Birr & other working timetables

[jhb171achill]

At the SDMRC exhibition I was asked about the Birr branch. 

Here is the 1959 working timetable, by which time the branch set was usually on old GSWR composite bogie and a tin van, hauled by a “C”.

For good measure the Thurles & Clonmel branch is in there too.

And here’s the branch in 1928; at which time it’s steam, of course, most likely with a Limerick-based J15, and the branch train (as Senior remembered it) consisting of a six-wheel brake third and a six-wheel 1st / 3rd composite.

Edited Sunday at 21:23 by jhb171achill

[Mol_PMB]

Operating that timetable at a model exhibition would make for a very relaxed show! 

[Broithe]

1 hour ago, Mol_PMB said:

Operating that timetable at a model exhibition would make for a very relaxed show! 

I once "lived" in a place in the very dullest part of Lincolnshire. We had two buses a week. One Tuesday afternoon, I was cycling past the brick bus shelter, with its tiled roof, but no timetables, when the occupant, a chap in a raincoat and trilby, with a leather suitcase, possibly a travelling salesman, shouted at me "When's the next bus to Lincoln?"

Ever helpful, I shouted back "Friday!", and cycled on.

About an hour later, I came back and he was still there and, realising that he had assumed I was lying, I told him, "Look, you've missed the Tuesday bus, the next one is Friday".

I often wonder what happened to him after, it was a long way from there to nowhere...

[Galteemore]

Reminds me of how in 1939 the Garda caught a German spy, Walter Simon, in Dingle. He was waiting on the platform for a passenger train, apparently unaware that the last one had left fifteen months before. Only a man who had just landed from a U-boat would make a mistake like that ! 

Edited Sunday at 21:15 by Galteemore

[jhb171achill]

Correct; and as a result he was arrested the next morning!

So; while browsing the 1928 timetable, a few other interesting branches…..

Edited Sunday at 21:23 by jhb171achill

[Galteemore]

Fab stuff - any chance of a 1950s Bundoran branch WTT pls ?;) 

[airfixfan]

Exact same request as Daxid re BUNDORAN branch WTT

[jhb171achill]

Yup - will delve. 

[jhb171achill]

1 hour ago, airfixfan said:

Exact same request as Daxid re BUNDORAN branch WTT

Ask and thou shalt receive. Bundoran and other places GNR. 

Barrack St included - for Dempsey!

This is the autumn 1955 WTT. 

[Mayner]

Generally a service of 3-4 passenger/mixed trains operated daily on short feeder branch lines (like Loughrea, Birr) on the GSR system up to the fuel restrictions of the Emergency, CIE attempted to restore a similar service frequency following the end of the Emergency until hit by the Fuel Crisis of 1947 following which remaining branch line services were cut back to two trains daily, usually one scheduled as passenger one as mixed. Main line passenger services tended to be similarily infrequent even into the midlate 60s.

There were a number of exceptions to the two mixed/passenger rule.  In the 1960 timetable the 'morning' Farranfore Valencia train was scheduled as a "Goods" between Tralee and Killorglin, then working as a "Mixed" to Valencia, returning in the evening as a "Perishable" to Farranfore and Tralee. In practice a single 6w coach appears to have been coupled to the loco of the Goods between Tralee & Killorglin.

In diesel days morning train from Valencia and its opposite afternoon working were classed as passenger both working to and from Tralee.  Traditionally the morning train form a country or provincial terminal and its opposite evening workings were classed as the most important workings.

 

[Galteemore]

7 hours ago, jhb171achill said:

Ask and thou shalt receive. Bundoran and other places GNR. 

Barrack St included - for Dempsey!

This is the autumn 1955 WTT. 

Thank you !! 

[Irishswissernie]

I have a bound volume of the GNRI Working Timetables for the periods commencing 1 July 1917 and 1 October 1917. I thought I could scan the Bundoran WTT for that period, however  it is incorporated in the line plus branches Dundalk to Omagh so is spread over 22 pages! I have thought about scanning the whole bound book several times over the last 20 years but unfortunately 'can'tbearsedstosis' always strikes. I could photograph the pages; here is a sample. It will take some time so possibly a project for the now dark nights when there nowt on the Telly and definitely when Madame is away. I could start tonight then!!

[Mol_PMB]

Here's the Birr branch WTT for summer 1961, with a little more activity than in 1959:

I have a reasonable number of CIE WTTs if people would like me to scan any more for them.