Stena to reduce Dún Laoghaire fast ferry service

Victor

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2010/0107/1224261824253.html

Stena to reduce Dún Laoghaire fast ferry service

LORNA SIGGINS Marine Correspondent

STENA LINE has reaffirmed its commitment to Dún Laoghaire after recent speculation that it might quit the harbour.

However, the large fast ferry, HSS Stena Explorer, will run daily only during summer months and a smaller fast ferry service will be used in the winter months.

Stena says all 60 jobs will be retained at Dún Laoghaire and no redundancies are planned.

It introduced the fast ferry service on its Dún Laoghaire-Holyhead route in April 1996 and at peak it was running up to five round trips daily. However, the catamarans can burn almost three times as much fuel, and at a higher grade, than conventional ships and sailing frequency had been reduced to one trip a day.

The withdrawal of the HSS Stena Discovery in January 2007 from the Harwich-Hook of Holland route due to high fuel costs and its subsequent sale to Venezuela had fuelled speculation that the same might happen on its Irish Sea route.

Stena was also finding the higher cost of berthing in Dún Laoghaire prohibitive – €6.7 million annually compared to an estimated €2 million for Dublin Port, where its ferry base is run by a stevedoring company.

Route director Vic Goodwin told a staff meeting the operating costs and port dues in Dún Laoghaire had “placed severe pressure on the financial performance of this route” but he was confident that a new operating agreement from 2011 would cut harbour dues.

Cookie_Monster

Good to see a commitment to stay at least, they have been lots of rumours of them pulling out altogether

Run_to_da_hills

With all the latest paranoia and hassle with flying hopefully ferry crossings might pick up. I took it twice recently as an alternative and it was a pleasure.

alexlyons

ye I work out of the national and have been helping kids down there for almost 10 years. We've all known this was gonna happen, in actual fact, the idea we were told was the HSS was gone for good with the smaller one taking over completely. It's been running only one crossing a day for a year or so. The small ferry is gonna dock in nearer the george yacht club, and not use the huge linkspan for the Explorer

A number or years ago, they dropped the cruising speed from 40 knots to 39 knots, and saved £1 million a year on fuel. They also slowed the turn around from 30min to 1hr approx.

Also, when they pulled the 6.30am ferry, about 5 years ago, they decided not to tell anyone and just let them turn up. luckily one of our group knew a good few people in the DL office, who told him the day before and got us transferred to the 11am sailing. Good that they're staying I suppose.

Cookie_Monster

I didn't think the facilities were still in place to use a different terminal than the linkspan, are you sure.

A smaller craft would be perfectly capable of using the linkspan as is

alexlyons

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

I didn't think the facilities were still in place to use a different terminal than the linkspan, are you sure.

A smaller craft would be perfectly capable of using the linkspan as is

Yup thats the way they're doing it. AFAIK they need to adjust the current one a bit to make it work, however some people I've spoken to believe it won't work at all. But if they're keeping both, and they need to chaneg the current one every time they swap, then they may as well use the smaller one.

tommyhaas

Surely though its only a matter of time before Stena pull out of Dunlaoghaire all together, and just sail out of Dublin. I dont see what the advantage is to Stena of sailing into Dunlaoghaire instead of Dublin

Cookie_Monster

tommyhaas wrote: »

Surely though its only a matter of time before Stena pull out of Dunlaoghaire all together, and just sail out of Dublin. I dont see what the advantage is to Stena of sailing into Dunlaoghaire instead of Dublin

No I can't see any. Less congestion maybe so they can choose times better?

Same sailing time pretty much
More expensive fees
60 additional staff to pay for

TheGrabbingHand

The Smaller craft will use the Lynx Berth (No 4). The facilities are still in place and the HSS will still use its current berth.

Cookie_Monster

TheGrabbingHand wrote: »

The Smaller craft will use the Lynx Berth (No 4). The facilities are still in place and the HSS will still use its current berth.

is that just the opposite side of the same terminal?

alexlyons

yes

alexlyons

tommyhaas wrote: »

Surely though its only a matter of time before Stena pull out of Dunlaoghaire all together, and just sail out of Dublin. I dont see what the advantage is to Stena of sailing into Dunlaoghaire instead of Dublin

its pretty popular with a lot of people, including truckers etc as they don't have to trek it into the port

tommyhaas

alexlyons wrote: »

its pretty popular with a lot of people, including truckers etc as they don't have to trek it into the port

Aye but long term its hardly enough to sustain the service, And with the barriers gone on the M50 and with the Port tunnel, getting to to the Port isint the 'mare it used to be. Id imagine in a few years it'l only be CIL & INS using Dunlaoghaire

alexlyons

tommyhaas wrote: »

Aye but long term its hardly enough to sustain the service, And with the barriers gone on the M50 and with the Port tunnel, getting to to the Port isint the 'mare it used to be. Id imagine in a few years it'l only be CIL & INS using Dunlaoghaire

True true, i don't think it'l be pulled completely however. i wouldn't be surprised seeing it scaled back to just the small craft from say march to october in about 2 years or so.

TheGrabbingHand

Dun Laoghaire is easier to get to by car and dart station right outside

Propellerhead

Dun Laoghaire was always by far the more attractive option as a foot passenger. I have family in Britain and every year since 1982 I've travelled at least once a year via boat and train.

It appears to me that Stena want to scupper the HSS and the Dun Laoghaire contract. The Stena Adventurer is a much inferior tub in terms of access and service as a foot passenger. If you want to travel to London, as I do, then you are forced to get a bus from Westmoreland Street at 0715 with no easy public transport link from either Heuston or Connolly.

The Mortons Stop ain't St Pancras International, that's for sure :rolleyes:

Stena have been more than a bit smart with the timings of the HSS, with no rail connections to the 1030 sailing from Holyhead to Dun Laoghaire, and you'd want to be pretty determined to use the 1330 sailing from Dun Laoghaire to Holyhead as a means to get to London Euston, arriving at 2145.

Not all of us want to be Ryanair'ed into submission. The annoying thing is that if the effort was made at both ends, boat and train to London could be competitive journey time wise with flying, and the amount of messing that airline pax have to do will only increase over the next while.

But hey, this is Ireland and we'll take any old crap.

Judgement Day

Well said Propellerhead - the ferry and rail link to London will inevitably come back into vogue in the future if it just hangs on. The days of cheap air travel are coming to an end but nobody seems to be prepared to contemplate the reality until it hits them in the face. CIE/IE have done their best to remove any rail connection to the ferries at Dun Laoghaire and Rosslare and the connections at Holyhead are not much better since privatisation. The disconnection of the Carlisle Pier in the early 1980's under the pretext of works associated with the DART dealt a hammer blow to passenger carrryings I would imagine and I never see much evidence of ferry passengers disembarking/boarding at Dun Laoghaire station these days.

L1011

The days of fast cat's will end with the days of cheap air travel, though; and the north Wales line isn't electrified either. Its not going to get as massive a competitive boost as you'd expect.