It's tough trying to be green in Ireland!

AngryHippie

Name and shame the lazy fecker, thats more like it.

probe

AngryHippie wrote: »

Name and shame the lazy fecker, thats more like it.

If probe comes across this again, you'll be getting MP4 video with sound and pics of the offending individuals and the condition of the train - fire extinguishers, toilets..... every detail - the good, bad and ugly. And it will appear on one or two websites that are even busier than boards.ie too...

One wonders why David McWilliams didn't bring a video cam on the Sligo train with the overflowing toilets? It would be a hot item on his website - not to mind youtube and dailymotion.com and others! All we'd be missing is the stench.... nobody seems to have come up with the MPEG4 equivalent of the HD smell-o-file, to convey perfume odours over an internet connection.

.probe

Carawaystick

probe wrote: »

Geneva bus and tram stop machines also take Euro coins as well as CASH cards. And if you want to use a Visa/MasterCard/Maestro etc, the ticket machines in the station (inside the door behind the bus stop) take cards and issue tickets valid on the Unireso (www.unireso.com) network (Geneva integrated travel system covering all modes of transport).

It would have been better to get your ticket in the airport railway station for your ultimate destination and take the train to Geneve-Cornavin and transfer to Geneve-Eaux Vives station via Tram 16. Geneve-Eaux Vives station is really a French railway station situated in Geneva and not part of the Swiss rail network. The Republic of Geneva has only been a free country since 1815 - prior to that it was in the French Dept of Léman, which no longer exists.

Best to plan one's journey in advance:

www.tpg.ch


.probe

well in 2000 sbb.ch said nothing about this connecting service on their website, you could not pay in euro or french francs on the bus and had to tender exact coin fare in swiss francs. the ticket in Geneve eaux vives also had to be paid in swiss francs and we had to pass swiss border guards afterwards.
If you are going to throw out intricacies of the continental rail network accept there's going to be some in Ireland.

Are you saying geneva has about a hundred year head start on Ireland yet have only changed their system to be integrated in the last 7?

probe

Carawaystick wrote: »

well in 2000 sbb.ch said nothing about this connecting service on their website, you could not pay in euro or french francs on the bus and had to tender exact coin fare in swiss francs. the ticket in Geneve eaux vives also had to be paid in swiss francs and we had to pass swiss border guards afterwards.
If you are going to throw out intricacies of the continental rail network accept there's going to be some in Ireland.

Are you saying geneva has about a hundred year head start on Ireland yet have only changed their system to be integrated in the last 7?

No efficient urban bus, tram or train system provides facilities for the passenger to pay the driver. The act of paying as you board delays the bus at each stop – making everybody’s journey longer and making it more difficult to keep the network operating to schedule. Which would make more people turn to their car rather than public transport.

All urban buses should have at least three sets of doors to allow people get on and off quickly at the stop – with everybody pre-ticketed before they get on. Could you imagine Luas operating as efficiently as it does if people were allowed to buy tickets from the driver – and everybody had to get on through one door? The same applies to buses.

The Swiss public transport system has had integrated ticketing for decades. No Swiss urban transport system involves the bus or tram driver in the payment process. Of course you had to go through Swiss and French border controls - Switzerland isn't in the EU - though it is joining Schengen shortly, which will allow travel between Switzerland and Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Italy, Greece, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain and Sweden without showing an ID at the frontier point.

.probe

probe

maniac101 wrote: »

OP, Assuming that you couldn't fly directly to Cork, you could have got the Aircoach. This is a bus service that would have taken you to the city centre. The same company then runs another bus to Cork from a street that's just a short walk away.

I just had a look at the aircoach.ie website. Their stupid "journey wizard" doesn't even work properly and advises one to "Please be at stop 15 minutes before"! A check-in deadline for a bus service to the city centre - the pathetic state of public transport in Ireland never ceases to amaze me. (Air France has a 10 minute check-in deadline for flights from London City Airport).

Moving on to the connecting aircoach from somewhere vague in "Dublin city centre" to Cork - do you think that it is acceptable that someone should put up with implications of "The same company then runs another bus to Cork from a street that's just a short walk away" carrying a suitcase?

As I said at the start - It's tough trying to be green in Ireland. The system doesn't work. There is no system. Virtually every aspect of public transport in Ireland one comes across is in an appalling mess.

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AngryHippie

probe wrote: »

There is no system. Virtually every aspect of public transport in Ireland one comes across is in an appalling mess.

.probe

That is the problem, there are 5 separate systems, competing for limited funding, with little or no competent management, a throttle hold by the union and a total lack of confidence from the public.
It should all be 1 integrated system, with the purpose of getting you where you want to go, cheaply, quickly and safely. with a compromise between the 1st 2 criteria only.

probe

AngryHippie wrote: »

That is the problem, there are 5 separate systems, competing for limited funding, with little or no competent management, a throttle hold by the union and a total lack of confidence from the public.
It should all be 1 integrated system, with the purpose of getting you where you want to go, cheaply, quickly and safely. with a compromise between the 1st 2 criteria only.

In Switzerland, Swiss Federal Railways only own about half the track in the country – the rest is owned by a dozen or so private railways. Most cantons have their own parliament and senate and make their own laws. The country has five main languages – French, Italian, Swiss German, High German, and English (aside from Romanch etc). Each city has its own public transport system. However from a ticketing, timetable, and customer service perspective it is a single system that works end to end involving trains, boats, trams, funicular rail, cable cars, buses, and air travel – the Swiss Travel System.

Ireland has Coras Iompair Éireann – the “System” for transport of Ireland. They own all the railways, and over 95% of urban and rural bus services. Yet there is no integration from a ticketing, timetable and customer service perspective. The Irish Travel NON SYSTEM. Owned, managed and used by morons. Everyone else couldn’t put up with it and takes the car instead.

The fiasco hits one the minute one arrives at Dublin Airport. There is no railway station. There is no bus station. You can’t follow a sign that says “Bus” and along the route come across an organized describer display showing the next bus departures:

Zone Time Destination

1 11.02 GALWAY serving X Y Z
2 11.03 Heuston Station via X
3 11.04 Central Bus Stn, (Bus Arus), Connolly and Tram L2
4 11.10 Belfast serving towns A B C
H1 11.11 Radisson Airport Hotel shuttle
6 11.14 Aircoach – serving Grafton Street, Hotels C, D, E

Not to mention the often 10 minute queue for taxis – not because of a shortage of taxis in Dublin – there are 15,000 taxi licenses. The state owned airport simply can’t organize a smooth arrival of taxis to meet demand.

A total waste of resources. A national embarrassment.

.probe