Mass Rail Closing in the Next Decade?

kieran4003

bk wrote: »

I was with you until this point. This train is pure fantasy. There is only one a day and I take it regularly. The fastest I've ever seen it do is 2h 37 mins. It normally does it in 2h 45 mins.

The average time for all services is 2hrs 50mins.

That is not true. Sure my father drives that train and he says whenever he is on it, he nearly always does it in 2hrs 30. He said if there was no slower trains in front of you, with only 2 stops 2:25 would be easily done, and the time is dropping all the time as the speed restrictions are removed. If it reguarly was taking 2hrs 45, It would have a shocking puncuality rate and Irish Rail would have to lenghten its schedule in the timetable. They had to do this 2 years ago when they reduced the old 06:30 to 2hrs30, It only had 1 stop but was a disaster for puncuality. It was brought in when there were speed restrictions in place all over the line, The whole service was a disaster for several months at the end of 2009. The 06:30 was changed to 2hrs 45 4 weeks after being introduced! The current service is in place over a year beacuse it is punctual.

Of course there is the 07:30 which is allocated 2:35, It usually gets a clear run to Islandbridge and is there before 10, but has to wait for the 10:00 to Cork to leave platform 5. So its arrival is usually about 10:02/03 There needs to be a platform freed up so that there are 2 available for Cork trains.

bk wrote: »

Really? So from the point of view of an economist, what makes more sense:

- License direct non stop coaches private coaches between Cork and Dublin in 3 hours for €20 return at zero cost to the tax payer.

or

- continue to subsidise Irish Rail intercity journeys to the tune of almost 100 million a year [1].

And then spend another 170 million to knock just 30 minutes off the 2h 50m average journey time. Making it only 40 minutes faster then by coach (which costs the tax payer nothing) and no faster then the car!!!

How is that economically sound?

[1] It is hard to get the real cost from the annual reports, but it looks like mainline rail makes up 60% of IR's revenue, so it would seem reasonable that it accounts for 60% of the subsidy too.

How can that be economically justified when an almost as good coach bus service can be offered at no cost to the economy?

Oh by all means, let there be an express bus service. Competition is good for everyone. But I would not see people switching from train to bus, when a non stop bus is slower then an all stop train? Nor would it be cheaper. In my opinion it would be difficult to make it commercially viable, There does not appear to be any interest in operating such a service by any private company, the M8 is done over a year and a half now. Bus Eireann appears to have no interest in introducing an X8 service either.

bk

kieran4003 wrote: »

Oh by all means, let there be an express bus service. Competition is good for everyone. But I would not see people switching from train to bus, when a non stop bus is slower then an all stop train? Nor would it be cheaper. In my opinion it would be difficult to make it commercially viable, There does not appear to be any interest in operating such a service by any private company, the M8 is done over a year and a half now. Bus Eireann appears to have no interest in introducing an X8 service either.

Really the two private train coach operators between Galway and Dublin have devastated passengers numbers on Irish Rail to Galway.

Of course it would be cheaper, it is cheaper:
- Galway to Dublin return €44 by Irish Rail, €20 by GoBus or City link.
- Cork to Dublin return €74 by Irish Rail, €22 by Aircoach (yes not a direct service but indicative of the cost of a ticket would be).

The coach can also be faster:
- Galway to Dublin by rail 2hrs 35min to 2hrs 45mins
- GoBus/Citylink 2hrs 30mins and they drop you at O'Connell Bridge, which is much more convenient then being dropped at Heuston and then having to get the LUAS into town.

Difficult to make it commercially viable? Seems it was commercially viable enough for two private operators to setup hourly services to Galway, with Irish Rail and Bus Eireann already there and they are doing very well.

Do you honestly think a 3 hour bus service to Cork for €20 wouldn't steal a massive number of customers off Irish Rail? and wouldn't be successful? Honestly I think your view is heavily tinted by your father. As a regular user of the Cork to Dublin train, I can assure you if such a service exist, I'd never again grace the inside of an Irish Rail train. Why would I, €25 is a hell of a lot less then €74. That €50 difference would go a long way and just for the sake of an extra 5 minutes.

I'm pretty certain a lot of people would think the same way. Hell there are already 2 non direct (4 to 5 hours) bus services (Bus Eireann and Aircoach) between Cork to Dublin and they do plenty of business. Do you really think a direct service wouldn't also steal a lot of customers from them?

For a person who claims to think from the point of view of an economist, you are not making much business or economical sense.

As for no one introducing such a service yet, well everyone knows that there is a massive backlog of new bus license applications with the NTA and that they are working their way through this backlog.

I can guarantee you at least one if not two companies have applied for direct, non stop licenses on each of the major roots.

And you never answered my question, how does it make sense to continue to subsidise intercity rail to the tune of 100 million per year, when bus coaches would cost the tax payer zero?

foggy_lad

Ourladyofknock's points about the services from IE being more commuter geared are appropriate as many of the Intercity routes are losing the few trains they had with meals and full dining cars and kitchens. there are now no real first class trains on the Waterford route and no train works the route with a dining car.

http://www.irishrail.ie/your_journey/printed_timetable_pdfs/2011/Dublin%20Waterford%2011.pdf

The timetable does list 2 trains a day(3 on Sundays) which are !st class but any passenger can argue this as the trains have no proper 1st class cars and no dining car and meals served!

