Downpatrick and County Down Railway

Belfast & County Down Railway

The railway first arrived in Downpatrick on 23 March 1859, with the completion of the Belfast and County Down Railway's mainline from Belfast Queen's Quay railway station. The line originally terminated at Downpatrick, but in 1869 a separate company- the Downpatrick, Dundrum & Newcastle Railway- built an extension to the seaside town of Newcastle. The BCDR took over the DDNR in 1881, though this unforeseen extension had created an inconvenience wherein trains running between Belfast and Newcastle had to run around at Downpatrick to continue their journey in a fashion similar to Kilkenny railway station on the Great Southern and Western Railway. The opportunity arose in 1892 to end this cumbersome practice with the opening of the Downpatrick, Killough and Ardglass Railway and, with it, Downpatrick Loop Platform. The DKAR was built and operated by the BCDR, and branched off from their mainline about half a kilometer from the new Loop Platform. In conjunction with this, a 'Loop Line' was constructed which enabled trains to bypass the main Downpatrick Station, calling instead at the Loop Platform where passengers intending for Downpatrick could switch to a local train and carrying on without having to run around.

Closure

Following the 1945 Ballymacarrett rail crash and the resultant £80,000 (The equivalent to £3,376,000 in 2018) it had to pay in compensation, the Belfast and County Down Railway was financially ruined. This was a deciding factor in the nationalisation of the company as part of the Ulster Transport Authority in 1948. The UTA closed all BCDR lines except the Bangor branch a mere two years after taking them over, and so on Sunday 15 January 1950, all the railways around Downpatrick were closed. The tracks were lifted in 1953 and Downpatrick station was handed over to the UTA's bus division, becoming Ulsterbus in 1968. Ulsterbus moved out of the station in 1975 and it was demolished shortly after, erasing the last trace of the railway in Downpatrick town.

Heritage Railway

Local architect Gerry Cochrane M.B.E. was inspired to start the scheme after taking a walk along the route of the line, and by 1982 had gained support to rebuild part of the line as a heritage steam railway from the local council.^[1] Lord Dunleath, whose father had purchased the railway trackbed adjacent to his estate after the closure of the BCDR in Downpatrick, gave the newly formed society a package of land on which to build the line and station for a peppercorn rent. This was on the approaches to the old Downpatrick station, which had been demolished in the 1970s. Work started on rebuilding the railway in 1985, with public trains finally running in the town again in Friday 4 December 1987,^[1] making it the first Irish gauge heritage railway in Ireland to carry passengers over its own track. Track has been relaid on nearly 6 km (4 mi) of Belfast and County Down Railway trackbed, and a 1.6 km (1 mi) extension south to the hamlet of Ballydugan is planned.

The railway began life as the Downpatrick & Ardglass Railway, as the original intention was to extend the railway to this fishing port on the south coast of County Down. This name was dropped in 1996 following the abandonment of this proposal and the railway was renamed the Downpatrick Railway Museum until 2005 when the new name, Downpatrick & County Down Railway was adopted following the opening of the Inch Abbey extension.^[1]

O&K No. 1 at Downpatrick

O&K No. 3 Pulls a train out of Downpatrick in 2006

The Loop Platform

Downpatrick station building

The BCDR Railmotor undergoing restoration in 2014.

Stations

• Downpatrick Station is the principal station on the DCDR network, where all passenger trains originate from. It has two platforms, though one of these is currently out of use. The original BCDR station was sited on Market Street, but was demolished and replaced by a supermarket before the DCDR was established.
• Downpatrick Loop Platform has no road access, which helped it to escape demolition in the 1950s. It serves as the interchange point between the DCDR's South and Back lines. Downpatrick Loop has two platforms.
• King Magnus' Halt is the current terminus of the South Line. It has one platform and serves the grave of Viking King Magnus Barefoot, a site previously inaccessible before the arrival of the railway. Magnus Halt was not an original BCDR station, though it is located at the site of the BCDR's Ardglass Junction.
• Inch Abbey Halt is the current terminus of the North Line. It has two platforms and serves the ruins of Inch Abbey. The station was not part of the BCDR, as it is located on a short deviation away from the original trackbed.

