So I posted in the Dublin Subreddit a few nights ago an idea 3am me came up with to improve its rail system. I was bored today so I thought I’d expand on it to the whole country lol.
So the idea I have was based on the old rail map of Ireland and it works in 4 phases.
Phase 1 (red on the map):
Build 23 new stations on the existing lines. Many of these were previously abandoned. Some are brand new. It would also add an exit to Manulla Junction.
Phase 2:
Open all existing rail lines for passenger use. The two lines this would affect are Drogheda – Navan and Waterford – Rosslare
Phase 3:
Expand on the rail system. This would extend lines and create links that the final phase can take advantage of.
This phase includes an extension of the M3 Parkway line to Navan and on to Cavan, a connection between Athenry and Claremorris, an extension of the Cork Commuter Line to Youghal, an expansion of the Phoenix Park Tunnel to Dublin Airport and, possibly most exciting is a branch of the Sligo Line from Collooney to Donegal Town.
Phase 4:
The most ambitious idea, it would create completely new lines and establish ‘regional services’.
Firstly a new intercity line between Cork and Waterford would be completed.
A new line from Cork to Killarney would be created, including a branch from Kenmare to Cahersiveen.
There would also be a new line from Limerick to Tralee, where there is also a line to Dingle.
Two new lines in West Galway would be created, one to Clifden and one to Carraroe.
Dublin would get a new line orbiting the city, starting at Howth Junction and ending at Dun Laoighre
Donegal would get 4 new lines. Donegal to Buncrana, Letterkenny to Milford. The other 2 would be in collaboration with NI Railways. Ballybofey to Derry via Lifford and Letterkenny to Derry direct.
NI Railway would also help with 2 other new lines. Cavan to Ballyshannon via Enniskillen and Cavan to Portadown via Monaghan.
What would ye think if this was actually set as a target for the Government?
PS: The label at Bundoran has gone weird. It should be under Ballyshannon.
by Annonymous4186
18 comments
The legend is
Phase 1: Red
Phase 2: Blue
Phase 3: Yellow
Phase 4: Purple
Phase 4 (In Northern Ireland): Pink
I’d love to see the Poulaphuca tram running again. It brought people from Dublin out as far as Poulaphuca house way before they flooded the valley for the Blessington lakes.
Do like the idea of extension of the m3 parkway right to Cavan. Would question the distance between stations (Virginia & Ballyjamesduff are less than a 10min drive for example).
In real terms the big gap in our existing map heads north west through Meath and Cavan right up to Donegal so I would expect that to be the route…
This map maintains the single biggest problem with the current railway, which is that *everything* in the two halves of the country has to go to Dublin first.
Even the initial version of the All-Island Rail Review has a link from Mullingar to Athlone, let alone a more adventurous Sligo/Ballina link.
Tbh if you want to make a huge impact on people’s day to day lives we need to get light rail / trams into the cities.
The extremely bad environmental and lifestyle impacts are happening in the commuter belts.
Cork should have a tramway plan to Carrigaline and Ballincollig, and electric rail on the existing commuter lines.
The N40 ring route is handling an insane volume of traffic for a city of 300,000 ppl. It’s completely damning reflection of the state of public transit in Cork. It’s actually worse than Dublin’s network and that’s quite an achievement (driven by national bodies)
Dublin should have the metro underway and at the very least a tramway into every significant suburb. It’s an endless talking shop and no action.
Both of them need denser networks, not longer ones.
Our level of ambition on these things is ridiculously low and then we tend to go off into crayons on maps about national railways that don’t have any real strategy to them and probably will never be delivered.
There’s been talk of extending the Dart to Wicklow Town and increasing trains that stop at Kilcole by using electric batteries trains (recharge over the overhead lines and then go battery the rest of the way) at the same frequeny as Greystones or hourly. With the amount of people living in Wicklow that work in Dublin it would be great to have a more frequent and reliable quicker transport.
Edit: quick google and apparently they have the prototype trains and a plan done up so it’s looking really promising. Expected as soon as 2026.
It’s…..beautiful
There’s absolutely no need for a station in some of these places
The connemara lines would need to come to terminus in the west side of the city.
While the tunnel still exists from the canal to the station, there is no longer any sign of the line past nuig/cathedral.
Either that or have them cross earlier and go to oranmore for example. Getting them directly into ceannt would be near impossible.
Put a line to Shannon airport and you have my vote!
Newtown Cunningham is further north than Derry? Was there an earthquake I wasn’t aware of?
I always thought we should have a large rail station in the center of the country that had links to all the counties.
You’ve missed a great opportunity to mention the GNR’s old Ferry Road there, which if reopened would have provided faster links between Dublin and Derry, and an alternative route from Belfast, while also serving communities like Dungannon, Omagh and Strabane.
People have mad interpretations of the word “fun”.
Good stuff, any chance you could make it so we can zoom in and read the where the stations are? Or it could be just my phone
Any party that does this in power has my vote
Holy shit he actually featured monaghan in his rail development plans someone make this guy minister for Transport
Mountains! Some of these proposed routes make no sense. e.g. Glengarriff – Kenmare – Killarney unless we are talking funicular railways.