Other lines are falling into the same Commuter mould with 1st class cars being the same as the rest apoart from maybe being a bit quieter.

http://www.irishrail.ie/your_journey/printed_timetable_pdfs/2011/Dublin%20Cork%2011.pdf

The Cork train has a dining car and kitchen on only 6 of 15 trains to Cork and 5/15 trains from Cork-Dublin and there is only a snack trolly at weekends.

Also worth noting that two trains a day on the Cork service are 22000 DMU's but IE does not class these as having 1st class so how can these same trains have 1st class on the waterford and other routes?

http://www.irishrail.ie/your_journey/printed_timetable_pdfs/2011/Dublin%20Galway%2011.pdf

Galway only has 1 train a day each way with dining facilities and only 3 trains each way per day are classed as having a 1st class car which is the exact same as the rest of the cars!

http://www.irishrail.ie/your_journey/printed_timetable_pdfs/2011/Dublin%20Rosslare%20Europort%2011.pdf

The services to Rosslare are awful with no 1st class and only two of the 6 trains a day even having a snack trolly!

http://www.irishrail.ie/your_journey/printed_timetable_pdfs/sep2011/Dublin%20Sligo%2011.pdf

Sligo has no 1st class and no dining cars at all but at least they are well served with a snack trolly for each service.


It also seems that over the years when there were fewer speed restrictions IE may have been unknowingly operating a dangerous service and with the purchase of new track testing equipment were able to fully realise the state of the rails and immediately slap on PSR's?

I think that where Kieran4003 says the run into Dublin has become much more congested is just wrong because I can remember the Sligo train 20-30 years ago taking forever to get from Broombridge area into Connolly so no real change there, also the Waterford train takes much longer now through Kildare, Newbridge, The Curragh and Cherryville and does not appear to be making any time on the new 4 track section.

and when the cork train gets a clear run into inchicore/Islandbridge in the mornings it is usually at the expense of several other trains which are held at Cherryville kildare newbridge etc

I say scrap 1st class now and run good quality commuter services with well stocked reasonably priced snack trollys and possibly retrofit all the new commuter trains with a small fridge unit for storing cold drinks and sandwiches for the trollys.

foggy_lad

@BK usually when Bus Eireann have a lot of passengers for the Cork bus they put on a non-stop bus as well as the stopping service, if they could regularise this auxilliarry service it would be a big improvement for travellers to/from Cork.

bk

foggy_lad wrote: »

@BK usually when Bus Eireann have a lot of passengers for the Cork bus they put on a non-stop bus as well as the stopping service, if they could regularise this auxilliarry service it would be a big improvement for travellers to/from Cork.

Agreed, but at the moment they are not licensed to do this. They are allowed to use different routes for auxiliary services, but they have to apply for a license to normalise this service.

I have absolutely no doubt that they and Aircoach have applied for such licenses. You would be a fool not too.

The fact that Bus Eireann has to lay on extra buses at Cork for a bus that normally takes 4hours 30mins shows that the demand is definitely there for a 3hour direct service.

I don't know why the rail fans keep trying to deny that the demand exists there and such a service would likely be very successful?

OurLadyofKnock

Now imagine if they had of reopned Mullingar-Athlone how Galway would be on the commuter rail system with a high-frequency service to Dublin. We would not be talking about Galway being removed from the rail network.

Now imagine if IE had of stood their ground and open Orammore instead of Dick Fearn having tea with West on Track and Trainspotters and opening Ardrahan and the other boghole as well.

Now imagine if all the Mk3s were converted to push-pull sets and refurbished and some new small freight/passenger locomotives without train heating were ordered to supplement a modest investment in new railcars. The guff about "non-standard IEs orders for locos being too small" is a total red herring. Loads of private European rail companies had locos built during the same period in numbers less than I can count on one hand and the minimun order was no problem for them. Some of these purchased 900mm gauge electric locos with central rack drives which is about as "non-standard" as you can get. Yet Irish Rail claimed nobody would sell them 20 or so locos - when there was no end to manufacturers all over the world who would of been glad to fill the order.

Now imagine if they had of electrified the Maynooth and Kildare lines with a connecting electrified line via the Phoenix Park Tunnel with Kildare trains terminating at a mix of Docklands and Grand Canal (with proper turn-back options).

No imagine IE actively trying to please and retain their railfreight customers instead of telling them to get lost. They would still have that business to fall back on now.

Now imagine that someone inside of Irish Rail is capable of imagination.

There's the rub.

OurLadyofKnock

The more I think about it - I wonder it IE management is driven by some kind of English throwback stereotype view of this country - and who never envisioned Ireland with motorways and they assumed they was coming to a Thomas the Tank Engine island to just modernise Thomas and Percy?

They never considered there might be an Eddie the Express Bus and Mick the Motorway.


or Darragh the Depression for that matter.

SandyfordGuy

Whatever the issues about licensing, even the stopping services are not really adequate, for example the first bus from Cork doesn't get into Dublin until 10.50 and Dublin Airport until 11.15 with the last bus leaving Dublin at 7pm and Dublin Airport at 6.15pm.

Even if there is not demand for a non stop service, which I'd think there perhaps is, there should at least be a later bus to Cork after the times we have at present. Just a look at how packed the 6pm Bus Eireann and 7pm Aircoach services to Cork show this.

