Too many staff?

[comcor]

Mallow to Rosslare

If it had gone Cork-Waterford-Rosslare, a Cork-Waterford section would probably still be hanging on, in the same way that Limerick Junction-Waterford is. Unfortunately, as Youghal was built as a terminus station, in a location where it was next to impossible to cross the Blackwater, a Cork-Waterford link was never possible by joining Youghal to Dungarvan, and splitting after Midleton to go via Lismore would have been second only to Bray Head in terms of Irish railway engineering challenges.

[ACustomer]

Mallow-Waterford had literally dozens and dozens of level crossings which would sooner or later have killed it off. Great for scenery, but not much regular passenger potential.

[Goods]

On the contrary this was the route linking Kerry/Cork to Rosslare and vice versa and was also a fast freight route to a port. The line was heavily used during the beet season moving beet from the rich south east to the sugar factory in Mallow all linked directly to the factory by rail. In our brains we shut down all the beet factories and now import sugar, a double loss. Along the route you had busy towns like Fermoy, Lismore, Cappaquin, Dungarvan and Waterford. The route ran along the spectacular Blackwater and was a treasure and would have had value today in taking container freight off the roads. Mindless destruction of national asset.

[comcor]

The beet went via Limerick Junction. I believe Mallow-Dungarvan closed in 1967, when beet from the South-East would have gone to Carlow (or maybe even another site back then).

Anyway, the status of long-closed lines shouldn't really be the point of this thread. The discussion should focus more on areas where capital expenditure can be used to reduce operational expenditure and improve the viability of marginal lines.

[Goods]

Google YouTube and see the beet trains on the line to Mallow.
On capital expenditure, the idea that auto gates cost a million each seems to be a bit rich or else we are doing it the Irish way like the motorways where the cost is out of proportion. Change should have been gradual over the years and factored in for the life of the line. In the same way as electricity infrastructure is costed it’s about the cost over the lifetime of the asset rather than the current cost.

[ACustomer]

The main purpose of Waterford-Mallow since about 1906 was Rosslare Boat traffic, especially the Rosslare Express. This is from another era, and there is not much point in wasting energy on nostalgia for a beautiful line.

Maybe Goods has a point about the cost of automated crossings. It appears that CCTV monitored and fully signalled 4-barrier crossings are the standard. There are very widely used automatic half-barrier crossings which should be perfectly OK for a fraction of the cost (unless of course you cant trust Irish drivers going round them in pursuit of a Darwin award)

[Jamie2k9]

Originally Posted by ACustomer

The main purpose of Waterford-Mallow since about 1906 was Rosslare Boat traffic, especially the Rosslare Express. This is from another era, and there is not much point in wasting energy on nostalgia for a beautiful line.

Maybe Goods has a point about the cost of automated crossings. It appears that CCTV monitored and fully signalled 4-barrier crossings are the standard. There are very widely used automatic half-barrier crossings which should be perfectly OK for a fraction of the cost (unless of course you cant trust Irish drivers going round them in pursuit of a Darwin award)

We had half barriers here for a while. Full barriers save a lot of potential problems and are the way to go. There are a lot of LC incidents in the UK annually, something which isn't the case here.