Buildings & Structures

• Downpatrick Station Building was originally the town's Gas Manager's House, sited across the road from the DCDR and moved over brick-by-brick.
• Downpatrick Signal Cabin, a BNCR structure, was moved brick-by-brick from Kingsbog Junction on the Belfast–Derry line.
• Downpatrick East Signal Cabin, a GNR structure, was originally Bundoran Junction's North Cabin. It was moved to DCDR in 2011 and opened to the public in 2017.
• Downpatrick Locomotive Shed, a BNCR structure, was moved stone-by-stone from Maghera where it was originally the goods shed.
• Downpatrick Station Canopy was originally attached to the Maghera Shed.
• Downpatrick Water Tower was moved from Antrim station.
• Bridges 163 & 164 are original BCDR bridges, and carry the Back and South lines respectively across a narrow stream.
• Downpatrick Loop Platform and Canopy are the only BCDR buildings left in Downpatrick.
• The Cutting is just beyond the limit of passenger operations on the South Line. It carries trains up a slight gradient, with vertical retaining walls on either side.
• The Quoile Bridge is the longest bridge on the DCDR. It carries the North Line over the River Quoile, and though the spans are newly fabricated, the concrete centre pier is original.

Overview

The railway hosts three steam locomotives, eight diesel locomotives, seven diesel railcar sets., twenty-three carriages, thirty-four wagons and three permanent way vehicles, making for a total of seventy-eight railway vehicles- Or, if the railcar constituent vehicles are considered as separate, eighty-two total vehicles.

At present O&K No. 1 is the operational steam locomotive, with a second O&K under restoration. 1875-built 0-6-0 tank engine, GSWR No.90, which was delivered to Downpatrick on Sunday 30 September 2007 after overhaul at the Railway Preservation Society of Ireland's workshops in Whitehead, Co Antrim, is Ireland's oldest operational steam engine. Two E Class diesels, No.'s E421 and E432, were acquired in 1986, with E421 working the Society's first passenger trains. However, the E Class could not start from cold and to this end, three G Class diesels arrived at the railway to facilitate shunting and works trains- One of which was donated to the society after a member purchased it from Westrail, and two of which are on long-term loan from the Irish Traction Group (ITG). The ITG also loans three mainline diesels to the railway- These are CIÉ A class No.A39_R (Moved to the railway on Sunday 22 November 2009), 141 class No. 146 (Arrived on 27 November 2010) and 201 Class No. C231. (Which arrived on 7 June 2014). ^[2]

There are two main rakes of carriages. The passenger set is used on all running days, and consists of CIÉ 3223, UTA 728 and, if extra capacity is needed, GSWR 836. The buffet set is parked in a platform on running days but publicly accessible, and consists of CIÉ carriages 3189, 2419, 1918 and 2978. The carriage fleet is considerably varied, with a mix of six-wheeled and bogie carriages, and representatives from virtually every time period and Irish gauge railway company- Including the BCDR (The DCDR owns 5 of the 6 extant BCDR carriages), GNR, GSWR, GSR, UTA, NIR, CIÉ, and most significantly, the Ulster Railway, which is represented by No. 33, the sole surviving UR vehicle and Ulster's oldest carriage. Other notable carriages are BCDR Railmotor No. 72 and Royal Saloon No. 153, both of Ireland's extant Travelling Post Offices and the last AEC railcar. Two carriages, GSWR No.'s 1097 and 1287, are on loan to the railway from RPSI.

The DCDR also has a large selection of wagons, goods vans and underframes. Ex-NCC brake van No. 33 was the railway's first passenger-carrying vehicle. Included in the railway's wagon fleet is the most powerful steam crane in Ireland, NCC No. 3084.

The railway has also been donated several items of stock by Iarnród Éireann, such as Sligo, Leitrim and Northern Counties Railway Railcar B, built in 1947. This railcar arrived in poor condition and it will be some time before the DCDR can return it to operational condition. Prototype BR-Leyland Railbuses, RB3, which was modified in the early 1980s to run on Irish metals and was used for a period by Northern Ireland Railways, was acquired by DCDR in 2001, with the hope of using it to run midweek trains as it did not require as large a crew as locomotive-hauled trains. However, due to several faults inherent with the prototype Railbus' design, this did not come to fruition. Three more ex-NIR railcars are owned by DCDR, encompassing the last 450 Class, 458 ''Antrim Castle'', which arrived in 2014 and will be converted to a buffet train enabling the current buffet carriages to come out of service for overhaul, and two 80 class railcars which arrived in 2018. A small fleet of permanent way vehicles, all acquired from NIR, and some road/rail on-track plant, are used by the railway's Permanent Way department.

