Buses versus trains - have trains got a future

westtip

I know this has been debated on another thread somewhere but just can't find it, so if this is duplication pardons please.

Travelling from Galway to Dublin on weekend of Friday Oct 23rd by public transport (ie train or bus), whilst I know what people have been saying about Go Bus I just can't quite believe the difference in prices and availability of buses versus trains!

Taking a train using webfares, the price will be 48 euro for an adult with no discounts fully flexible any train, a child 20 euro a student 31 euro and a weekender ticket 33.50. The journey takes 2 hours 45 minutes.

BTW to guarentee a reserved seat pay an additional 6 euro.

Go Bus 10 euro each way Full stop end of story. unless you are student in which case the fare is even lower at 18 euro return

Journey time also 2 hours 45 minutes (at the moment what will it be when M6 finished?)

A bus available 14 times a day a train 7 times a day

Last train on a Friday evening: 1805
Last bus on a Friday evening: 1945

Last train back Sunday evening: 1850
Last bus back sunday evening: 2315

For your ten euro each way - you do get a seat! Illegal not to have a passenger in a seat!

On this basis and the fact the bus could be 15 minutes faster when the motorway finally opens in January What future for Irish Rail on this line?

The ticket will be for a student member of the family - I think the answer is fairly obvious what mode of transport will be used.

triple-M

westtip wrote: »

I know this has been debated on another thread somewhere but just can't find it, so if this is duplication pardons please.

Travelling from Galway to Dublin on weekend of Friday Oct 23rd by public transport (ie train or bus), whilst I know what people have been saying about Go Bus I just can't quite believe the difference in prices and availability of buses versus trains!

Taking a train using webfares, the price will be 48 euro for an adult with no discounts fully flexible any train, a child 20 euro a student 31 euro and a weekender ticket 33.50. The journey takes 2 hours 45 minutes.

BTW to guarentee a reserved seat pay an additional 6 euro.

Go Bus 20 euro each way. Full stop end of story. unless you are student in which case the fare is even lower at 18 euro return

Journey time also 2 hours 45 minutes (at the moment what will it be when M6 finished?)

A bus available 14 times a day a train 7 times a day

Last train on a Friday evening: 1805
Last bus on a Friday evening: 1945

Last train back Sunday evening: 1850
Last bus back sunday evening: 2315

For your ten euro each way - you do get a seat! Illegal not to have a passenger in a seat!

On this basis and the fact the bus could be 15 minutes faster when the motorway finally opens in January What future for Irish Rail on this line?

The ticket will be for a student member of the family - I think the answer is fairly obvious what mode of transport will be used.

unless there is major investment in rail transport ,bus services will end up coming out on top,higher speed trains could be a start,trains in Ireland are just too slow

Zebra3

OP,

Where is the M6?

I got the bus from Dublin to Galway on a Friday earlier this year and never again!!!

The traffic from Athlone to Galway was awful.

Just getting out of Athlone took about 25 minutes. :mad:

messrs

Train to Longford €34.50 return and never can get a seat, Bus to Longford €23 return and at least always have seat - and takes roughly the same time - al least no stopping on tracks waiting for signals and trains coming the oppsite way as only 1 track for certain parts of journey

Judgement Day

triple-M wrote: »

unless there is major investment in rail transport ,bus services will end up coming out on top,higher speed trains could be a start,trains in Ireland are just too slow

In case you've missed it, there has been massive investment in the railways but without the winding up of CIE/IE it doesn't matter how much money is spent it will be money down the drain! :mad:

KevR

westtip wrote: »

Go Bus 20 euro each way. Full stop end of story. unless you are student in which case the fare is even lower at 18 euro return

I'm sure it's just a typing error but just to clarify for everyone, it's €20 return for an adult (€10 each way).

I don't know if you are aware but City Link have also introduced a non-stop service between Galway and Dublin. This is in addition to their "multi-stop" service. If you book in advance on the web you can get single adult fares for €1 (one euro!) on City Link; €2 return.
City Link Web Page

My sister is going to college in Dublin and comes home to Galway every weekend. She has booked all her buses between now and Christmas for a total of €22! She used to get the train last year and it would cost the best part of €300 (with a student travel card) on the train between now and Christmas. Also, she won't have to pay for the Luas between Abbey Street and Heuston when getting the bus, she did last year when getting the train.

