Troubled times ahead on the Belfast line

Mark Gleeson · 06-01-2008, 22:39

Its been seriously messy on the Belfast line last few days, numerous failures

It appears that both Irish Rail and Northern Ireland Railways have both breached section 3.1 of the The Railway Safety Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2007. A 29k made it to Belfast and back. IE shouldn't have sent it up and NIR shouldn't have let it onto the there track

Mark Hennessy · 07-01-2008, 08:53

Are NIR answerable to any statuatory rail safety body in the UK?

packetswitch · 07-01-2008, 10:26

The legal situation in NI is very strange - the million and one Acts in relation to the 'British' railway system don't apply and thus some of the 19th century stuff is still on the books. (Thankfully of course this means that the dafter bits of the 1990s 'experiment' on her majesty's mainland never came across the water). The ORR and the rest of the alphabet soup in London have no jurisdiction in NI that I know of...

At present the situation is a bunch of regulations mentioned by Mark, enacted pursuant to older H&S legislation as extended by a Northern Irish Act, the Railway Safety Act (from the first-attempt assembly, 2002); it's the responsibility of the Dept. of Regional Development. Because of the current political situation the trend is to move from quango to department (rather than the position in this state which is the other direction) but it's all the civil servants anyway and the minister just smiles and signs. in the international tradition

CSL · 07-01-2008, 10:43

Is there not nasty penalties for the 'no-tpws' breach ?

of course you could designate the line 'heritage' for the duration

jaysus the ATOCs must be looking over and going ''bleeding paddys what do you expect"

packetswitch · 07-01-2008, 10:51

They can hardly talk after last week's mess. I was in Coventry and the rants by the locals about how Network Rail made a complete cock-up of engineering work were quite spectacular. Oh, the humility of it all.

Mark Gleeson · 07-01-2008, 11:05

The issue here is two fold

1. Irish Rail have left themselves in a very tricky position by not fitting more of their fleet with TPWS equipment, its off the shelf stuff

2. NIR where not on the ball, and didn't cop IE sneaking a train through

Penalties are severe

There has been numerous breakdowns and delays over the last 3 days, numerous replacement trains to the point of several of NIR's own trains spent the night in Dublin

The quickest solution would be to train IE drivers to drive NIR's C3K trains. It has become the case in recent days a NIR driver drives to Dublin and has to leave the train overnight in Dublin since IE haven't got staff trained to drive it back

CSL · 07-01-2008, 13:59

Ah for ffs can they not stick the NIR GMs on the front of Mk3 rakes [ or some other intelligent move ] or are we just getting a bit too ott here ?

Mark Gleeson · 07-01-2008, 14:09

NIR has a total of 1 serviceable locomotive, already visited Dublin several times standing in for enterprise

IE staff can't operate the NIR coaches north of the border since they are not trained on UK central door locking which is a legal requirement. NIR staff can't operate any IE coaches anywhere, so the fun begins

You can't make this up its a total farce. The entire point of the enterprise was a single common train which IE and NIR staff could drive, in fact you could have a NIR driver and IE guard it avoided all the chaos we have seen in recent days

06-01-2008, 22:39	#1
Mark Gleeson Technical Officer Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Coach C, Seat 33 Posts: 12,669	Its been seriously messy on the Belfast line last few days, numerous failures It appears that both Irish Rail and Northern Ireland Railways have both breached section 3.1 of the The Railway Safety Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2007. A 29k made it to Belfast and back. IE shouldn't have sent it up and NIR shouldn't have let it onto the there track __________________ Unhappy with new timetable - let us know

07-01-2008, 11:05	#6
Mark Gleeson Technical Officer Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Coach C, Seat 33 Posts: 12,669	The issue here is two fold 1. Irish Rail have left themselves in a very tricky position by not fitting more of their fleet with TPWS equipment, its off the shelf stuff 2. NIR where not on the ball, and didn't cop IE sneaking a train through Penalties are severe There has been numerous breakdowns and delays over the last 3 days, numerous replacement trains to the point of several of NIR's own trains spent the night in Dublin The quickest solution would be to train IE drivers to drive NIR's C3K trains. It has become the case in recent days a NIR driver drives to Dublin and has to leave the train overnight in Dublin since IE haven't got staff trained to drive it back __________________ Unhappy with new timetable - let us know

07-01-2008, 14:09	#8
Mark Gleeson Technical Officer Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Coach C, Seat 33 Posts: 12,669	NIR has a total of 1 serviceable locomotive, already visited Dublin several times standing in for enterprise IE staff can't operate the NIR coaches north of the border since they are not trained on UK central door locking which is a legal requirement. NIR staff can't operate any IE coaches anywhere, so the fun begins You can't make this up its a total farce. The entire point of the enterprise was a single common train which IE and NIR staff could drive, in fact you could have a NIR driver and IE guard it avoided all the chaos we have seen in recent days __________________ Unhappy with new timetable - let us know

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07-01-2008, 08:53	#2
Mark Hennessy Membership Officer Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Maynooth Posts: 1,116	Are NIR answerable to any statuatory rail safety body in the UK?

07-01-2008, 10:26	#3
packetswitch Member Join Date: Oct 2006 Posts: 216	The legal situation in NI is very strange - the million and one Acts in relation to the 'British' railway system don't apply and thus some of the 19th century stuff is still on the books. (Thankfully of course this means that the dafter bits of the 1990s 'experiment' on her majesty's mainland never came across the water). The ORR and the rest of the alphabet soup in London have no jurisdiction in NI that I know of... At present the situation is a bunch of regulations mentioned by Mark, enacted pursuant to older H&S legislation as extended by a Northern Irish Act, the Railway Safety Act (from the first-attempt assembly, 2002); it's the responsibility of the Dept. of Regional Development. Because of the current political situation the trend is to move from quango to department (rather than the position in this state which is the other direction) but it's all the civil servants anyway and the minister just smiles and signs. in the international tradition

07-01-2008, 10:43	#4
CSL Member Join Date: Dec 2005 Posts: 378	Is there not nasty penalties for the 'no-tpws' breach ? of course you could designate the line 'heritage' for the duration jaysus the ATOCs must be looking over and going ''bleeding paddys what do you expect"

07-01-2008, 10:51	#5
packetswitch Member Join Date: Oct 2006 Posts: 216	They can hardly talk after last week's mess. I was in Coventry and the rants by the locals about how Network Rail made a complete cock-up of engineering work were quite spectacular. Oh, the humility of it all.

07-01-2008, 13:59	#7
CSL Member Join Date: Dec 2005 Posts: 378	Ah for ffs can they not stick the NIR GMs on the front of Mk3 rakes [ or some other intelligent move ] or are we just getting a bit too ott here ?