Stock Lists

Steam Locomotives

Number	Wheel Arrangement	Build Date	Original Operator	Arrived At DCDR	Current Status	Photo	Notes
1	0-4-0T+WT	1934	Irish Sugar Company	1987	In Service		Overhauled at Whitehead between 2004 and 2012.
3	0-4-0T+WT	1935	Irish Sugar Company	1987	Operational, being returned to service		Steam tested 19 May 2018.
90	0-6-0T	1875	Castleisland Railway/GSWR	2007	On display in Carriage Gallery - Awaiting Overhaul		On loan to DCDR from Irish Rail. Originally built as a railmotor.

Diesel Locomotives & Multiple Units/Railcars

Number		Class	Build Date	Original Operator	Arrived At DCDR	Current Status	Photo	Notes
E421		E421 Class	1962	CIÉ	1986	Inside Carriage Gallery, awaiting Overhaul		Named W.F. Gillispie OBE
E432		E421 Class	1963	CIÉ	1986	Awaiting Overhaul		Out of traffic
G611		G611 Class	1961	CIÉ	1996	Stopped Awaiting Attention		Owned by the Irish Traction Group
G613		G611 Class	1961	CIÉ	1986	Undergoing Overhaul		Privately Owned
G617		G611 Class	1962	CIÉ	1996	Operational		Owned by the Irish Traction Group
A39R		A (001) Class	1955	CIÉ	2009	Operational		Owned by the Irish Traction Group
146		B (141) Class	1962	CIÉ	2010	Operational		Owned by the Irish Traction Group
C231		C (201) Class	1956	CIÉ	2014	Operational		Owned by the Irish Traction Group
Railcar B		-	1947	SLNCR	2006	Awaiting Overhaul		Last passenger-carrying SLNCR vehicle
RB3		-	1980	BR	2001	Stopped		Experimental Railbus - built by BREL/Leyland for use on British Rail, came to NIR 1981
458	458	450 Class	1987	NIR	2014	Undergoing conversion to Buffet/Grotto train.		3-Car set. Named Antrim Castle.	Power car
	798								Intermediate
	788								Driving trailer
69		80 Class	1978	NIR	2018	Operational, being returned to service.		2-Car set.	Power Car
749									Driving Trailer
90		80 Class	1978	NIR	2018	Mechanically operational, but stored as strategic reserve.		2-Car set.	Power Car
752			1979						Driving Trailer
712		-	1962	CIÉ	1998	Awaiting Overhaul		ITG-Owned Wickham Railcar.
713		-	1962	CIÉ	1999	Undergoing Overhaul		Wickham Railcar, Nicknamed Rosie

Carriages

Number	Type	Original Operator	Arrived At DCDR	Current Status	Photo	Notes
39	Six-Wheeler	BCDR	1987	In Carriage Gallery, awaiting overhaul		Third Brake - on temporary underframe
72	Bogie	BCDR	1985	On display in Carriage Gallery		Originally railmotor; later converted to autocoach
148	Bogie	BCDR	1987	On display in Carriage Gallery		Includes half of carriage BCDR No. 152
153	Bogie	BCDR	1987	In Carriage Gallery, Awaiting Overhaul		Royal Saloon: carried at least 3 British Monarchs; on temporary underframe. Acquired 1984 before DCDR had its own land- Stored at RAF Bishopscourt until 1987.
154	Six-Wheeler	BCDR	1984	In Carriage Gallery, Awaiting Overhaul		Second - on temporary underframe
1918	Bogie	CIÉ	1988	Part of Buffet Set		Laminate Brake
1944	Bogie	CIÉ	1995	Undergoing Overhaul		Park Royal
2419	Bogie	CIÉ	1988	Part of Buffet Set		Buffet Carriage
2977	Bogie	CIÉ	2017	Undergoing restoration inside the Carriage Gallery		Travelling Post Office, owned by An Post.
2978	Bogie	CIÉ	1995	Used as Grotto Carriage at Halloween & Christmas		Travelling Post Office owned by An Post
3223	Bogie	CIÉ	1988	Operational		Laminate - Brake Generator Second
6111	Bogie	CIÉ	2015	Awaiting Overhaul		Former AEC railcar 2624, converted to push-pull driving trailer in 1974.
Unknown	Six-Wheeler	GNR	1993	Awaiting Overhaul		Third - on temporary underframe
33	Unknown	Ulster Railway	1986	In Carriage Gallery, Awaiting Overhaul		Only surviving stock from UR; on temporary underframe. Third oldest carriage in Ireland (built 1862).
25	Six-Wheeler	MGWR	2006	In Carriage Gallery, Awaiting Overhaul		-
53	Six-Wheeler	MGWR	2006	In Workshops, awaiting overhaul		-
69	Six-Wheeler	GSWR	1992	Undergoing Overhaul		Converted from Full Brake to Brake First Saloon; Privately Owned
836	Bogie	GSWR	1986	On display in Carriage Gallery		-
1097	Bogie	GSWR	2005	Stored		On loan from RPSI
1287	Bogie	GSWR	2004	In use as a 'Tarry' (mess van)		On loan from RPSI
728	Bogie	UTA	1991	Operational		Ex-MPD driving trailer; later 70 Class Intermediate
8918	Bogie	BR	2014	Undergoing minor maintenance		Ex-BR DBSO 9712, later came to NIR but was never used in service.
3189	Bogie	BR	2007	Part of Buffet Set		Ex-BR MK I Brake Third - Converted by CIÉ to Generator Coach

