Athy railway station serves the town of Athy in

County Kildare County Kildare ( ga, Contae Chill Dara) is a county in Ireland. It is in the province of Leinster and is part of the Eastern and Midland Region. It is named after the town of Kildare. Kildare County Council is the local authority for the county, ...

, Ireland. It is a station on the

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...

Waterford "Waterford remains the untaken city" , mapsize = 220px , pushpin_map = Ireland#Europe , pushpin_map_caption = Location within Ireland##Location within Europe , pushpin_relief = 1 , coordinates ...

intercity route.

Description

The single track north and south of the station splits to provide two platforms. Platform 1, next to the station building, car park and pedestrian entrance, is used where possible for passenger services. only when two trains are in the station simultaneously is Platform 2 used. A siding at the southern end of the station is all that remains of the line to Wolfhill. Due to the rapid growth of Athy itself, this station has seen considerable growth in passenger numbers. In 2004 the mechanical signalling system was replaced. In 2007 the platforms were extended to accommodate longer trains, a development which included the demolition of the signal box. In July 2008, planning permission was granted for the refurbishment of the partially derelict station building itself.

History

The station opened on 4 August 1846. Opened by the

Great Southern and Western Railway The Great Southern and Western Railway (GS&WR) was an Irish gauge () railway company in Ireland from 1844 until 1924. The GS&WR grew by building lines and making a series of takeovers, until in the late 19th and early 20th centuries it was the ...

, the station was amalgamated into the

Great Southern Railways The Great Southern Railways Company (often Great Southern Railways, or GSR) was an Irish company that from 1925 until 1945 owned and operated all railways that lay wholly within the Irish Free State (the present-day Republic of Ireland). The p ...

. The line was nationalised, passing to the Córas Iompair Éireann with the Transport Act 1944 which took effect from 1 January 1945 and closed for goods traffic on 6 September 1976. It passed on to

Iarnród Éireann Iarnród Éireann () or Irish Rail, is the operator of the national railway network of Ireland. Established on 2 February 1987, it is a subsidiary of Córas Iompair Éireann (CIÉ). It operates all internal InterCity, Commuter, DART and fr ...

in 1986.

Footbridge

Athy station was not originally built with a footbridge. On February 5th 1886 a newsboy, John Hamilton, was struck by a train while crossing the tracks, suffering serious injuries. He died two days later. At the inquest the railway company was criticised that they had “not at present proper provision for the protection of life at the railway station, and we, therefore, consider that a bridge crossing should be erected without delay”. By the end of April 1886 the new footbridge was ready to open.

Wolfhill Line

Due to limited coal supplies during World War I, a branch from Athy to the collieries at Gracefield and Modubeagh near Wolfhill, County Laois was opened by the government in September 1918. It was built by reusing track obtained by singling a section of the mainline to Waterford at a cost of approximately £125,000. The branch left the main line at the south end of Athy station, crossed the

River Barrow The Barrow ( ga, An Bhearú) is a river in Ireland. It is one of The Three Sisters; the other two being the River Suir and the River Nore. The Barrow is the longest of the three rivers, and at 192 km (120 mi), the second-longest ri ...

with a concrete-built bridge, and passed through the village of

Ballylinan Ballylinan or Ballylynan () is a small town in County Laois, about from the border with County Kildare in Ireland. The name means "Lynan's town", though exactly who Lynan was is now forgotten. Transport A 12-mile railway line linking Ballylina ...

(Ballylynan). Initially, the branch was primarily used to transport coal. The Wolfhill collieries closed in the 1920s, but a shortened line as far as a siding at Ballylinan remained open for the transport of sugar beet to the

Irish Sugar Company Greencore Group plc is a food company in Ireland. It was established by the Irish government in 1991, when Irish Sugar was privatised, but today Greencore's products are mainly convenience foods, not only in Ireland but also in the United Kingd ...

's factory at

Carlow Carlow ( ; ) is the county town of County Carlow, in the south-east of Ireland, from Dublin. At the 2016 census, it had a combined urban and rural population of 24,272. The River Barrow flows through the town and forms the historic bounda ...

. The branch was vested in the

in 1929. In the early 1940s, a short spur for the delivery of cement was constructed to the Asbestos Cement Factory (later to become Tegral) on the west side of Athy town. In 1963, as part of a wider program of line and station closures, the line between Ballylinan and the Asbestos Cement Factory was closed. The Asbestos Cement Factory spur closed in 2005 and the track was lifted in 2019, in preparation for the construction of the Athy Distributor Road. As of 2022, only a short siding at the southern end of Athy station remains.

References

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External links