Zebra3 wrote: »

OP,

Where is the M6?

I got the bus from Dublin to Galway on a Friday earlier this year and never again!!!

The traffic from Athlone to Galway was awful.

Just getting out of Athlone took about 25 minutes. :mad:

Depending on when you got the bus there might not have been non-stop services at that point. You were more than likely on a bus that stopped in every single town imaginable along the way and only used the motorway as far as Kinnegead. Also, there could well have been roadworks just outside Athlone because they were connecting a new section of motorway up to the existing Athlone Bypass.

Those roadworks outside Athlone are complete and there is now motorway (M4 and M6) the whole way from Dublin to East Ballinasloe. There is also a new non-stop bus service between Dublin City and Galway which uses the motorway. It takes approximately 2 hrs 45 mins for the journey which is the same as the train. When the last section of the M6 motorway opens late this year or early next year these journey times will be reduced by 20-30 mins; the bus will then be quicker than the train (as well as cheaper).

• GoBus offer non-stop services only. They have free WiFi and a toilet on every bus.
• City Link have non-stop and multi-stop services. They have free WiFi but, as far as I know, they don't have toilets.

Edit: On the City Link site it says the non-stop buses have toilets but people I have spoken to that have used the service said the buses they were on did not.

Polar101

I travelled Dublin-Galway-Dublin on the train last Saturday week. It was very nice for 16 euro, and I had a reserved seat too.

Run_to_da_hills

Same can be said for other up and coming motorway routes like Dublin Limerick / Ennis, Dublin Cork ETC. With the completion of these interurbans Expressway will hammer IR.

MOH

westtip wrote: »

Taking a train using webfares, the price will be 48 euro for an adult with no discounts fully flexible any train, a child 20 euro a student 31 euro and a weekender ticket 33.50. The journey takes 2 hours 45 minutes.

There's almost no weekender tickets available now - they stopped issuing new weekender cards sometime around January, so when the current ones expire, that's it.

Of course, there's still Irish Rail web pages that tell you how to get a weekender card, even though it's no longer possible.

westtip

KevR wrote: »

I'm sure it's just a typing error but just to clarify for everyone, it's €20 return for an adult (€10 each way).

.

Yes it was just a typo! just made an edit change in case anybody wondering about your comment! And all the other stuff you gave about promotional prices is good stuff - I just think IR are dead in the water on these arterial routes.

westtip

Zebra3 wrote: »

OP,

Where is the M6?

I got the bus from Dublin to Galway on a Friday earlier this year and never again!!!

The traffic from Athlone to Galway was awful.

Just getting out of Athlone took about 25 minutes. :mad:

I am talking about express buses only Galway-Dublin - that would not divert off into Athlone bus station - and yes the points you make give rise to the arguments expounded elsewhere for near motorway junctions "mini bus stations" for express services to pull off the inter-urbans, drop and collect passengers and get back on the inter-urbans quickly.

KC61

As I mentioned elsewhere, I very much doubt that the market is large enough to sustain this level of service on the Dublin/Galway route:
Citylink Non-Stop - 14 services each way
Citylink Stopping - 15 services each way
Gobus Non-Stop - 14 services each way
Bus Eireann - 17 services each way
Irish Rail - 7 services each way

I suspect Citylink are trying to eliminate Gobus. Either way someone is going to get seriously burnt.

The comments regarding the train are equally valid - the fastest service should revert to less than 2 hours 15 minutes once the Kildare Route Project is completed, and other services to 2 hours 30 minutes, but a push on rail speeds is urgently needed.

Chris_533976

And some more double tracking. The bus does not have to wait 20 minutes at a bus stop for the bus coming the other way to pass.

westtip

KC61 wrote: »

As I mentioned elsewhere, I very much doubt that the market is large enough to sustain this level of service on the Dublin/Galway route:
Citylink Non-Stop - 14 services each way
Citylink Stopping - 15 services each way
Gobus Non-Stop - 14 services each way
Bus Eireann - 17 services each way
Irish Rail - 7 services each way

I suspect Citylink are trying to eliminate Gobus. Either way someone will have is going to get seriously burnt.

