Iarnród Éireann

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Iarnród Éireann - Irish Rail

Type	private limited company by shares
Founded	1987
Headquarters	Dublin, Ireland
Area served	Ireland
Industry	Infrastructure & Public Transportation State Administrator
Parent	Coras Iompair Éireann
Website	Iarnrod Eireann.ie

An Iarnród Eireann commuter train at Tara Street Station, Dublin, 2006. Translated, the text on the LED reads: Destination: Pearse Station.

Class 201 no. 215 at Grand Canal Dock DART station, 2001

Iarnród Éireann (in English, Irish Rail) is the national railway system operator of Ireland. Established on 2 February 1987, it is a subsidiary of Córas Iompair Éireann (CIÉ). It operates all internal intercity, commuter and freight railway services in the Republic of Ireland, and, jointly with Northern Ireland Railways, the Enterprise service between Dublin and Belfast. In 2007, Iarnród Éireann carried 45.5 million passengers,^[1] up on 43.1 million in 2006.^[2]

[edit] Organisation

At the time of its establishment Iarnród Éireann referred to itself as Irish Rail, and introduced the four rails IR logo; however, the initials "IR" were often defaced as "IRA" on signage.^{[citation needed]} The company gradually brought the Irish form of its name to the fore, ultimately introducing its current IÉ corporate branding and logo in 1994. The Irish word iarnród (alternately rendered "bóthar iarainn") translates into English as iron road, or railway. While the name "Irish Rail" was dropped from the logo, it remains part of the official company name ("Iarnród Éireann - Irish Rail") and was revived as the name of the company's online booking service, irishrail.ie, in 2006.^{[citation needed]}

Operationally, services are divided across four regional areas:

• Northern and Eastern services are managed from Connolly (including Sligo in the North-West)
• Southern and Western services are managed from Heuston

[edit] Services

[edit] Passenger services

IÉ's passenger services are branded under three main names; InterCity, Commuter and DART.

[edit] Intercity

InterCity services are long-distance routes radial mainly from Dublin. The Belfast - Dublin service, run in conjunction with Northern Ireland Railways, is branded separately as Enterprise. The two main InterCity stations are Connolly and Heuston in Dublin, and Intercity services run to/from County Cork, County Limerick, County Kerry, County Clare, County Galway, County Waterford, Rosslare Europort, County Sligo, Westport, County Wexford and Ballina. Dublin's third major station, Pearse is the terminus for much of the suburban network in the Greater Dublin area. An additional InterCity service runs from Limerick to Waterford and Rosslare Europort, although this is currently operated by Commuter railcars

[edit] Commuter

The majority of Commuter services are based in Dublin, which in 2008 has four commuter routes. These are: Northern (Dundalk), Western (Maynooth/Longford), South Western (Newbridge/Kildare/Portlaoise) and South Eastern (Arklow). See Dublin Suburban Rail for more details. The Cork Suburban Rail currently has three Commuter services to Mallow, Cobh and a third service to Midleton which became operational on a part of the disused Youghal branch line on 31 July 2009.^[3] Limerick Suburban Rail currently consists of two lines to Ennis and Nenagh, with shuttle services to Limerick Junction. A Commuter service is planned for Galway to Oranmore and Athenry.

Commuter trains also operate on shuttle duty for branches from the main InterCity services from Mallow to Tralee (off the Dublin - Cork route), from Manulla Junction to Ballina (off the Dublin - Westport route) as well as acting as InterCity trains for Dublin - Rosslare and some Dublin - Sligo services, as well as the aforementioned Limerick - Rosslare Europort service.

[edit] DART

The north-south route along Dublin's eastern coastal side is also host to DART, Ireland's only electrified heavy rail service.