What is really needed is a bus which allows people to get to Dublin earlier, a later bus to Cork, ideally also serving Dublin Airport to facilitate both early flights from Dublin and later arrivals wishing to travel to Cork.

bk

SandyfordGuy wrote: »

What is really needed is a bus which allows people to get to Dublin earlier, a later bus to Cork, ideally also serving Dublin Airport to facilitate both early flights from Dublin and later arrivals wishing to travel to Cork.

Yup GoBus and Citylink's services to Galway are what they need to copy to Cork.

Clockface hourly services that run most of the day, starting earlier and finishing very late.

New modern buses with free wifi and onboard toilets.

This and a big ad campaign would start changing peoples views of bus coaches being slow, unreliable and uncomfortable.

SandyfordGuy

Bit risky though with a recession, I doubt Bus Eireann would be allowed to use government funds to provide this expansion as it would quite rightly be objected by Aircoach as it would be in essence state aid to help it, in it's fight against the competitor as Expressway is commercially operated. Also Aircoach I would say are not in the ideal trading environment either with the reduction in passengers using the airport.

Drimnagh Road

Ironic we should speak of Aircoach as I have to hand that there is to be a "timetable change" on Dublin-Cork route on Monday 28th November, Could they be introducing a non-stop direct service I wonder?

Edit-just realised this is already been discussed in a seperate thread

SandyfordGuy

The way I read the timetables is that there would be a new timetable on the 29th.

devnull

The Greystones timetable is also changing the same day.

SandyfordGuy

I've posted the Cork stuff in another thread rather than clogging up this one with unrelated topics, the Greystones seems to have had a timetable adjustment also on the online booking system, they've changed it so it integrates with the Dalkey service to give the common section of a route a service every half hour for 24 hours, which makes sense really as at the moment there can be two buses in under 10 minutes to/from the airport in Blackrock and then nothing for 50 minutes. Would be good to keep this in a separate thread too.

OurLadyofKnock

CIE wrote: »

The only reason that Ireland is not like Germany or the UK is due to that small thinking.

and the fact our entire landmass is smaller than the US state of Maine and has a population smaller than Greater Manchester and we surrounded by swirly oceans and seas.

But let's not let reality get in the way of meaningless platitudes.

We had our chance to create population densitity for hardcore rail transport during the Tiger years - the Government instead turned the entire nation in a one off housing empire.

While your beloved CIE designed and are still designing empty office blocks.

Carawaystick

SandyfordGuy wrote: »

Whatever the issues about licensing, even the stopping services are not really adequate, for example the first bus from Cork doesn't get into Dublin until 10.50 and Dublin Airport until 11.15 with the last bus leaving Dublin at 7pm and Dublin Airport at 6.15pm.

Even if there is not demand for a non stop service, which I'd think there perhaps is, there should at least be a later bus to Cork after the times we have at present. Just a look at how packed the 6pm Bus Eireann and 7pm Aircoach services to Cork show this.

What is really needed is a bus which allows people to get to Dublin earlier, a later bus to Cork, ideally also serving Dublin Airport to facilitate both early flights from Dublin and later arrivals wishing to travel to Cork.

Of course IÉ supply a service that allows passengers from Dublin to Cork arrive in Cork city centre ate perfectly reasonable hours too... sher no-one'd like to be in the real capital before about ten in the morning....

robd

OurLadyofKnock wrote: »

and the fact our entire landmass is smaller than the US state of Maine and has a population smaller than Greater Manchester and we surrounded by swirly oceans and seas.

But let's not let reality get in the way of meaningless platitudes.

We had our chance to create population densitity for hardcore rail transport during the Tiger years - the Government instead turned the entire nation in a one off housing empire.

While your beloved CIE designed and are still designing empty office blocks.

Well said. I just didn't have the energy to respond to CIE myself.

CIE

OurLadyofKnock wrote: »

and the fact our entire landmass is smaller than the US state of Maine and has a population smaller than Greater Manchester and we surrounded by swirly oceans and seas.

But let's not let reality get in the way of meaningless platitudes.

We had our chance to create population densitity (sic) for hardcore rail transport during the Tiger years - the Government instead turned the entire nation in a one off housing empire.

While your beloved CIE designed and are still designing empty office blocks.

Like I said; small thinking. Reality, you say? Small thinkers let themselves succumb to reality and be victimised by it (and thus start uttering "meaningless platitudes"); big thinkers shape reality. But don't let me get in the way of your efforts to have Ireland laughed at from the outside, especially since your "solution" is to continue to tear down instead of building back up (kind of worse than mere slave mentality, but one must call it as one sees it). You keep letting the European Union dictate to you and thinking that there's naught you can do about it (while blaming the national government who has been just their vassal over the years), Ireland will become balkanised in terms of transport as well as continually de-industrialised while Germany continues to enrich itself. Enjoy riding that donkey, because you won't even have buses eventually with that kind of thinking, and very few cars...first the railways, then the rest of the infrastructure.

Population density means nothing. You think that Sweden lets their average population density (half the density of Ireland) get in the way of having electrified railways running at high speeds to destinations with slightly smaller populations than Sligo, for example? Arvika, one of the last stops on the X2000 service which features electric tilt-trains running at average speeds between 90 and 108 mph, has about 15,000 inhabitants. Switch their service to something like the 22000-class running at average speeds of 45 mph or so if you're lucky, and they will not be quiet in their protestations. (Herrljunga, with limited X2000 service, has a population of only 3700. The X2000 terminates at lots of cities with smaller populations than Galway city, e.g. Karlstad, Uddevalla, Östersund, Falun.) And yes, this is on their traditional railway network; no high-speed lines have been built nor are their plans to build them, but there are plans to continue to upgrade the traditional lines for 250-km/h running.

