Irish Rail

The past, present and future of cross-border rail

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Enterprise crossing Craigmore Viaduct near Bessbrook

Recently, to great fanfare, the Irish government announced an €800m funding package in support of its Shared Island strategy aimed at funding public spending on projects in Northern Ireland. The lion’s share of the spend is on the A5 project, and that, together with Casement, is where most of the media attention went. However, there is also an allocation aimed at increasing the frequency of cross border rail services. Before looking at this in detail we should talk a little …

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Ireland commits to funding Enterprise replacement from 2027 – what about NI?

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The Irish National Development Plan is a long document, and I have had little time to do more than skim it, but the key headline spotted by Jonny McCambridge and noted by Mick, one of the concrete proposals in the plan, is the replacement for the Belfast-Dublin Enterprise service by 2027. The branded Enterprise service was introduced by the Great Northern Railway in 1947, and at one time was extended to Cork.  NIR relaunched its side of the service in …

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“…on which Mr Hazzard in purporting to be offended by a long-standing informational map would do well to reflect.”

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Or, catch yourself on!  From the Belfast Telegraph, the operator of the national railway network in Ireland, Iarnród Éireann, with a demonstration of how to respond to contrived mischief-making by a member of the UK parliament, in this case Sinn Fein’s Chris Hazzard, MP.  From the Belfast Telegraph report  A spokesman for Irish Rail said the company had worked “through good and bad times” to provide services between Northern Ireland and the Republic, including “the extraordinarily challenging era when sectarian …

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“Even in South Armagh, where boundaries of currency and diesel colour may also be blurred…”

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Also in the Irish Times, Frank McNally magnificently tackles the recent kerfuffle over northerners non-eligibility to enter Iarnród Éireann’s Euro 2012 competition.  [Does Slugger get a mention? – Ed]  Oh yes…  From today’s An Irishman’s Diary …as someone who grew up in one of only three counties in the Republic devoid of a rail service, I have more than average sympathy for Michael Fisher’s point. After all – leaving questions of national allegiance aside for a moment – I would …

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