Railway station upgrade will have tribute to late colleague

A special meeting of the Comeragh District Council was held to discuss the development plans for Kilmacthomas Railway Station which will include the model railway made by the late Lar Barton. 

Following on from an agreement between Waterford City and County Council and the Kilmacthomas community at the time of the development of the Greenway, some seven years ago, it has now been arranged for the Kilmacthomas Railway Station to be further developed (following approval of the Plenary Council).

Repairs have been carried out since 2016 on the railway station, including stabilisation of the structure, replacement of the roof and joinery, along with attention to the signal box and platform. 

The overall development includes two short-stay accommodation areas, two worker's huts and the model railway exhibition piece to be put on display.

A passionate, soon to be retired, Councillor Ger Barron said, "If this is my last action as a Councillor, then I'm glad to be able to propose that we adopt this project.

"It's an interesting and very exciting project and it's a project that has its roots," added Cllr Barron. 

Cllr Barron went on to speak about his former colleague, Lar Barton: "For those of you will remember him as our caretaker and really interesting man, he phoned me about two and a half years ago, to ask me to come up to him and I came up to his house. 

"He then told me he hadn't very long to live, unfortunately. But he wanted the model railway, that he had built over a 30 year period, to go on display somewhere along the Greenway so his grandchildren will be able to come in and say, 'my granddad built that'." 

"I'm very glad to see that we've come to the stage on it now and I hope we'll continue the progress on this after I'm gone," he added.

"This model railway cost a lot of money, its constituent parts are worth a lot of money, but as a whole, it's worth a lot more," concluded Cllr Barron.