And oh yes: stop letting the brainwash about rail freight permeate your thought. That has the potential (if used) to make far more dough than passenger service. But by all means, let the HGVs wreck the shiny new motorways until they're all full of potholes...small thinking. (The trollface does think small, yes.)

foggy_lad

CIE wrote: »

Like I said; small thinking. Reality, you say? Small thinkers let themselves succumb to reality and be victimised by it (and thus start uttering "meaningless platitudes"); big thinkers shape reality. But don't let me get in the way of your efforts to have Ireland laughed at from the outside, especially since your "solution" is to continue to tear down instead of building back up (kind of worse than mere slave mentality, but one must call it as one sees it). You keep letting the European Union dictate to you and thinking that there's naught you can do about it (while blaming the national government who has been just their vassal over the years), Ireland will become balkanised in terms of transport as well as continually de-industrialised while Germany continues to enrich itself. Enjoy riding that donkey, because you won't even have buses eventually with that kind of thinking, and very few cars...first the railways, then the rest of the infrastructure.

Population density means nothing. You think that Sweden lets their average population density (half the density of Ireland) get in the way of having electrified railways running at high speeds to destinations with slightly smaller populations than Sligo, for example? Arvika, one of the last stops on the X2000 service which features electric tilt-trains running at average speeds between 90 and 108 mph, has about 15,000 inhabitants. Switch their service to something like the 22000-class running at average speeds of 45 mph or so if you're lucky, and they will not be quiet in their protestations. (Herrljunga, with limited X2000 service, has a population of only 3700. The X2000 terminates at lots of cities with smaller populations than Galway city, e.g. Karlstad, Uddevalla, Östersund, Falun.) And yes, this is on their traditional railway network; no high-speed lines have been built nor are their plans to build them, but there are plans to continue to upgrade the traditional lines for 250-km/h running.

And oh yes: stop letting the brainwash about rail freight permeate your thought. That has the potential (if used) to make far more dough than passenger service. But by all means, let the HGVs wreck the shiny new motorways until they're all full of potholes...small thinking. (The trollface does think small, yes.)

If you live in Sweden chances are part of your very high rates go towards paying for your local railway lines whether you use them or not. Mainlines only are paid for by the state and everything else is covered by private companies and the individual small towns/cities that the trains travel through.

Malmo to Stockholm return on 29th and 30th of this month costs about €90 for 2nd class with no wifi for the 4.5 hour journey but there are much dearer journy times throughout both days. Trains are not very frequent but the lack of train services is supplemented by excellent express bus services and the farther north you go they get less frequent so there is only 2 trains on weekdays between the likes of Umea and Lulea and a journey time of over 4.5 hours for the 265km journey but both trains include bus transfers between Umea and Vannas and there are no services on sunday.

You should not try to talk up sweedish railway services until you have fully examined all the pitfalls involved. remember what you might see on the travel channels are out of date tourist promotion programs so are obviously complimentary of Swedens railways, the reality is very different!

parsi

kieran4003 wrote: »

Even if you look at the the fastest journey times now , things have improved a lot:
Dublin - Cork 2hrs 30mins

Once a bloody day !

All the others are 2h50 - 170mins to do 165-odd miles ! They nearly ran faster than that during the Emergency with rubbish coal.

parsi

bk wrote: »

Yup GoBus and Citylink's services to Galway are what they need to copy to Cork.

Clockface hourly services that run most of the day, starting earlier and finishing very late.

New modern buses with free wifi and onboard toilets.

This and a big ad campaign would start changing peoples views of bus coaches being slow, unreliable and uncomfortable.

I used Citylink to go to/from Limerick earlier in the month and found it very comfortable. By booking earlier it was cheaper than the train and also much cheaper than driving & paying for overnight parking.

The one gripe I'd have is that they didn't have toilets and there's no covered waiting area in either Cork or Limerick (I got soaked down to my subdermis ).

A couple of questions occur to me - they are along somewhat unrelated lines, but bear with me all the same.

We're cutting back on everything and hiking taxes on everything. Higher VAT, residential charge, more motor tax, higher prices for the old reliables, you name it. Longer queues for operations, bigger classes in schools, less support for kids with special needs, you know the drill. When we're doing all that, why in the name of anything rational should we keep shelling out money to keep empty trains running? I read somewhere that taxpayer subsidies to Irish Rail are costing about €200 million a year.


One of the days this coming week I've to go to a meeting in the Rochestown Park Hotel in Douglas. My starting point is a couple of hundred metres from Superquinn in Ballinteer. On the way down and back, I'll stop for a cup of tea, a sandwich and a comfort break. My meeting starts at 11 am, and I reckon I'll be in time if I leave my house at 7:30. I'll finish up at 5 pm, and I should get back to my house at more or less 8:30. I also reckon that my 510 km round trip will cost me about €50-55 in fuel.

Can someone give me a better Plan B that lets me leave my car in the driveway? Ideally, I mean a plan that costs less and gets me there and back more quickly. But I've an open mind, so I'm willing to consider a plan that does one of those things only - as long as it doesn't make the other much worse.

