Laois councillor rails against train 'tragedy'

A Laois councillor has lashed out about the demise of railways around Ireland and blaming local and national Government for what he believes was a tragedy.

Cllr Ollie Clooney, Independent, launched a scathing attack on the historic decision to shut Ireland’s railways which accelerated in the 1950s and 1960s. 

“Railways are close to my heart but for the the life of me I don’t know what happened,” he said.

Cllr Clooney told a recent meeting in county hall that railways may have been losing money and needed support.

“But a tragedy happened,” he told the meeting in County Hall Portlaoise.

He said the first railway was laid in Ireland in 1834 by ‘pick and shovel’ between Dublin and Kinsgstown. He said Ireland’s longest railway ran between Dublin and Tralee.

He blamed the Government for “throwing away” the railways. He said the loss of the railways impacted the lives of many.

“It was very shortsighted. The Government and local Government of the day went missing,” he said.

Cllr Clooney added that the railways could still be enjoyed in the shape of Greenways and proposed the opening of a greenway between Abbeyleix and Kilkenny City.

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The issue was raised at the September meeting of the Borris-in-Ossory Mountmellick Municipal District meeting.

Irish railway mileage was cut by one third between the 1920s and 1960s. The process gathered pace in the 1960s under the Government of Seán Lemass as part of efforts to revitalised a failing CIÉ.