Wagons & Underframes

Number	Type	Original Operator	Arrived At DCDR	Current Status	Photo	Notes
1536	Tanker	Private Owner	1999	Not In Use		-
18885	Goods Van	CIÉ		Used for storage		Contains Generator - known as Roaring Meg
27756	Container Flat	CIÉ	2017	In use		Carries a spare English Electric 4SRKT engine
8452	Plough/Brake Van	GSWR	1990	Used for storage		-
8314	Ballast Hopper	GSWR	1986	Used for Ballast Trains		-
8411	Ballast Hopper	GSWR	1986	Used for Ballast Trains		-
C496	Ballast Hopper	NIR		Used for Ballast Trains		-
Unknown	Goods Van	BCDR	2013	Awaiting Overhaul		Body Only
Unknown	Cement Van	GNR	1998	Stored	-	Disassembled, in 'kit' form
C505	Flat	NCC		In Use		-
713	Flat	NCC	1991 (As Carriage) 2002 (Conversion)	In Use		Former 70 Class Driving Trailer; body destroyed by arson in 2002
C604	Container Flat	NCC		In Use		Brown Van underframe; Carries BCDR Van
Unknown	Bridge Wagon	BCDR		Awaiting Overhaul		1 of 3 Bridge Wagons
Unknown	Bridge Wagon	BCDR		Awaiting Overhaul		1 of 3 Bridge Wagons
Unknown	Bridge Wagon	BCDR		Awaiting Overhaul		1 of 3 Bridge Wagons
C378	Open Wagon	Courtaulds	1987	Not In Use		-
33	Brake Van	NCC	1987	Not In Use		Used in the lifting of the Portadown - Derry/Londonderry line
619	Underframe	GNR	1987	In Use		Carries BCDR Royal Saloon No. 153.
Unknown	Underframe	GSWR		In Use		Carries UR No. 33. Former horsebox.
C???	Container Flat	NCC		Not In Use		Brown Van underframe one of 599-608 series
3084	Steam Crane	NCC	1994	Not In Use		Consists of Crane, Water Wagon & Jib Wagon; built 1931. Originally self-propelled; now the largest in Ireland (capable of lifting 36t).
667	Goods Van	NCC	1987	Not In Use		Brown Van
674	Goods Van	NCC	1987	Not In Use		Brown Van
687	Goods Van	NCC	1987	Not In Use		Brown Van
688	Goods Van	NCC	1987	Not In Use		Brown Van
Unknown	Underframe	BNM	1999	PW Use		Regauged 4w underframe. Named ''Pink Panther''
Unknown	Underframe	BNM	1999	In use		Carries the detached conveyor belt from NIR Ballast Regulator No. 315 (See below)
C32	Open Wagon	UTA	1985	Not In Use		Pyramid ends
935	Underframe	WLWR		In Use		Carries BCDR No. 154
Unknown	Underframe	GSWR		In Use		Carries BCDR No. 39
1110	Underframe	GSWR	2000	In Use		Carries BCDR No. 148
13M	Underframe	MGWR		In Use		Carries GNR 6w (unknown number)

PW Vehicles

Number	Original Operator	Arrived At DCDR	Current Status	Photo	Notes
HC1	NIR		Not In Use		Former Tamper, Converted By NIR Into a Hedgecutter
7 (7007)	NIR	2008	Operational		Type 7 Tamper
315	NIR		Operational		USP3000C Ballast Regulator