Anyone?

Drimnagh Road

Found this post from way back in 2006 on the original IRN board whilst searching for something else. We haven't got anywhere faster since then... by rail anyway.


THERE’S a train a-comin’ — but the car isn’t far behind, and rail bosses are worried. Iarnrod Eireann, Ireland’s train operator, is attempting to speed up its inter-city service between Dublin and Cork to ensure the journey can still be completed faster by train than car.

The direct train from the capital to Cork takes two hours and 25 minutes. Thanks to a number of road improvements the same 255km (160 miles) car journey can be completed in three hours, but this journey time is set to fall further.

Plans to continue upgrading the entire road to dual carriageway or motorway-standard have led to expectations that the travel time will fall to two hours and 15 minutes by 2010, putting motorists firmly in the fast lane.

Anxious rail bosses are now devising plans to knock more than 25 minutes off the journey time with an initiative due to start in the next five years.

“Obviously one of our selling points is that we get from city centre to city centre in a faster time than cars, and this is something we want to maintain on all routes,” said Barry Kenny of Iarnrod Eireann. “Our service from Dublin to Cork is quick but we are aware of the need to make it quicker.”

Kenny said the company wants to “dramatically improve” maximum train speeds between the cities from 160 kph (100 mph) to 200 kph (125 mph).

To achieve this, the railway will introduce two engine cars in place of just one. Trains are currently hauled from the front, but under the new plan they will be pushed from the other end as well as being pulled.

According to Kenny, feasibility studies will begin soon. The plan also involves straighter tracks, the elimination of level crossings and the renewal of signalling and train-protection systems. “A two-hour time would simply be impossible for any other transport mode in this country to even come close to matching,” he claimed.

But the Dublin-Cork train route is not the only inter-city service threatened by cars as the republic’s roads improve dramatically. The direct train from Dublin to Limerick can complete the journey in two hours and six minutes, but by road this can now be completed just nine minutes slower. With the completion of the Mountrath bypass in 2010 that time will fall further.

Dublin to Belfast is two hours by train and the same by road, while Dublin to Galway is two hours and 39 minutes by car compared with two hours and 20 minutes rail.

As part of the government’s Transport 21 plan, Martin Cullen, the transport minister, said times on the Dublin to Limerick road route will be reduced by 31 minutes, while Dublin to Galway will be shortened by 36 minutes between 2006 and 2015.

Austin Smyth, a transport professor at the University of Westminster in London, and the author of a report on Ireland’s transport plans, said that travelling by train from Dublin to Cork would not remain attractive unless the travel time is reduced. “There is scope for improvement on long-distance rail routes from Dublin if Iarnrod Eireann had more ambitious plans. The idea for the Dublin to Cork line shows what might be achieved on the network,” he said.

The road travel times are calculated by the AA and are “achievable” at anything other than peak times, according to Conor Faughnan, the association’s spokesman.

But Kenny claimed these times were unrealistic. “For a road user to beat our centre to centre rail-journey times, you would have to be breaking the law, driving at 2am, or both,” he said.

Faughnan insisted the times quoted by the AA are real and “improving all the time as more roads are developed”.

Michael Egan of the National Roads Authority said the Dublin to Cork route could be travelled at 120 kph by 2010 if cars don’t stop, because all towns along the route will be bypassed. “This means it will be possible to drive it in about two hours and 15 minutes, and that’s at the speed limit,” he said.

The National Development Plan promised the journey by car from Dublin to Cork would be reduced by 39 minutes. Before this was achieved, Transport 21 was launched in 2005 with a similar target.

corktina

5 years later, roads now much quicker and train 24 minutes slower (generally).They've missed the chance to improve the train service,it will be a long time before investment at any meaningful level is available.

CIE

corktina wrote: »

5 years later, roads now much quicker and train 24 minutes slower (generally).They've missed the chance to improve the train service,it will be a long time before investment at any meaningful level is available.

That status quo is going to decay just as quick if the economic situation doesn't get better, as well.

Nobody's missed any chance. But if you let the EU badger Ireland into raising the corporate tax rate, then that might be a bad situation indeed.

parsi

Wow. Cork > Dublin in 2h06 in 2006

Today it's 2h50.

Gee Barry that's some change alright....

DWCommuter

Deleted User wrote: »

Anyone?

Absolutely not.

DWCommuter

CIE wrote: »

Like I said; small thinking. Reality, you say? Small thinkers let themselves succumb to reality and be victimised by it (and thus start uttering "meaningless platitudes"); big thinkers shape reality. But don't let me get in the way of your efforts to have Ireland laughed at from the outside, especially since your "solution" is to continue to tear down instead of building back up (kind of worse than mere slave mentality, but one must call it as one sees it). You keep letting the European Union dictate to you and thinking that there's naught you can do about it (while blaming the national government who has been just their vassal over the years), Ireland will become balkanised in terms of transport as well as continually de-industrialised while Germany continues to enrich itself. Enjoy riding that donkey, because you won't even have buses eventually with that kind of thinking, and very few cars...first the railways, then the rest of the infrastructure.

