IRELAND & NORTHERN IRELAND FOCUS
Rail Technology Magazine investigates the historic rail line between Belfast and Dublin which, after decades of underinvestment and political upheaval, has become a symbol of 21st century rail travel.
ent owners, extended periods of major un- derinvestment and the difficulties that have arisen as a result of Irish political history in the 20th
T
line has remained a constant throughout that time.
Today the service linking the two cities is known as Enterprise, a reprising of an older incarnation, and its joint owners, Translink in Northern Ireland and Iarnród Éireann (Irish Rail) in the Republic have big plans to extend and improve services to further increase already impressive ridership fig- ures.
Enterprise emerged from the latter half of the last century where, from the 1960s and 70s onwards, the Troubles in Northern Ireland and a poorly functioning Irish economy resulted in very little investment in the service on either side of the border. The net result was the line falling into poor repair in the 1980s with unreliable journey times and unreliable rolling stock. The situation, however, improved dramati- cally in the 1990s when a stabilised political situation in the North and the beginnings of the Celtic Tiger economy in the South gradually meant there was far more fund- ing available.
In the 1990s the two governments, with the assistance of the European Union, reinvest- ed by upgrading the track to Continuously Welded Rail and, following on from invest- ment in new rolling stock, a new Enterprise service came into being in 1997.
This new service has seen a huge increase in passenger numbers. Prior to 1997, the Dublin-Belfast line saw ridership of be- tween 400,000 and 500,000. By the early 2000s, and with the introduction of a new train service, new rolling stock, reasonably good track over most of the distance and a more regular timetable, that figure had risen to over one million; a more than dou- bling of passengers within five years.
It is a success story that Translink and Irish Rail are proud of, but the co-owners are clear that more needs to be done, as the line has continued to suffer security alerts, line
42 | rail technology magazine Feb/Mar 11
here has been a railway line linking Belfast with Dublin for more than 150 years. Given the many differ-
closures and service disruptions through- out most of the last ten years.
century, it is lucky indeed that the
For example, the Enterprise suffers more than most Northern Ireland rail lines from security alerts. Mal McGreevy, the company’s general manager, rail services, explained: “Security is a generic Northern Ireland problem however civil unrest is- sues have affected us more frequently on the Portadown line which impacts on both the Enterprise services and one of our main commuter lines.
Enterprise’s other major issue is infra- structure. Although the line has been up- graded, some sections have speed restric- tions down to 50mph on tight bends and on some Victorian-era embankments built across boggy ground. In 2009 another ex- ample of the need to upgrade infrastruc- ture occurred when part of the Malahide Viaduct near Dublin collapsed. The re- sultant three-month closure saw rolling stock marooned either side of the bridge, causing major logistical problems for both Translink and Irish Rail.
But, if anything, the Malahide incident em- phasised the very close relationship that exists between the two operators. “It is ab- solutely 50-50,” McGreevy states. “We’re both publicly-owned, vertically-integrated railway companies. We both own and op- erate our own infrastructure; we own and operate our own rolling stock. That makes Translink unique in the UK.
“We have an excellent working relation- ship. A relationship where operational ob- jectives always take precedent. We might arm-wrestle over the final financial set- tlement as any joint operators do, but we have not fallen out and we do not have to revert to terms and conditions of contract. We operate as a single unit and we attempt to deliver the Enterprise service as a single branded product, not an Irish Rail product nor a Northern Ireland product.”
For Dick Fearn, chief executive of Irish Rail, the Enterprise rail service between Dublin and Belfast is “a good example of all-island co-operation; it benefits all com- munities”.
During a joint committee in the Irish Parliament, he said: “In order to prop- erly manage a jointly owned and branded service, we have regular liaison meetings on strategy and service, operations, fleet engineering or trains, infrastructure like tracks and signalling and safety, which is always a top priority in railways. The service is marketed within each jurisdic- tion by the relevant companies; we market in the Republic of Ireland and Translink markets it in the North.”
McGreevy again: “An example of how we work together can be seen in the rolling stock. Northern Ireland Railways and Irish Rail effectively acquired equivalent rolling stock for each to provide 50% of the fleet for the cross-border operation. We ac- quired two new GM class 201 locomotives and two rakes of seven De Dietrich-built Enterprise coaches. But Irish Rail already owned and operated another 29 class 201s, so purely in terms of the mainte- nance of our class 201 fleet it seemed sen- sible to ‘sub-contract’ the maintenance of the locomotives to Irish Rail. Conversely, we have ‘imported’ the maintenance of the entire coaching stock into Belfast. We
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