Green light for railway

Green light for railway

9 October 2024

ALMOST a year after the Downpatrick and Co Down Railway closed after being engulfed by the worst flood in living memory, it’s full steam ahead for the hugely popular attraction.

Hard-working volunteers who have toiled tirelessly to reopen the heritage railway – which suffered catastrophic damage – have been rewarded with the green light to reopen.

The Department for Infrastructure’s Rail Safety Authority has given officials permission to reopen with the focus now geared towards getting ready for the annual Halloween and Christmas events which had to be mothballed last year.

The painstaking work to get the railway back on track has been recognised by the rail regulator, highlighting not just the huge physical repairs that have been completed, but detailed paperwork to get back up and running.

Since last November there has been a herculean effort to not only get the heritage railway ready to reopen for business, but preserve a piece of unique living history for future generations.

November’s flood, which also decimated Downpatrick town centre businesses, left the hugely popular railway under several feet of water with officials working to navigate the aftermath of the devastating incident which, at one, point threatened its entire future.

The flood left a trail of destruction in its wake which required urgent repairs to locomotives, carriages, parts of the track, bridges, platforms, and buildings.

Faced with a monumental task to get back in business and in a safe and operational condition to ensure the railway’s long-term viability and continued contribution to the community, volunteers worked tirelessly and their efforts have been rewarded.

At the end of this month, the Halloween Phantom Flyer rolls out while preparations are well underway for the hugely popular Christmas Lapland Express trains.

Railway chairman Robert Gardiner said he was delighted to receive formal approval from the Rail Safety Authority to officially reopen after almost a year out of action.

“It’s hard to believe it’s almost a year since the floods that devastated our town and other parts of Northern Ireland,” he said.

“I remember clearly the waters starting to rise on our last day of the Phantom Flyer; it was just possible to get back into the station. The sound of the rain that weekend on the roof of the Loop Platform was deafening.

“I’ve seen that whole marsh area flood before and thought nothing of it. Indeed when the rails just poked out of the water I remember joking we’d have to change our name to Downpatrick and County Down Canal.”

Sadly for the volunteers it was no joke and the flood water rose menacingly higher and there was nothing they could do, nowhere to evacuate the collection of rolling stock to. 

“All we could do was wait and hope,” said Mr Gardiner. 

“It’s been a long road to recovery. First, trying to assess the damage and then start to repair where we could. We were also very mindful of what had happened next door at the Asda store so independent inspections had to be carried out on our buildings as well as the rolling stock.”

Mr Gardiner recalled that the scale of the inspections seemed daunting, alongside examinations of bridges, buildings, track, locomotives and carriages.

“If there was one thing that kept us going it was the support of the local community. I’ve said this to the lords, ministers and everyone who came to visit — if you could bottle the community response and support that has been shown to us since the floods hit, you’d never need to write another grant application ever again.

“It has been tremendous and deeply humbling, from fundraising quizzes to the amazing concert in Down Cathedral. We’ve been blown away.”

He added: “We’ll be running our Halloween event without the local council’s event support grants this year which makes it more difficult for us, but we felt we needed to reopen as soon as we could once we got the go-ahead from the Rail Safety Authority.

“There is, unfortunately, still flood related work to do. We’ve still to give the Carriage Gallery a deep clean and three bridges on our south line may need some more remedial works, but these will be ongoing works while the doors are open. Let’s just hope it doesn’t rain too heavily this winter.”