hurricanemk1c

Instead I just have to deal with it on a daily basis, and trying to explain to people who have no concept of how a railway works why certain things are done, while at the same time trying to prove the need for funding for various far smaller projects that would be far more beneficial and prove rail value

No the foundation analogy is exactly the point - additional capacity requirements on the Northern line stands without having an airport connection. Add an airport connection, even a branch with a connection (and associated increased dwell times to accommodate transferring passengers) and you're back to square 0, let alone square 1. In an ideal world, do both at the same time - capacity and airport. But capacity should come first, as it benefits far more people. There's not a willingness to fund this however within the political election cycle. It's a higher priority than an airport line (and if I'm honest double track Portarlington-Athlone would be equal priority). And there's no stomach for CPO, so Metro to the airport would be sufficient and likely deliver far higher capacity too than any heavy rail link

1 train out of currently 112 a week stop at 6 stops. 13 a week stop at 3 stops, the rest at 4 stops being relatively major population centres along the route and therefore logical for an Inter-City service. You need a good foundation to build anything extra. Part of the DART+ extension to Drogheda includes better acceleration/braking than 29000 units and freeing up some capacity that way, likewise with a new Enterprise fleet having better traction capabilities than a 201+DD fleet, and also making Howth-Howth Jctn a shuttle service. My day to day job comes up against a variety of capacity constraints that adding a spur from Clongriffin to the airport will only add to, resulting in a sub standard service. I want a link to the airport, being a regular user of Dublin Airport, but it has to be done logically. The only way without extra track between Clongriffin and the city centre that you are going to get a decent service to the airport is divert services from other locations. It's not a "circle of negativity", it's being logical about the problem. Otherwise we build a spur, can't adequately use it, and the only winner then is newspaper headliner writers saying another public transport screw up. You don't randomly build a house without checking the land and whether it can support the proposed structure, why should provision of a rail line be any different? It amuses me that a shuttle is fine to the airport, ie changing trains with suitcases in Clongriffin, but not elsewhere. Either it's OK or not. Why would I get a train from Howth to Howth Jctn, change to a train to Clongriffin, and change again to get to the airport when there's a near direct bus? Same from various other parts of the Dublin area, such as my own on the Maynooth line (when BusConnects reaches us we'll have a direct link to the airport by bus, rather than two interchanges as proposed above. Even today it's just one).

Just putting a spur from Clongriffin to the airport (and I saw single line mentioned, a mad bottleneck of capacity) will not solve anything without fundamental changes between Clongriffin and the city centre. Otherwise you're just adding congestion, or diverting trains which then will upset large numbers of people. It would only work with additional track laid on the existing corridor, or tunnel it. A relatively low frequency DART service would not be sufficent. And I've crossed the road many, many, many times between Connolly and Busaras, easily done if you wait for the traffic lights. And a good proportion of bus services that serve Busaras also serve the airport

BS08E51 Warning Yellow RAL7043 Traffic Grey (Underframe) RAL9005 Jet Black RAL9006 White Aluminium (Bodyside Grey) RAL6036 Pearl Opal Green

They are exactly the same seat they were built with. Only covering changed, and refreshed cushioning where required.

Not sure about China, but plenty of model shops in Japan (such as Plaza Japan and Hobby Search) are full genuine retailers who sell a hell of a lot more than model trains, so just because they sell other unrelated things doesn't mean they are fake. This is a general comment, not about the specifics of Murphy's or Dapol

It should also be stressed that B134 is being worked on by IÉ employees, and naturally the usual diet of 071s and 201s are priority for their time and attention. It's moved around in the last week or so ready for electrical work to continue. It's also giving more time to get through certification with the CRR.

When I was commuting from Portlaoise to Heuston there was still plenty of comments "the old orange and black trains were terrible". This would have been about 10 years after the last Mark 3 was withdrawn. Still high in public mind in many areas. I mean, there's still grudges held from which side of the Civil War families held

Passenger numbers are back to near pre-Covid levels particularly on Intercity routes, so think you're mistaken there. If the lack of catering was such an issue that would not have happened

There's still the two slots in the A3 car, and there's effectively seat belts in between the tip up seats that strap it a bike in, exactly like a NIR CAF

Have over 150,000 miles on them, if I need to do any kind of work I aim for them and deliberately avoid the bone shaking, dull and considerably more unreliable Mark 4s. The latter I'm sure actually caused bits of my laptop to fail from vibration. Everyone has their own opinion though, but the concept of the new B2 cars is not nonsense just because you don't personally like travelling on them

Don't go to Europe then where there's half a vehicle in a similar layout in many Intercity trains crossing countries. It's a good balance of requirements

We have industrial heritage, and plenty of it. It's just culturally determined as "British" and therefore doesn't fit into the post independence "everything British was bad" mindset of a lot of museums around the country. That affects not just railways but any industry of note that has been here

"Train” means a vehicle with flanged wheels designed to operate on a railway for whatever purpose, and includes carriages and rolling stock. Railway Safety Act 2005