since that means that a crew will end up where they're not normally ending their shift, the 18:05 up will be delayed in departing for seventeen minutes in order to allow them to travel back "on the cushions". And that will result in the "A" on the ballast train taking it back instead of the 071, because of blah blah blah!

But to us, it's all exotic. WE don't know what we'll see, but there actually is a pattern to it; we just haven't found that out yet.

I like this description: ".....the inherent tension between a fixed system and the world of chance...." - though, to the men behind the scenes, maybe less chance and (to them!) more logic?

 

[DoctorPan]

I would argue that the 90s weren't the greatest era of Irish Railways. Old worn and flithy trains and stock, running on system that was held together by string, rust and prayer.  At least these days, you know your train is going to turn up on time, is clean and delievers a comfortable service from A to B. I've spent a long time trying to convice my parents to travel on train and that the trains of today are far improvement from the old Mk3s and Mk2s they remember from the late 90s and early 00s when they last used the train service. 

[Galteemore]

Dr Pan - as I hinted above re the toilets, got to agree on much of what you say. As a consumer, the railway is much more pleasant. What one does miss is the ‘atmosphere’. 
 

Perhaps ‘chance’ isn’t so much the word as ‘events’, JHB. On the old railway, there were much more ‘events’ - pretty much as you describe them above. And we used to talk of ‘railwaymen’ (adjust for historic gender  bias) - with the sense that this was a caste who did this as a vocation and not a job. We can’t romanticise the past of course. But the facts show that some drivers did come in on days off to shine up their locos. And the knack they had (I’m thinking of Frank Dunlop here - NIR’s Chief Loco Inspector) - was of taking these events and calmly imposing that logic on them, no matter how challenging the events were ! 

Edited August 21, 2021 by Galteemore

[jhb171achill]

I'll guarantee yiz all wan thing.

In forty years' time, many will hark back to the 2020s as the golden age of rail travel, as you could still go to Galway, Westport, Nenagh, Tralee, Sligo and Rosslare by train, before the ICRs had armed security guards on them to keep the druggies off, and when you could watch nice ICRs go past without being robbed by casual passers by...........!

[jhb171achill]

8 minutes ago, Galteemore said:

Thanks JHB. Perhaps ‘chance’ isn’t so much the word as ‘events’. On the old railway, there were much more ‘events’ - pretty much as you describe them above. And we used to talk of ‘railwaymen’ (adjust for historic gender  bias) - with the sense that this was a caste who did this as a vocation and not a job. We can’t romanticise the past of course. But the facts show that some drivers did come in on days off to shine up their locos. And the knack they had (I’m thinking of Frank Dunlop here - NIR’s Chief Loco Inspector) - was of taking these events and calmly imposing that logic on them, no matter how challenging the events were ! 

Very true........

Senior did this. The SLNCR and CDRJC couldn't afford a resident civil engineer, so he did one inspection of the Barnesmore Gap in his own time on one occasion, resulting in a fairly damning verdict on the track, and he supervised several small engineering jobs on the SLNCR in the same way - he said that due to the cheapness of construction of that line, and the penny-pinching land acquisition, cutting and embankment sides were far too steep in many places. Add Leitrim weather to that and you can see why they were plagued with embankment subsidence from opening to closure. He attended several quite serious embankment slips and on one occasion managed to get a large load of stone from Goraghwood Quarry delivered to Enniskillen and handed over to the SLNCR; it is my impression that the accountants of neither the GNR nor SLNCR were aware of any of it.... he would have been in a position to "hide" it in his PW maintenance budget, which covered the whole Irish North, plus Armagh - Cavan, Bundoran, and branches.

Suffice to say that the SLNCR never received a bill on this occasion, nor for his permanent way or Weir's Bridge inspections, as they had nothing to pay it with!

Edited August 21, 2021 by jhb171achill

[Westcorkrailway]

For my 2 cents For me the greatest period in Irish railway history was the only early 1960s. Huge varietly of lines, steam locos still plying his trade introduction of first GM locos, Livery variety was huge, coaching stock variety was also huge, narrow gauge was still in use.........