Population density means nothing. You think that Sweden lets their average population density (half the density of Ireland) get in the way of having electrified railways running at high speeds to destinations with slightly smaller populations than Sligo, for example? Arvika, one of the last stops on the X2000 service which features electric tilt-trains running at average speeds between 90 and 108 mph, has about 15,000 inhabitants. Switch their service to something like the 22000-class running at average speeds of 45 mph or so if you're lucky, and they will not be quiet in their protestations. (Herrljunga, with limited X2000 service, has a population of only 3700. The X2000 terminates at lots of cities with smaller populations than Galway city, e.g. Karlstad, Uddevalla, Östersund, Falun.) And yes, this is on their traditional railway network; no high-speed lines have been built nor are their plans to build them, but there are plans to continue to upgrade the traditional lines for 250-km/h running.

And oh yes: stop letting the brainwash about rail freight permeate your thought. That has the potential (if used) to make far more dough than passenger service. But by all means, let the HGVs wreck the shiny new motorways until they're all full of potholes...small thinking. (The trollface does think small, yes.)

So its Sweden now and not Germany? Correct?

How many more countries (that aren't even remotely like Ireland) are you going to use as an example? In fact... ah forget it.:rolleyes:

Niles

corktina wrote: »

5 years later, roads now much quicker and train 24 minutes slower (generally).They've missed the chance to improve the train service,it will be a long time before investment at any meaningful level is available.

The latest IRRS journal notes that services on many IÉ lines were quicker in the 1980s...

DWCommuter

Niles wrote: »

The latest IRRS journal notes that services on many IÉ lines were quicker in the 1980s...

I love hearing this, but there were many of us (non enthusiast types) taking some serious sh1t a few years ago when we pointed this out.

foggy_lad

parsi wrote: »

Wow. Cork > Dublin in 2h06 in 2006

Today it's 2h50.

Gee Barry that's some change alright....

Indeed and getting back to mr Kenny's figure of 2hours 25minutes from 2006 I believe even back then this was only possible like today with one train a day which was almost non stop and would have had the road cleared to enable the speeds achieved. As for sticking a locomotive on each end lol loco and pretty pointless for the benefits. The locomotives being used are ripping up the low speed Irish track and the only remedy is getting rid of the locomotives or upgrading every mile of track and tracked.

Niles

foggy_lad wrote: »

Indeed and getting back to mr Kenny's figure of 2hours 25minutes from 2006 I believe even back then this was only possible like today with one train a day which was almost non stop and would have had the road cleared to enable the speeds achieved. As for sticking a locomotive on each end lol loco and pretty pointless for the benefits. The locomotives being used are ripping up the low speed Irish track and the only remedy is getting rid of the locomotives or upgrading every mile of track and tracked.

Agreed locos (well, 201s anyway) are probably not the most suitable for the task. But at the time though it probably would have been difficult to get funding for power cars when the 201s were less than a decade old. I think the 201s suffered from being brought in at the wrong time, i.e. towards the end of when loco hauled was in vogue. Sort of like the last steam engines BR built in 1960, nothing wrong with them per se but built too late to be of any long term use in terms of trends.

Though in saying that I'm not sure that the mkIVs being loco hauled is the problem... I mean the trains were faster in the 1980s and at best the trains would have been 071s hauling mkIIIs then.

foggy_lad

Niles wrote: »

Agreed locos (well, 201s anyway) are probably not the most suitable for the task. But at the time though it probably would have been difficult to get funding for power cars when the 201s were less than a decade old. I think the 201s suffered from being brought in at the wrong time, i.e. towards the end of when loco hauled was in vogue. Sort of like the last steam engines BR built in 1960, nothing wrong with them per se but built too late to be of any long term use in terms of trends.

Though in saying that I'm not sure that the mkIVs being loco hauled is the problem... I mean the trains were faster in the 1980s and at best the trains would have been 071s hauling mkIIIs then.

The problem seems to be the track around Kildare and limerick junction and several other places falling to pieces as trains roll over it. Many of the speed restrictions are in the Kildare and curragh area and then through the bog. Of course accidents like at cherryville junction would only have highlighted the dangers at that time of poor signalling and communication and also the awful state of trains when you consider that this accident was caused because a train ran out of fuel due to not having a working diesel gauge.

Irish rails attitude towards the rail network and their trains has not really changed that much since cherryville and other more recent disasters on the railway. Signalling and communication has improved but there is still a major incident just waiting to take more lives whether on the main lines or in a city environment it will happen sooner rather than later with Irish rail at the controls!

corktina

Niles wrote: »

Agreed locos (well, 201s anyway) are probably not the most suitable for the task. But at the time though it probably would have been difficult to get funding for power cars when the 201s were less than a decade old. I think the 201s suffered from being brought in at the wrong time, i.e. towards the end of when loco hauled was in vogue. Sort of like the last steam engines BR built in 1960, nothing wrong with them per se but built too late to be of any long term use in terms of trends.

Though in saying that I'm not sure that the mkIVs being loco hauled is the problem... I mean the trains were faster in the 1980s and at best the trains would have been 071s hauling mkIIIs then.

but they got funding for the mkk4s though didnt they? They should have refurbished the mk3s , scrapped the 201s and bought new lightweight power cars instead.. Now we are stuck with the 201s, there will be no finance for power cars in the next decade or two and speeds will HAVE to stay below 100mph, which means that the accendancy of the Motorways will continue.

robd

CIE wrote: »

Like I said; small thinking. Reality, you say? Small thinkers let themselves succumb to reality and be victimised by it (and thus start uttering "meaningless platitudes"); big thinkers shape reality.