The comments regarding the train are equally valid - the fastest service should revert to less than 2 hours 15 minutes once the Kildare Route Project is completed, and other services to 2 hours 30 minutes, but a push on rail speeds is urgently needed.

I hadn't even looked at Citylink nor BE b4 making the OP, that is an astonishing capacity for any route. 61 buses from a city of just over 72,000 people What would the capacity on each bus be? 65/70? say 70 thats capacity for 4270 passengers both ways - thats enough for 6% of the population everyday to pop up on the bus to Dublin - and none of them to get on the train - boy some of those buses must be near empty! Truly astonishing waste of resources!

Ham'nd'egger

westtip wrote: »

I hadn't even looked at Citylink nor BE b4 making the OP, that is an astonishing capacity for any route. 61 buses from a city of just over 72,000 people What would the capacity on each bus be? 65/70? say 70 thats capacity for 4270 passengers both ways - thats enough for 6% of the population everyday to pop up on the bus to Dublin - and none of them to get on the train - boy some of those buses must be near empty! Truly astonishing waste of resources!

I'd assume that it would be a 49-53 seater coach on each service.

And yes, most of these buses will be running close to empty for much of the day. There is simply no way that even with niche markets, innovative offers, WIFI, €2 deals etc than all these services can sustain close to these these levels of service so something has got to give sooner or later.

monument

Zebra3 wrote: »

I got the bus from Dublin to Galway on a Friday earlier this year and never again!!!

The traffic from Athlone to Galway was awful.

Just getting out of Athlone took about 25 minutes. :mad:

I had to deal with something like this, over a half hour to just get out of Galway one Friday heading to Dublin. Never again.

flazio

Well GoBus have given up on the passengers between the two cities like, Loughrea, Ballinasloe, Athlone Kilbeggan etc so that reduces services in those areas. I reckon the cutbacks will continue to be worst hit on the 'stops' along the way rather then the departures from each hub.

bk

You would think that rather then competing so aggressively with one another on the Dublin - Galway route, one of them would instead switch to a direct, non-stop Cork to Dublin route.

There isn't any direct non stop service on this route yet, so they could make a killing here.

I think Irish Rail would be the first to fail in this price war, followed by Bus Eireann.

KC61

As I said above, the completion of the Kildare Route project will shave about 6 minutes off rail journey times.

There should be some improvement in rail times due to the new railcars. The current timetable does not reflect their performance characteristics, but rather those of locomotive hauled services.

On average, the railcars should deliver an improvement of 1.5-2 minutes per station stop, due to improved acceleration/deceleration and reduced dwell times. However, on single track routes this improvement may be diminished depending on how many other trains travelling in the opposite direction that a train has to pass en route, and also on the location of passing loops.

I'd find it difficult to see that demand for a bus from Dublin-Cork would overtake that for a train - the journey time (even with the motorways) is just that bit too long for a comfortable bus journey. Now in a car....somewhat different.

westtip

monument wrote: »

I had to deal with something like this, over a half hour to just get out of Galway one Friday heading to Dublin. Never again.

Your experience makes a good case for the following in Galway:

Bus lanes in both directions in and out of the city

Park and Ride bus facilities out of town.

The outer bypass, with good urban clearway to the bypass.

Congestion charging for taking a car into Galway city centre (with resident permits and allowances)

flazio wrote: »

Well GoBus have given up on the passengers between the two cities like, Loughrea, Ballinasloe, Athlone Kilbeggan etc so that reduces services in those areas. I reckon the cutbacks will continue to be worst hit on the 'stops' along the way rather then the departures from each hub.