[Noel]

Well trains are designed to move us from point A to point B, and that they do today.

Most passengers just want to meet that mission objective (ie arrival), most of us also seeking almost rail tour entertainment and a tour down nostalgia lane. RPSI a better bet for that albeit the intermediate stations are wastelands with no track, no movements, derelict old goods sheds, platforms and loading bays that no longer have track, just an imprint in the weeds since the sleepers were lifted. I bought a truck load of old sleepers 35 years ago, and still pondering laying them in the garden with short length of rails. Forget 21mm, when 1:1 if even a nano sized layout could form a feature.

[Westcorkrailway]

1 minute ago, Noel said:

Well trains are designed to move us from point A to point B, and that they do today.

Most passengers just want to meet that mission objective (ie arrival), most of us also seeking almost rail tour entertainment and a tour down nostalgia lane. RPSI a better bet for that albeit the intermediate stations are wastelands with no track, no movements, derelict old goods sheds, platforms and loading bays that no longer have track, just an imprint in the weeds since the sleepers were lifted. I bought a truck load of old sleepers 35 years ago, and still pondering laying them in the garden with short length of rails. Forget 21mm, when 1:1 if even a nano sized layout could form a feature.

Come down to west cork, local tractor dealer bought some BnM locos and track, he told me if I buy 4 I’d get the 5th one free

[Broithe]

For me, the Golden Age of Irish Railways was from 1995 to when the Mk 4s arrived.

95% of my experience was four journeys annually from Heuston to Ballybrophy and return. Clearly, this is not a huge sample of what was available, but the relief of getting on a train which, for me, was 100% reliable, clean, pleasant and comfortable, was a massive step up from the Stafford-Holyhead journey on the Big Island. that was never the same twice - utter chaos and unreliability.

I don't think the Mk 4s were a great step down, but they didn't seem to be a great improvement either. In the orange days everything was just so pleasant and civilised, it was a shock every time after the struggles on the Big Island.

[Galteemore]

Thinking about it, there is probably an inverse, if not causal, relationship between the comfort of the consumer and the interest of the enthusiast. Most Leitrim farmers would have been delighted to see a railcar working the 7:20 to Sligo it if was a winter’s night. Not so the enthusiast who would quite happily have bumped along in a mouldy compartment coach behind ‘Enniskillen’ or ‘Sir Henry’….

Edited August 21, 2021 by Galteemore

[DJ Dangerous]

Pfft, 2020's are the golden era!

071's, 201's, gorgeous CAF Mk4 sets, Enterprise sets, RPSI specials, DART's, 22000's, 29000's, massive container liners, the railways of today are awesome!

[Bob229]

The 1990s great era, plenty of loco hauled trains and a variety of freight trains

[Sleeper]

I loved all Ireland final day back in the 90s especially when it involved the munster teams so many different trains passing Portlaoise at full speed every 15 or 20 minutes, don't think I'll get same buzz tomorrow even with two munster teams.

[jhb171achill]

Barry C & I were going through his pics to select for the next book, and amongst what we were looking at were a selection taken in the 1980s and 90s in Thurles station.

One of the days featured had a number of GAA specials; I know Cork was one of the sides playing, and I presume Laois was the other - however, the number of carriages stuffed into sidings in every corner of the station was incredible, despite the necessity to keep the up and down line open for passing traffic too. I don't have the picture in front of me now, and it'll be in the next book anyway, but there must be some five or six specials parked up which are VISIBLE, plus one or two others that were there that day.

And we're not talking about a couple of 3-coach ICRs, or some other such creature, but 071s and GMs with ten- and twelve-coach trains of Mk 2s, Cravens, and probably laminates & Park Royals. I'll fish it out and post it at some stage.

Just as well it wasn't during the beet season!

[JasonB]

For me, the 90's was definitely the golden era. Loved what was running back then, both freight and passenger. Many an afternoon was spent at Clonsilla or Coolmine stations on school summer holidays, waiting for whatever powered through. So much variety back then. Brings back some great memories.