Sunday, July 23, 2023

The world and its mother turning to rail transport

Derek Scally in the Weekend edition of The Irish Times has an interesting article on the reintroduction of sleeper trains across Europe. And in that same paper there is a news report on Germany planning to invest €47 billion on the overhaul of Germany’s state railway company, Deutsche Bahn.

There has been a major improvement on railways in Ireland over the last 25 years but we are still lagging far behind European rail networks.

Why have freight/cargo trains disappeared off Iarnród Éireann tracks over the last 25 years? At Mallow station the entire freight yard has been decommissioned. Similar decommissioning has occurred across the network.

Why has there not been a rail spur built from the main Dublin Belfast line to Dublin Airport?

A rail link to Kerry Airport at Farranfore would have meant the building of a short two kilometre spur from the Tralee Mallow line. When the Mallow Tralee line was upgraded would it not have made sense to have upgraded the track to allow for faster speeds? 

Such a high speed rail link to Kerry Airport would have attracted passengers from Cork, Kerry, even parts of Limerick and Clare.


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