If I were running Go Bus I would talk to the competitor about rationalising the services between them and taking some resources to provide express services non stop from Athlone - better to work with your competitor than kill each other off - of course this kind of co-operation is likely to have some kind of legal anti competitive accusations of cartel etc - but these kind of deals do get struck, I would also be looking for an alternative drop off/pick up point somewhere just off one of the junctions on the Athlone by-pass to incorporate a quick stop in Athlone and forget about the crawl to get into the bus station; again the argument for bus halts/mini stations near the motorway junctions will make public transport and use of the new interurbans more efficient. As for Loughrea, Ballinasloe, Kilbeggan, Moate etc - leave that to the public sector bus provider to give an inferior service, sure this is the way it is going to go anyway.

BTW what is the offering for non stop Athlone-Dublin bus journies? Ten years ago I lived in Athlone and used to have to get the train to Dublin once a week - the train at some ungodly hour seemed to take forever - with the new motorway there must be market for a non stop - Athlone Dublin bus service. I see the early train now is 06.17 to get into Heuston at 08.10, An express bus leaving Athlone at 7.00 am must be able to get to Heuston by 08.30 with bus lanes into the city? This would be a lot more civilised than the desparate train journey CIE offer.

KC61

westtip wrote: »

BTW what is the offering for non stop Athlone-Dublin bus journies? Ten years ago I lived in Athlone and used to have to get the train to Dublin once a week - the train at some ungodly hour seemed to take forever - with the new motorway there must be market for a non stop - Athlone Dublin bus service. I see the early train now is 06.17 to get into Heuston at 08.10, An express bus leaving Athlone at 7.00 am must be able to get to Heuston by 08.30 with bus lanes into the city? This would be a lot more civilised than the desparate train journey CIE offer.

The early train is actually 0505 getting in for 0700!!

Bus Eireann have a service leaving Athlone at 0715 and getting into Dublin for 0855.

The problem with the early trains is that they are stopping all along the route and are effectively commuter services.

KevR

I wonder would City Link ever consider stopping their non-stop service somewhere on the edge of Athlone and allow passangers to interchange between non-stop buses and multi-stop buses. Of course they would have to timetabled so they are both in Athlone at exactly the same time.

They would no longer have a non-stop Galway to Dublin service as such but it wouldn't add long to the journey if they stopped at the edge of Athlone. There would be good benefits to this:

• People living in Athlone would have a non-stop service to Dublin or Galway.
• Someone travelling from Galway to Kinnegead for example could go non-stop as far as Athlone and interchange onto a multi-stop bus. Another example would be someone in Moate travelling to Galway. They could take the multi-stop to Athlone and change onto a non-stop service the rest of the way to Galway.
• As it is now, anyone not living in Galway or Dublin is condemned to using a multi-stop bus for their entire journey. City Link could change this if they wanted to.

Judgement Day

Buses versus trains - have Irish railways a future. Not until CIE/IE is got rid of. No matter how much money is thrown at the railways they will become increasingly irrelevant to the majority of the Irish population unless a massive transformation is undertaken. Don't hold your breath! :mad:

Nostradamus

Judgement Day wrote: »

In case you've missed it, there has been massive investment in the railways but without the winding up of CIE/IE it doesn't matter how much money is spent it will be money down the drain! :mad:

Look at the Midleton and WRC reopenings. The infrastructure is like something from a German ICE line and yet the railcars plod along at a snails pace.

I have yet to see any reason for this.

Nostradamus

Judgement Day wrote: »

Buses versus trains - have Irish railways a future. Not until CIE/IE is got rid of.

Myself and the founders of P11 were saying that in 2003 and the Gricers, Tarquins and the Nigels did not approve.

Funny, they are all saying it now... Too late chappies. Tough **** now, go back to slide collections and find the true meaning of life.

dermo88

Well, let the Gricers, Tarquins and Nigels stay in their own little world if they like. Lucky I compiled everything said, created a directory, and they hated me saying it.

Anyone who said it got BANNED. My knowledge has been gained from other posters here and on Platform 11, so I give credit where credit is due. I also have to give credit to a lot of posters who may still be on Irishrailwaynews, who are rational.

I am proud to stand and say that I am banned from Irishrailwaynews, otherwise known as Tarquin from the home counties wanting to keep Iarnrod Eireann backward.

Wheres Brian Guckian in all this. Is he drawing with his crayons? how sweet.

