Search Results for 'Michael J Hurley'

By 1848, construction of the railway line west from Dublin had reached Mullingar and the following year, the Chancellor of the Exchequer agreed to advance a loan of £500,000 towards extending the line to Galway. The board of the Midland and Great Western Railway entered into a contract with William Dargan to construct the entire length of line from Mullingar to Galway. Dargan’s success in building the Howth to Dublin railway had earned him a bonus of £300 and this he used to set himself up a a railway contractor.

When the Galway-Salthill Tramway ceased trading in 1918, it caused a problem for locals who had been using the service as public transport so a group of local businessmen came together on April 5, 1919 to register The Galway General Omnibus Company Limited as a public company. The directors were Thomas McDonough, Joe Young, Robert Mackie, Michael Crowley, Philip O’Gorman, Martin Hynes and Martin Finan. John Leech was the secretary and Joseph Garvey the manager.

The first regular public transport service in Galway was run by the Galway and Salthill Tramway Company which started business on October 1, 1879, and by 1885 was being used by in excess of 105,000 passengers per year. During World War I, most of the company’s best horses were commandeered by the British Army and there was more and more competition from motorised vehicles, so the tramway ceased trading in April 1918.