Irish Railway History

Ireland now has some 2,300km of public railways, all 1,600mm (5'3") gauge (the distance between the rails). Irish Rail (Iarnród Éireann), the state railway system in the Republic has 1,944km, and in Northern Ireland, Northern Ireland Railways operates another 357km. Most of the system carries passengers predominantly, and freight traffic is light by international standards. Some lines, particularly on the NIR system, carry no freight at all.

Irish Railway System Map (2015)

Irish railways were built between 1834, when the Dublin to Dun Laoghaire line opened, and the early years of the 20^th century. In 1920, both the route length (3,442 miles, 5,540km [Railway Magazine, May 1958]) and the traffic levels carried were at their peak, but competition from road traffic began to make inroads into railway traffic from the 1920s. While most of the system was 1,600mm gauge, some lines mostly in rural areas were narrow gauge - 914mm gauge. In the north west, County Donegal was almost entirely served by two large narrow gauge systems totalling some 300km. In 1923, the Keady - Castleblayney line in Co. Armagh was closed after only 10 years open to traffic, and by the early 1930s a number of rural lines had followed into oblivion, mostly in the south and west.

The main lines between Dublin and Cork, Belfast, and Belfast - Derry received a fair amount of investment over the years, and locomotives, carriages and services were as good as anywhere in Europe, but rural and western lines received little new investment especially during the lean years of the 1920s - 1930s. In 1925, all the railway companies whose lines fell wholly on the Southern side of the newly created border (between Northern Ireland and the Republic) were amalgamated as the Great Southern Railways. By the late 1940s, Ireland still had an extensive railway system which was almost entirely steam operated, and indeed, one short branch line in Co. Tyrone was to remain horse-worked until its closure in 1957!

Between 1949 and 1960, huge changes took place. Large investment was made in diesel locomotives and railcars and new carriages in the Republic, with Inchicore (the main CIÉ works) working at full capacity for many years. Following nationalisation of CIÉ (the State transport company in the Republic) in 1950, many unremunerative lines were closed, and others reduced to freight only status. Meanwhile, in the North, the Ulster Transport Authority (state owned railway and general public transport in Northern Ireland 1949-67) closed almost 80% of the railway system under its control, and introduced diesel railcars to the rest.

Both economic circumstances and political interference had resulted in the closure of most of the Great Northern Railway system in 1957. The remainder was divided between the two state companies. CIÉ took over the remaining lines in the Republic, and the UTA took over what was left in the North - only to close over half of it by 1965.

By 1960, main line trains were almost entirely dieselised, leaving steam on secondary duties and freight traffic. At the end of 1962, following the delivery of more diesel locomotives and with further branch line closures imminent, CIÉ eliminated steam traction for good. In the North, dieselisation had followed a different pattern. No main line diesel locomotives had been acquired at all, and practically all passenger trains were railcar formations. Freight traffic had been abolished by the UTA in 1965, apart from cross-border traffic to and from Belfast and Derry, and yet further closures of lines had taken place. In 1967, the UTA was split up into road and rail undertakings. The railways became the Northern Ireland Railways system. Steam lingered on in the form of a remaining few ex-NCC "WT" class 2-6-4T locomotives until 1970, when the last two were withdrawn. The last public main line passenger steam train, both in Ireland and Britain, had operated on Easter Monday, 1970. After that, NIR began a gradual program of renewal. Currently, most NIR services are still railcar operated (by newer railcars!). Most services in the Republic were locomotive-hauled (up to the 2000s) but are now too virtually all railcars.

CIÉ have published a short history of their own.