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Sligo Leitrim & Northern Counties Railway An Irish Railway Pictorial by Sprinks
Sligo Leitrim & Northern Counties Railway An Irish Railway Pictorial
By Neil Sprinks
Softcover
80 Pages
Copyright 2001
INTRODUCTION
The Sligo, Leitrim & Northern Counties Railway was one of Ireland's most distinctive lines. Although of standard 5ft Sin gauge, it remained independent throughout its existence from 1879 to 1957 and was Ireland's last privately owned common carrier railway. Its 42 miles and 50 chains route from Carrignagat Junction, 5i1 miles south of Sligo on the Midland Great Western line to Dublin, to a junction with the Great Northern Railway at Enniskillen was undulating, with sharp curves, steep gradients and numerous level crossings, all legacies of building the line at minimum cost and as dose as possible to the contours of the land.
Over this line the trains were, in living memory, railbuses, a modern railcar, and steam-hauled goods, cattle, mixed or special passenger workings. Most, latterly all, steam locomotives were of the unusual 0-6-4 tank type from one manufacturer, Beyer Peacock. The locomotives carried only names, and were never given numbers.
Financial stringency led to longevity of equipment, and there were remarkable anachronisms in rolling stock, signalling and workshop practices. But despite shortage of money, there were many signs of ingenuity and enterprise such as the use of railbuses from 1935, while in the difficult mid-1940's a new modern railcar was ordered and the company started running lorry and bus services. Then, a fewyears later, when two essential new steam locomotives were required, Beyer Peacock 0-6-4 tanks of course, as had been the norm since 1882, they were procured through hire purchase.
The Line's Beginnings
The SLNCR was promoted primarily by prominent residents and landowners at the Sligo end of the route, anxious not only to bring the benefits of rail transport to the area to be served by the line, but also, by linking with the Great Northern at Enniskillen, to provide outlets for livestock to the ports of Derry and Belfast in addition to that provided to Dublin since 1862, by the Midland Great Western line from Sligo. Ironstone, iron ore and coal traffic from the Lough Allen area also featured in the company's prospectus, although this locality lay some way to the south and was never connected to the SLNCR, but was eventually reached by the Arigna branch of the Cavan & Leitrim Railway. A branch from Arigna to the SLNCR at Dromahair was mooted, however, in 1904.
There had been earlier schemes for railways from Sligo to Enniskillen, including one via Bundoran which materialised in 1866 only as the Bundoran to Bundoran Junction line, worked by the Irish North Western Railway and later part of the Great Northern. The gap between Bundoran and Sligo was never filled.
The bill authorising the Sligo, Leitrim & Northern Counties Railway was enacted by the Westminster parliament on 11th August 1875. The Act also conferred running powers for the company's trains over the MGWR from its Sligo passenger station and Sligo Quay goods station to Carrignagat Junction, and
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