Derek told them, I told them, Platform11 told them, Nostradamus foretold it. We all knew. We always stated loud and clear

Fix whats broken first and then work on the rest.

We were hated and vilified for that.

But a small number Irishrailwaynews posters and moderators have problems understanding sentences longer than one syllable. Unless of course its a picture of a Freight train in Mayo running twice a WEEK, in which case.

Piles of coverage.

Well....what more can anyone say.

This was inevitable, and frankly, every previous recession be it 1957 (Beddy), 1979-1981 (Mc Kinsey II) has lead to an outside consultant being brought in to make recommendations on CIE. They don't need a goddamn consultant, they need a brutal long and vicious strike to remove the cancerous entity of CIE and its Unions.

I say.

BRING IT ON.

Then reform can happen, privatisation can happen, local participation and cooperation can happen, and things can only get better.

the_syco

Bus Eireann: stops at 4000 stops, and takes 5 hours.
Citylink: usually good, but no shelter at the stops.
Train: fast, has shelter at teh stops, and you can drink on board.

Trains & privateisation = f**k up like England, where you have 4 trains muthaf**king queuing at peak times.

dereko1969

Nostradamus wrote: »

Look at the Midleton and WRC reopenings. The infrastructure is like something from a German ICE line and yet the railcars plod along at a snails pace.

I have yet to see any reason for this.

Future-proofing? So that they don't need to dig stuff up in a few years when numbers increase (obviously referring to Midleton there not WRC).

westtip

KevR wrote: »

I wonder would City Link ever consider stopping their non-stop service somewhere on the edge of Athlone and allow passangers to interchange between non-stop buses and multi-stop buses. Of course they would have to timetabled so they are both in Athlone at exactly the same time.

They would no longer have a non-stop Galway to Dublin service as such but it wouldn't add long to the journey if they stopped at the edge of Athlone. There would be good benefits to this:

• People living in Athlone would have a non-stop service to Dublin or Galway.
• Someone travelling from Galway to Kinnegead for example could go non-stop as far as Athlone and interchange onto a multi-stop bus. Another example would be someone in Moate travelling to Galway. They could take the multi-stop to Athlone and change onto a non-stop service the rest of the way to Galway.
• As it is now, anyone not living in Galway or Dublin is condemned to using a multi-stop bus for their entire journey. City Link could change this if they wanted to.

This idea of stopping on the edge of towns with mini-interchanges NEAR THE MOTORWAY JUNCTIONS is absolutely sound and has been expounded elsewhere, All that you say makes sense Kev, I am surprised a private operator is not offering an express service ex Athlone in the mornings and evenings, If I were GO Bus/CityLink I would be looking at this route to develop further with an express service and set up an "independent private bus station" lets say at the M6 N61 junction near Ganleys Hardware store, that would be a quick on and off the motorway - there must be a piece of land near this junction that could be used for this purpose, located here it could act as a mini interchanges for buses to Roscommon to feed into it. But hey ho what do we know about transport planning. We just live and see things and give our common sense views on these boards. You see I am not anti-rail and did not start this thread to say buses/roads are better than rail/Trains - I just think we have to accept the facts - the massive investment in the inter-urbans to the quality they have been produced and looking at the capacity they have vis a vis what is going on them means - these pieces of infrastructure need to be maximised for public transport us - and that means good fast buses - the problem buses have is the slowing down of journies to get in and out of town centres where the traditional bus stations are/have been located. We have to think how can we maximise the use of the new motorway system to improve public transport -

dowlingm

Trains could be a huge success in Ireland if the political obstacles were removed - by which I mean IE not being allowed to run buses to service stops that trains are not justified at. The 0520 from Galway to Dublin stops 11 times, adding both time and fuel consumption from accelerating away from the stop. I would remove Woodlawn, Attymon and Clara and only stop between Kildare and Heuston if absolutely necessary once Kildare Route Project is online. Unfortunately Clara will lose rail service over Cowen's dead body.

If the single track laid between Ennis to Athenry was laid between Athenry to Ballinasloe, it would have benefited a hell of a lot more IE passengers (commuters who actually want to travel in the direction they are going and not a L shape!). If half of it was laid in dynamic loops and the other half added more loops from Maynooth to Mullingar, even more again. Social goals are grand but reinforce success first.