You are confusing big thinking in business (i.e. thinking of the global market place) with building a service that meets the needs of a small population. Two very different things. Ryanair are the ultimate big thinkers in Ireland when it comes to transport. They'll carry upwards of 70 million passengers this year and are profitable.

Look at Irish Rail. They only carried 38.2 million Passengers in 2010. Dublin Bus carried 119 million Passengers. Bus Eireann 37.2 million. Of course we get no beakdown of DART, versus Suburban versus Intercity. My guess would be 20m:12m:6m. Guarantee you DART is profitable, Suburban is bear break even and Intercity sucks the life out of the whole thing.

Thinking big would be investing in services likely to deliver the greatest benefit to the greatest number of people. Based on this that's Dublin Bus. If Bus Eireann weren't curtailed by PD policy of privatization (dirty tricks aside) but not actually issuing licenses they'd probably be carrying 60m+ passengers at this stage so they should probably get some too.

Kill intercity and divert money to DART and suburban. Write off new carriages as a sunk cost cause that's what they are.

corktina

i dont think you can completely kill InterCity but is there a need for an all-day hourly service (on the Cork line) and as many trains running as there are? (elsewhere). A business hours service plus weekend student specials would cater for the bulk of the paying customers. All the freebies fill the rest of the available trains at a huge cost to the Government. If trains were limited along these lines, (in effect an enhanced semi-fast service) the 22xxx class ,which are virtually new and quite suitable, could cover these runs, and there would be no need for class 201s and mk4s, a sunk cost as you say.Economies of scale, and a better chance to break even. (we really can't afford to be subsidising the current service)

robd

corktina wrote: »

i dont think you can completely kill InterCity but is there a need for an all-day hourly service (on the Cork line) and as many trains running as there are? (elsewhere). A business hours service plus weekend student specials would cater for the bulk of the paying customers. All the freebies fill the rest of the available trains at a huge cost to the Government. If trains were limited along these lines, (in effect an enhanced semi-fast service) the 22xxx class ,which are virtually new and quite suitable, could cover these runs, and there would be no need for class 201s and mk4s, a sunk cost as you say.Economies of scale, and a better chance to break even. (we really can't afford to be subsidising the current service)

Very hard to know as Irish Rail clearly obfuscate the whole thing by not giving breakdowns for each type of service. Intuitively I wouldn't have thought the cost of additional services are that high if you have the trains and are maintaining the tracks. I would seriously question further investment in Intercity though. Don't think it is worth the investment as it won't significantly attract new passengers given convenience of motorways.

Irish Rail need to be squeezed by government to provide proper breakdowns then take axe to costs of low use services and rail paths in order to safe the good ones.

corktina

any investment in IC would need to be focused on 125mph operation. Thats not going to happen imo because we wont have the cash for many years to come. So, as you infer, we need to go forward from where we are, it's not an ideal situation to say the least!

OurLadyofKnock

CIE wrote: »

Like I said; small thinking. Reality, you say? Small thinkers let themselves succumb to reality and be victimised by it (and thus start uttering "meaningless platitudes"); big thinkers shape reality. But don't let me get in the way of your efforts to have Ireland laughed at from the outside, especially since your "solution" is to continue to tear down instead of building back up (kind of worse than mere slave mentality, but one must call it as one sees it). You keep letting the European Union dictate to you and thinking that there's naught you can do about it (while blaming the national government who has been just their vassal over the years), Ireland will become balkanised in terms of transport as well as continually de-industrialised while Germany continues to enrich itself. Enjoy riding that donkey, because you won't even have buses eventually with that kind of thinking, and very few cars...first the railways, then the rest of the infrastructure..

Believe it or not I am actually fairly famous outside of Ireland. So your "small thinking" is not relevant here.

CIE wrote: »

Population density means nothing. You think that Sweden lets their average population density (half the density of Ireland) get in the way of having electrified railways running at high speeds to destinations with slightly smaller populations than Sligo, for example? Arvika, one of the last stops on the X2000 service which features electric tilt-trains running at average speeds between 90 and 108 mph, has about 15,000 inhabitants. Switch their service to something like the 22000-class running at average speeds of 45 mph or so if you're lucky, and they will not be quiet in their protestations. (Herrljunga, with limited X2000 service, has a population of only 3700. The X2000 terminates at lots of cities with smaller populations than Galway city, e.g. Karlstad, Uddevalla, Östersund, Falun.) And yes, this is on their traditional railway network; no high-speed lines have been built nor are their plans to build them, but there are plans to continue to upgrade the traditional lines for 250-km/h running...

Dude, Sweden is a very flat country with long, straight stretches of rail line (good for high speed) with a lot of heavy industry, mining and forestry. The nature of their climate makes rail better for long distance transport in winter - which is why their main freight line runs to Narvik inside Norway above the artic circle. They also have direct rail connections into Euro now via Denmark - to supplement the ones into Norway and Finland they already had. Swedish cities are big and well spread apart from one another.

On this island we only have one major city - Dublin and small regional city Belfast, and the rest are just big towns.

Sweden is nothing like Ireland. One major factor is they have LOTS of Nuclear Power and they can electrify their lines. Ireland will never, ever have Nuclear Power because our newspapers journalists are ignorant, hysteria-inducing gob****es who like to play God. Look at the carry on of Myers and McDonald regarding a small bit of temp. landscaping in Stephen's Green for the DART/Metro interchange. The headbagers calling Joe Duffy actually having political clout in this country - while in any other country they would be ignored as hysterical cranks looking for attention. Here in Ireland all our major political parties formulate policy based on Joe Duffy callers, pathologically-insane newspaper editorials and parish priests in Mayo.

