Guided walk Skibbereen/Baltimore Railway Line

There is always a great sense of nostalgia about railways and the part they played in providing an economic and social lifeline.
It is 64 years since the railway line from Cork to Baltimore closed on Good Friday, 31 March 1961, so the number of people still alive who remember the line in operation is a diminishing group.
The story of the railway in West Cork goes back to the 1840s. On 30 June 1849 West Cork’s first train ran from Ballinhassig to Bandon. In August 1860 the ‘West Cork Railway Company’ was formed with the intention of extending the railway from Bandon to Skibbereen, through Dunmanway.
It took some fourteen years before the railway line did eventually make it to Skibbereen. On 21 July 1877 the first train arrived from Cork to the new station in Skibbereen. The town was en fête. The Iron Road to West Cork was finally in place!
The plan was to extend the railway system to other parts of West Cork. The final addition to the railway system in West Cork was the extension from Skibbereen to Baltimore. It was built largely at the expense of the Government, who subscribed close to £60,000.
The laying of the tracks to Baltimore was reasonable straightforward, there was only two difficult engineering challenges, both within a few hundred meters of each other and both very near to the Railway Station at Skibbereen.
The line was opened to traffic on 2 May 1893.