KC61

the_syco wrote: »

Bus Eireann: stops at 4000 stops, and takes 5 hours.
Citylink: usually good, but no shelter at the stops.
Train: fast, has shelter at teh stops, and you can drink on board.

Trains & privateisation = f**k up like England, where you have 4 trains muthaf**king queuing at peak times.

A bit unfair - Bus Eireann services are scheduled to take 3 hours 30/40 minutes.

The Citylink stopping service is given 3 hours 15 mins.

The Big Red Button

westtip wrote: »

I know this has been debated on another thread somewhere but just can't find it, so if this is duplication pardons please.

Travelling from Galway to Dublin on weekend of Friday Oct 23rd by public transport (ie train or bus), whilst I know what people have been saying about Go Bus I just can't quite believe the difference in prices and availability of buses versus trains!

Taking a train using webfares, the price will be 48 euro for an adult with no discounts fully flexible any train, a child 20 euro a student 31 euro and a weekender ticket 33.50. The journey takes 2 hours 45 minutes.

BTW to guarentee a reserved seat pay an additional 6 euro.

Go Bus 10 euro each way Full stop end of story. unless you are student in which case the fare is even lower at 18 euro return

Journey time also 2 hours 45 minutes (at the moment what will it be when M6 finished?)

A bus available 14 times a day a train 7 times a day

Last train on a Friday evening: 1805
Last bus on a Friday evening: 1945

Last train back Sunday evening: 1850
Last bus back sunday evening: 2315

For your ten euro each way - you do get a seat! Illegal not to have a passenger in a seat!

On this basis and the fact the bus could be 15 minutes faster when the motorway finally opens in January What future for Irish Rail on this line?

The ticket will be for a student member of the family - I think the answer is fairly obvious what mode of transport will be used.

Meah, I'd still rather pay more to stand on a train than to get a seat on a bus. I hate buses, seriously I can't stand them, and therefore I'm totally willing to pay the price difference. It's a matter of personal taste I suppose.

antoinolachtnai

It is hard for an outsider to conceive how expensive it is to maintain a railway. I worked in rail a little bit in another European country. The cost and difficulty of running the whole thing is just incredible. Underground railways and high-speed rail make the costs even higher.

Even looking at budgets for upgrading railway junctions and signalling to cope with more trains is a mindblowing experience.

At the same time, there is no other transport means like the railway for speed and efficiency and quality of the journey.

The issue though is scale and ultimately, density. You need an awful lot of passengers to make the whole thing reasonably viable. You can only get that by having a fair bit of density along the route. We don't really have a lot of this in Ireland. The cities other than Dublin are fairly small. The western lines terminate a mile or so from Dublin city centre, beside a massive park. The eastern lines are basically full.

At the moment in Ireland, it does seem that if you gave the coaches their own lane on the motorway and allowed them a 120km/h speed limit, rail would lose its positioning and attraction for customers altogether.

I'd always choose a train over a bus, I don't know about now but the last time I checked, a bus from Dublin to Listowel took about five and a half hours, compared to 4 hours to Tralee by rail.

I'd be campaining in the streets if IE were to be privatised. I think the company needs a massive shakeup and probably a whole new board and structure, but to privatise it would be insane. I'm sure our safety record would plummet if the infrastructure was put in private hands, just look at the Railtrack saga in the UK.

markpb

chatterpillar wrote: »

Meah, I'd still rather pay more to stand on a train than to get a seat on a bus. I hate buses, seriously I can't stand them, and therefore I'm totally willing to pay the price difference. It's a matter of personal taste I suppose.

Karsini wrote: »

I'd always choose a train over a bus, I don't know about now but the last time I checked, a bus from Dublin to Listowel took about five and a half hours, compared to 4 hours to Tralee by rail.

No-one is questioning peoples preferences. There aren't many people who would choose a bus over a train. The real question is if the train isn't delivering substantial benefits, should the rest of the country continue to subsidise the train's (massive) infrastructure and service costs?

