Railway

C.V.R. the Cogher Valley Railway ran for 35 miles from Tynan, Co. Armagh, to Maguire's Bridge, Co Fermanagh which is just over the county border with Tyrone. The CVR travelled from Tynan, through the following Co. Tyrone towns, Caledon, Crilly, Aughnacloy, Ballygawley, Augher, Clogher, Fivemiletown, before ending up in McGuire's Bridge. It was a narrow gauge railway, which closed in the mid 1940s, it opened about 1880(C) It was heavily subsidised by the British Government, as were all the narrow gauge railways in Ireland. The British Government's very first regional development scheme in any part of the British Isles was known as the Congested Districts Board and set up in the nine counties of the west of Ireland from Kerry to Donegal, to create work for the unemployed after the potato famine. A further development to this program was the subsidising of narrow gauge railways to increase tourism and trade in the whole of Ireland. This railway system was very successful, no one was any more than 12/15 miles from a railway station. There were so many railways in Ireland, you could travel by rail from Co Kerry to Ballycastle, Co. Antrim by rail.