All aboard: ship passengers packed onto train

I recently attended a family First Holy Communion in Cork. I went to meet my sister, who was coming down from Dublin by train, at the station.

It was May 19th and MSC Magnifica had berthed in Cobh. It carries 4,600 passengers and crew.

As I awaited, a two-carriage train arrived from Cobh. ! I wondered how so many people could be packed onto it.

When they had all passed through the barrier, I asked a station attendant how so many people could get on the train. He was too busy to talk.

I went to the ticket office and put the same question to the attendant there.

She was more helpful. She said they put on an extra train every half hour (two carriages), but “you should see them trying to get on the last train back to Cobh in time for the ship’s departure”. I can imagine. She was honest enough to say it was a disgrace.

It is not good enough.

In my younger days, we would refer to the ships between Dublin and Holyhead as ‘cattle boats’, because the quality of accommodation was better for the cattle than for the human passengers.

That was my reaction to the Cobh train.

Imagine the passengers coming off a luxurious cruise liner and being herded like cattle onto a two-carriage train? That is some culture shock.

In 2014, 46 liners will visit Cork.

It is a great achievement to get so many to make that visit.

But I wonder whether that first experience of Ireland will chase them (and the friends they talk to back home) away for the rest of their lives.

We need some ‘joined up’ thinking and planning here.

Fr. Frank Ryan (OMI)

Prescot Street

London

England