IRISH RAIL IS advising passengers to check their travel plans this weekend because of disruptions to their services.

A number of engineering and maintenance works are taking place until Monday across the services and Irish Rail said a number of routes will be affected.

Speaking to RTÉ Radio One’s Morning Ireland this week, Irish Rail’s Barry Kenny said the scale of the works required three days to complete and are being carried out this weekend to avoid affecting weekday customers.

Dublin will be heavily affected by the disruptions as no Dart service is being operated today or tomorrow between Dublin Connolly and Howth/Malahide. Dublin Bus will accept rail tickets during this period.

The Belfast Enterprise train service is being replaced by bus transfers between Dublin Connolly and Belfast Central.

Similarly, the Drogheda and Dundalk commuter services will be operated with bus transfers between Skerries and Dublin Connolly. Both the Rush and Lusk stations will be closed.

The Cork to Dublin rail line is also being impacted. Services all weekend will be operated by bus transfers between Mallow and Cork, with train services running only from Mallow to Dublin Heuston.

All Mallow to Tralee services will include bus transfers between Mallow and Banteer in both directions.

Revised times are in place for the Limerick services and trains between Limerick and Galway, and Ballybrophy and Waterford.

Further rail disruption is expected next week as the first of the five rail strikes is taking place on Wednesday.

A full list of the strike dates are as follows:

The dates are as follows:

• Wednesday 1 November
• Tuesday 7 November
• Tuesday 14 November
• Thursday 23 November
• Friday 8 December

For all other routes this weekend, customers are being advised to check times before travel across the weekend at www.irishrail.ie.

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