Primetime running feature on Limerick-Galway in a few minutes
 

http://www.rte.ie/news/2012/0117/blo...primetime.html

(I don't think this has already been mentioned on the forum)

Totally agree with Colm McCarty and Moore McDowell that it was a waste of money. Average of 8 users per rail-car is a disgrace. Luke Flanagan blames the fact they use 2700 rail-cars and have no catering as an excuse that nobody uses it :/

Iarnród Éireann for well over a year were offering €10 fares from Limerick so the excuses about the line not be promoted are untrue.

The line is not profitable, but very few lines in this country are. We still need a rail service. There are ways to get and encourage more people onto trains instead of cars and buses, but neither CIE or the Government have the will to implement them.

However, it's not the public's fault that the country is broke, nor is it their fault that a bunch of jokers and wasters gambled all their money on failed pyramid schemes and toxic banks. They shouldn't have to pay for it further by having more rail lines closed.

True all rail lines lose money its a question of how much of a loss is too much

The WRC was built despite all professional opinion, reports and advice saying no. Basically the cabinet of the then FF/Green government willingly and knowingly signed off on a project which they had been told would be loss making and did not meet the minimums required for funding.

The best thing Irish Rail could do is close Ennis - Athenry to put an end to the madness, its faster and cheaper by bus. To make Limerick Galway by rail competitive would cost 600 million as its basically a new line via Shannon and even then the cost benefit is less than the current woeful WRC

You could probably get close to profit on a Galway Athenry commuter service, which of course is what is what a proper country would have done first

The Waterford Rosslare line managed a load factor of 30-50 per train 6 days a week, it was closed more or less to plug the funding gap the WRC introduced

Is there any logic in running Waterford - Clonmel - Limerick - Ennis - Galway

I suspect that service would spend a good deal of time getting delayed in Limerick Junction.

What might be useful would be to run trains through to Limerick Junction as this would reduce times and changes for both Ennis/Sixmilebridge-Dublin and Galway-Cork passengers.

I can't see any real operational reasons not to run through to Limerick Junction.

If the connections were sorted, Galway-Cork should be possible in 3h 20, which is 25 minutes faster than Citylink and over an hour faster than Bus Eireann, so at least the WRC could beat something timewise.

There is. It would reduce the number of connections needed, which costs the passenger time, effort and comfort and the train company passengers and income.

The most important factor would be getting the connections at Waterford, Limerick Junction, Limerick and Athenry/Galway right such that it operates as a true network.

It would be a long trip without a dining car / trolley, but that could be sorted by having a trolley join the train at some point, e.g.Limerick-Limerick Junction and then swapping to another train in the other direction.

Not every train needs to stop at LimJct - the track runs straight through

Sure, but the ability to provide connecting services to Dublin/Cork/Tralee and other locations would be important to such a service.

I'm going to sound very harsh now but 100million on a new line with only 8passengers onboard on every journey is stupid. Iarnrod Eireann can predict passenger numbers doesn't mean the line will exactly do that. Depends on frequency of trains,Are they fast,Connecting to other trains & Comfortable. In my option this 100million would of been spend better upgrading the Rosslare line from Greystones To Wexford.Tilting the track and dramatically reducing the time on this line. Making the speed limit to 80m.p.h->90m.p.h
Journey times on this line should be from Dublin to Wexford/Rosslare 2hr30mins
This talk about platform lengths to cater for 6coach 22k sets on another thread is outrageous when you look at the amount of money that is been wasted on the western rail corridor to keep it operating...

That's my option

To be honest, I am not Varadkar's greatest fan but I think he came across very well on that interview. The fact is the money is gone and now we have to figure out how to make the WRC work without spending much more money.

The WRC isn't closing any time soon - doing this after sinking that quantity of money into it is utter madness and presumably it has relatively low staffing costs in terms of level crossings, stations and signalling. So it will continue to suck money out of the rest of the system and there is no stopping that. The reality is probably that Rosslare/Waterford is gone and North Tipperary are going to go because of the WRC and let's hope it ends at that. Any money going in is going to be for reducing operation costs and unavoidable safety investment - you can forget about improvements.

The WRC as a concept has a huge advantage over Rosslare. Its hinterland (for the whole run of it) covers about 6 constituencies while Rosslare's only covers 2.

Luke Flanagan blamed the 2700's for the lack of passengers and the fact they don't have catering services. No problem filling seats on these rail-cars on other lines excluding the Nenagh line.

I don't normally defend the Nenagh line but with a very small amount of investment its numbers are quite similar to something that cost 100 million. What has a bigger advantage over the WRC is the Limerick Junction-Waterford line. This line has seen no investment just the usual maintenance costs etc yet carries more people than the WRC per train.

Destructix: The LJ-Waterford line has had significant investment. Most of it is now CWR and the max line speed had been increased from 40 to 50 mph. Admittedly that's not a very good performance, but the basics should be in place for 60mph with a little spend on sightlines, etc.

In comparison to the money spent on the WRC only crumbs has been spent on Limerick Junction-Waterford line. A station will open on the WRC in Crusheen very soon with about 5 or 6 services daily. In a village with a population of less than 500 people vs Clonmel with only 3 services for a town of over 15,000 people.

There is no need for major investment in the Rosslare line - just sort out the timetable farce between Connolly and Greystones, a potential saving of about 20 minutes. This would require a pair of crossovers south of Dun Laoghaire to allow through trains use either platform in either direction.

The problem with assessing the prospects for any of the regional lines is that IE operate opaquely. If the infrastructure provider and operator roles were split (as demanded by the EU but from which a derogation was obtained), it would be possible to insist that Infrastructure be transparent about their capital state and forward plans since they would be an agency similar to the NRA - no issues of competitiveness would apply. Instead both the infrastructure and operating sides are sheltered from FOI.

Isnt that the plan - NRA & RPA to merge into Transport Infrastructure Ireland - giving the new body control of the rail network is the next obvious step with IR responsible for the day to day running of the trains

In theory yes but the NRA and RPA are unitary entities - if IE Infrastructure was to be hived out of CIE/IE work would have to start now to create the requisite boundaries so that TII could gulp it up and leave clear division of responsibilities between them and the IE rump. For instance - would it be just track and yards transferred or stations too? Some stations are used to park BE equipment - would that land be separated or would CIE lease the necessary parking? How would pensions be handled? etc. etc. etc.

The only firm plan is to merge the RPA and NRA

The NTA is slowly taking over all non infrastructure stuff in the RPA.