I am pleased to report that the infamous Hell’s Kitchen Bar and Railway Museum in Castlerea is to reopen.
Closed in 2011, the bar has reopened for both food and drinks and access to the railwayana therein (including A Class Locomotive No. 055).
I previously reported that the Naomh Éanna, located in one of the dry docks at Grand Canal Dock, had listed and called for the necessary action to have the boat removed.
RTE reports that the process of having the boat cut up has now commenced.
Irish Rail are in the early stages of relaying the Limerick to Foynes Railway for freight traffic.
I found this video on YouTube of drone footage of the state of the line at the end of July 2023.
I am happy to bring the existence of this venue to the attention of others – being a museum devoted to the history of Sion Mills, Co. Tyrone, the former mill village established by the Herdman family.
The Irish Examiner (soft paywall) reports that Cork City Councillors have approved Part 8 planning (process for a local authority to grant itself planning permission) for a greenway on part of the former CB&SCR trackbed between the Kinsale Road roundabout and Chetwynd Reservoir (east of the former, the trackbed is now a road).
The map below (extract from Openstreetmap and licensed under the Open Data Commons Open Database License) shows the location, to which I have added a rough line of the route in red.
The Kildare Nationalist has reported that the restoration of the iconic Four Pots on the Grand Canal near Sallins is complete.
I hope Waterways Ireland will keep it free of overgrowth going forward in order that another restoration is not required in 5 years time.
The BBC reports that the erstwhile Foyle Valley Railway Museum in Derry has reopened under the management of the charity “Destined”, a charity which trains adults with learning disabilities.
The former lockkeeper’s house at the 9th Lock on the Grand Canal in Dublin is for sale by Waterways Ireland (must be in need of some money for Thon Sheugh).
The fact that there is only an aerial photo of the site suggests that the interior is appalling and, in fact, the sales blurb declares the property to be “in need of a full renovation”. However, as the building is a protected structure, this will complicate any such renovation.
Irish Rail regularly warn about the impact that bridge strikes have on their network.
Today, the CIE Group went for an own goal, when a railway overbridge in Cork (on the Dublin – Cork line) was hit by a Bus Eireann bus.
One wonders how CIE, which is allowed to self insure*, will handle any costs associated with this.
* It is my belief that this provision of the Road Traffic Act is unconstitutional as the State is allowing one public transport operator to self insure and not others, thereby showing favourtism. Constitutionally, the State is not permitted to favour itself and must favour all equally or not at all.
H/T to Newry.ie for this story.
Mourne Textiles, based in Rostrevor, Co. Down, has launched a crowd funding campaign to “restore vintage flax processing and spinning equipment, to create a sustainable circular supply chain in Ireland.”
Further details of their plans and a link to the crowd funding page can be found here. The closing date for the crowd funding campaign is 30th June 2023.