Are you honestly going to continue with comparing Ireland to modern and intelligent societies like Germany and Sweden? These countries also exist for reasons greater than indulging Civil Servants and Semi-State unions. They have a vision - Ireland has none, except to keep the public sector from throwing their toys out of the pram constantly.

CIE wrote: »

And oh yes: stop letting the brainwash about rail freight permeate your thought. That has the potential (if used) to make far more dough than passenger service. But by all means, let the HGVs wreck the shiny new motorways until they're all full of potholes...small thinking. (The trollface does think small, yes.)

Our motorways are some of the best and most modern in the world now. Motorways don't get potholes! They are not boreens which have been widened.

That's ironically is what our rail system is by the way.

For all the faults and slagging the NRA get - if there is one organisation which can look back on the Tiger years and point to real results - it is most certainly the NRA. Our road network is pretty spectacular now - even by any international standards.

One would have to go to the Third World to find a comparison to CIE.

I am not small thinking - I am seeing our nation with a clarity and for the most part - it just ain't pretty.

OurLadyofKnock

But Kenny claimed these times were unrealistic. “For a road user to beat our centre to centre rail-journey times, you would have to be breaking the law, driving at 2am, or both,” he said.

Does this guy still have his job?

foggy_lad

OurLadyofKnock wrote: »

Does this guy still have his job?

Centre to Centre times of 2hours 25minutes which Barry Kenny quoted on Dublin to Cork DID NOT include a 25minute luas ride and a 10minute(at least) bus ride in Cork.

foggy_lad

corktina wrote: »

A business hours service plus weekend student specials would cater for the bulk of the paying customers. All the freebies fill the rest of the available trains at a huge cost to the Government.

Do you think the Government will continue to subsidise Irish Rail if they get rid of free travel?

The business hours service and student services cant actually be run at a profit by IE as it exists today.

corktina

twould be a brave politician who would scrap free travel/Maybe EU might insist on major changes though

foggy_lad

corktina wrote: »

twould be a brave politician who would scrap free travel/Maybe EU might insist on major changes though

true but i cant help thinking that if the services are cut there will be radical cuts in subsidy to go alog with that.

Although I can see an overall reduction of €10-€20 for those on long term social welfare payments happening before any reduction in free travel or household benefits like the free esb.

corktina

business hours trains and studentservices are well filled and must pay thier way surely. Its the middle of the day services that are quietest I would have thought and most used by free pass holders.

runway16

Folks,

One factor not considered in the debate about off peak services is the fact that if you remove some of them, you make the overall schedule less attractive to business people, who may then not patronise the peak time services.

The reason is that the overall schedule may simply not be attractive to them anymore. Take the case of a businessman travelling to Cork for a meeting. His meeting concludes at 2:30, and he may not be willing to wait around until 5pm for the next service. He may simply opt to drive or use a bus service instead.

Airlines have learned this lesson the hard way when trying to remove unprofitable middle of the day services - once they did, the business traveller started deserting them because the service did not offer the flexibility they required, so they switched to a competitor with a more extensive schedule.

corktina

he's likely to switch to his car anyway as it would be much quicker unless his meeting was virtually IN Connolly or Heuston

foggy_lad

corktina wrote: »

business hours trains and studentservices are well filled and must pay thier way surely. Its the middle of the day services that are quietest I would have thought and most used by free pass holders.

but you cant have business services and student services going one way without having empty trains going in the opposite direction unless you sent a train to cork in the morning and dont send it back until the evening. the well filled trains are usually only well filled one way so the empty trains are already paid for which drives up the overall cost beyond what the customers are prepared to pay for a train service. how many will pay €80 return for a trip to Cork(including luas and taxi/bus transfers)

DWCommuter

Its all very simple really. The IE business model needs to be overhauled. In terms of just the service side of things, costs need to be cut drastically, speeds need increasing and only then will it have a chance of being in a position to maintain regular schedules and have busy services and routes subsidising the lessor ones, but still maintaining them. However as a person who runs a business that is still reasonably successful I am horrified by how IE is run, considering it eats up 100s of millions annually in state subsidy. Both Government and IE/CIE management are responsible for a diabolical rail company who's only period of success was when billions were being fired at it and we were at near full levels of employment in the country.

Niles

corktina wrote: »

business hours trains and studentservices are well filled and must pay thier way surely. Its the middle of the day services that are quietest I would have thought and most used by free pass holders.

Not sure about this... there is a growing trend among the bus companies (including BÉ) to offer hourly/two hourly services... if IÉ doesn't run services outside the start and close of businesses it's just another reason to use the bus. Granted it takes less to fill a bus than a train, but I've often used middle of the day bus services on the Dublin-Rosslare route, and they're often quite full from the middle of the day on. The mid-morning ones not so much but these usually have to operate anyway to get the driver/bus back to the starting point or they would be out of hours.

There's also the fact that students don't always have 9-5 hours, depending on the course. I commuted to and from college and would have had one or two days a week when I finished at 2, had there been one company offering an hourly service and another only running at close of business hours you can guess which operator I'd go with.