[edit] Freight services

IÉ also has responsibility for running freight services on the Irish network through its Iarnród Éireann Freight division. This operates both railfreight trains, and a network of road haulage through various distribution nodes throughout the country. Iarnród Éireann Freight is subdivided into four sections:

• Bulk Freight - specialises in operating full train loads of freight, usually bulk movements of single products such as cement, mineral ore or timber.
• Navigator - the freight forwarding division, particularly associated with the transport of automotive stock parts.
• Roadliner - the road haulage division, responsible for both its own in-house fleet and privately contracted operators.
• Fastrack - the same day mail delivery service.

[edit] Operational details

The Enterprise route (Dublin to Belfast) is well regarded, despite occasional problems with punctuality.^{[citation needed]} These are primarily capacity related. The route is only two track and serves both local and intermediate commuter as well as intercity traffic, hence any delay has knock on effects. This is combined with limited platform availability at Connolly station in Dublin. There is also the persistent problem with engine overloading, due to the fact that Enterprise locos must also supply coach power (unlike the southern and western routes, where power is provided by separate generator vans).^{[citation needed]}

The Cork - Dublin route is also quite well regarded.^{[citation needed]} It was the "premier line" of the Great Southern and Western Railway, one of the biggest pre-CIE operators. Journey time on this route is quite poor as it is faster to drive by car even at peak times. Rolling stock are quite good on this route^{[citation needed]}, with new Mark 4 rolling stock complete with DVTs for faster turn around now in service. Recently ordered Class 22000 DMUs from South Korea have begun to come into service replacing older coaching stock on most other InterCity routes. These carriages has being stated by the company as the "Greenest trains in Europe". There is 183 being ordered in total. All of these carriages are to be in service in Spring 2009.

The Minister for Transport, Noel Dempsey had announced recently that an additional 51 railcars have been ordered for the company. These carriages are being planned on services between Dublin, Louth and Meath. They will come into service by 2011/2012.

There have been incidents on the Dublin - Sligo line, concerning delays.

The maximum speed of the intercity trains on the Irish rail network is 100 mph.

See also: Rail transport in Ireland

[edit] Station names

Although the majority of Iarnród Éireann's stations are simply named after the towns they serve, a number of stations in major towns and cities were renamed in 1966 after leaders of the Easter Rising of 1916 as a "suffix" - contrary to normal European practice where such namings are generally used only when there are two or more stations in a town or city:

• Dublin Connolly
• Dublin Heuston
• Dublin Pearse
• Dun Laoghaire Mallin
• Bray Daly
• Cork Kent
• Limerick Colbert
• Tralee Casement
• Dundalk Clarke
• Drogheda Mac Bride
• Sligo Mac Diarmada
• Galway Ceannt
• Waterford Plunkett
• Wexford O'Hanrahan

[edit] Network Catering

IÉ's Network Catering unit provided a trolley service of food and drink, a snack car and (on some routes) a restaurant service. It also operates a restaurant at Dún Laoghaire. According to Irish Rail's annual report, the unit lost €270,000 in 2004. Early in 2006, IÉ advertised for private catering contractors to take over the operation of its catering services. The service was taken over by RailGourmet in March 2007, who promptly raised prices of most items.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] See also

• List of Irish companies
• List of railway stations in Ireland
• History of rail transport in Ireland
• Transportation in Ireland
• Diesel Locomotives of Ireland
• Multiple Units of Ireland
• Coaching Stock of Ireland

[edit] Intercity and Enterprise Fleet

^[4]

22000 class dmu

De-Dietrich stock

MK4 push pull

[edit] Commuter Fleet

2600 class dmu

2700 class dmu

2800 class dmu

29000 class dmu

[edit] Dart Fleet

8100/8300 class emu

8200/8400 class emu

8500 class emu

8510 class emu

8520 class emu

[edit] References

This article does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (November 2006)

[edit] External links

• Official site - Timetables, bookings and operations
• Official site - Corporate Site with real-time DART info
• Eiretrains - Irish Railways Past & Present
• Irish Railway Technology and Information -reporting on all aspects of irish railways