Ballinamore

Ballinamore, Co.Leitrim, was the headquarters of the narrow gauge Cavan & Leitrim Railway, opened in 1887. Lines radiated from Ballinamore south to Dromod on the Midland Great Western line to Sligo, east to Belturbet on the Great Northern Railway line from Cavan, and west to Arigna. The locomotive workshops were also located here, but these become redundant after 1925 when all major work was transferred to Inchicore Works in Dublin.
The fine red bricked station building at Ballinamore survives as a school and the loco shed are now used as classrooms. The workshop however is roofless and derelict. The goods shed is used for the adjacent football pitch. The classrooms and school yard cover the station platforms and railway yard. The station had three platforms, the western one been for the Arigna branch, but this is now a car parl. The station also had a footbridge, the only one on the C&L network.
This is Ballinamore Station viewed from the railway side. The school class rooms which occupy the station have been built across the former up & down platform sites. Ballinamore Station was similar to other Cavan & Leitrim Railway structures found at Ballyconnell & Mohill. This view is taken roughly where the second platform was once sited. The front of the attractive C&L station building at Ballinamore, which has not seen a passenger since April 1959. his is the western end of the former station at Ballinamore, the site of which is now a carpark. In this view the class rooms have been constructed across the platform sites.
Looking west towards Dromod and Arigna from what was the end of the platform at Ballinamore, showing the carpark constructed on the former trackbed. From what was the Arigna bay platform we look straight across the main R199 road towards Dromod & Argina. Three parallel tracks once crossed the then narrower main road and ran though the where the farm lane is. One of the crossing gate posts can be seen behind the sign post. This is the small stone built goods shed at the east end of Ballinamore Station. The shed once had a corrugated iron extension on this end of the structure. The Cavan & Leitrim Railway had their main workshops located at Ballinamore, effectivly the centre of their 3ft gauge railway system. Today the buildings are incorporated into the school.
Another view of what was the locomotive shed and workshops at Ballinamore Station. After the Great Southern Railway takeover in 1925, heavy locomotive work was outshopped at Inchicore Works in Dublin. The rear side of one of the former Cavan & Letrim Railway workshop buildings, still standing at Ballinamore Station. A section of the former Cavan & Leitrim Railway workshops remains derelict and roofless, as seen here. The interior of what was one of the Cavan & Letrim Railway workshops at Ballinamore Station. The sheds in later years were largely used for storing redundant and withdrawn locomotives.