Should we build new intercity train lines and operate old ones if the patronage is low, the time difference is minimal and the cost to the passenger and taxpayer is huge? What's the social or economic benefit to the country in operating an expensive service that is no better than the cheaper alternative?

That said, I think if we eliminated subsidised internal flights (such as Kerry to Dublin) and transferred the subsidy to Irish Rail, we'd see a much improved service. I think it should also be possible to refuse to pay travel expenses for politicians if a viable train service exists.

corktina

The problem of rail fares vs coach fares is that they arent on a level playing field. Coach services are in effect subsidised by all other road users in that they only have to pay some of the costs of infrastructure whereas rail have to pay it all. Rail otherwise should be far superior.
Im slowly coming round to the view that at some stage we will have to bite the bullet and make public transport FREE or VERY cheap to woo people out of their cars.

alpha2zulu

Karsini wrote: »

I'm sure our safety record would plummet if the infrastructure was put in private hands, just look at the Railtrack saga in the UK.

The safety record here isent excatly smelling of roses either to be fair,even leaving aside what went on at the Malahide Viaduct,there have been several near misses over the past few years with derailments on main routes. The amount of speed restrictions on Iirsh routes seems outlandishly high aswell.

You have to bear in mind how intensely rail services are used in the UK, the operation run from some of the London Terminals like Waterloo or Victoria make Heuston and Conolly look like a glorified Hornby train set in comparison.
Even with the awful high profile accidents of the late 90's on the UK network on a mile per mile basis it surely must be as safe if not more so than the IE network here.

Regardless of the incidents recently there still hasn't been a passenger fatality on the CIE/IR network since the Cherryville Junction accident in 1983. But I will agree that Malahide was a near miss.

I'm vehemently against privatisation after the shambles of BR and Eircom, especially the latter.

mk6705

Karsini wrote: »

Regardless of the incidents recently there still hasn't been a passenger fatality on the CIE/IR network since the Cherryville Junction accident in 1983. But I will agree that Malahide was a near miss.

I'm vehemently against privatisation after the shambles of BR and Eircom, especially the latter.

Don't forget Air Lingus...I think though rail won't be going away any time soon to be honest. It's just alot more comfortable.

antoinolachtnai

corktina wrote: »

The problem of rail fares vs coach fares is that they arent on a level playing field. Coach services are in effect subsidised by all other road users in that they only have to pay some of the costs of infrastructure whereas rail have to pay it all. Rail otherwise should be far superior.
Im slowly coming round to the view that at some stage we will have to bite the bullet and make public transport FREE or VERY cheap to woo people out of their cars.

Well, the issue isn't just price, or even mainly price. The fact that people travel on the train to Galway at all at the prices charged demonstrates that.

It's just really hard to beat the car for convenience and in particular, for comfort. An improved experience, rather than an improved price-point, is what is critical to public transport uptake.

corktina

exactly my point really...to get people out of their cars you have to make public transport attractive....and price is ONE way to do it. When I can drive to Dublin on my own cheaper than the train, then thats what I'll do.If there are TWO of us, its simply no contest

antoinolachtnai

If you cut price though, you really risk reducing the standard of the service, because there just isn't the money there to subsidise the thing. If you break the relationship between revenues and costs (which is what happens when you massively subsidise) then you will very likely face a reduction in the quality of the service.

The reality may be that consumers need to bear more of the cost of transport, especially private transport. As you rightly observed, bus transport on major corridors benefits from a major subsidy, and private road traffic benefits from it too.

corktina

well the option in that case is to massively increase tax on private cars.

antoinolachtnai

A carbon tax, I think they are calling it.

corktina

we cant afford to be sitting back and leaving the rail system contract. Going forward we need it AND a stroing coach network. Carbon tax yes, but it would take a strong , even suicidal Government to increase taxes on cars to the point where rail and coach travel become attractive. Cant see it happening in my lifetime....

antoinolachtnai

The problem is that we don't have any money to do anything much.

Nostradamus

antoinolachtnai wrote: »

The problem is that we don't have any money to do anything much.

Unless you run FAS.

Judgement Day

or your name is John Lynch!

DWCommuter

Or you run a bank with lots of Fianna Fail shareholders.