Varadkar blocked funding for Western Projects

ben.schlomo

Laviski wrote: »

Zzippy wrote: »

The people living near the Athenry-Sligo rail line would get far more benefit from a greenway than a white elephant rail service. There is literally no business, social or other reason to reopen that line for rail traffic that makes economic sense.

with that mindset most bus routes should be wiped out as they are not profitable on their own including city service routes. why should those routes be maintained at the taxpayers expense? in fact why not privatize the whole public transport and will be interesting to see what would be left running.

ennis to athenry was set up to fail from the start, that is why the figures only now have surpassed the targets set for that line because they changed some of the timetable to able to cater for when the demand exist. however i can tell you the timetable is still crap. Look at the time tables and you will see, prime times are when people heading to work or do day shopping and coming back. Very little flexibility.

What city bus routes wouldn't be profitable? Very interested to see the stats and numbers involved.

Bobeagleburger

As much as I'd like to see Galway airport open it isn't viable.

As for the Western Rail corridor? Load another loss making line onto a company losing hand over fist? I'd be closing train lines rather than opening more. Waste of tax payers money. Put the money into health or education instead.

Varadker thankfully had sense when making these decisions.

Lord Glentoran

It's official - boardsies say "On yer Bike!" to rail users

Zzippy

Laviski wrote: »

with that mindset most bus routes should be wiped out as they are not profitable on their own including city service routes. why should those routes be maintained at the taxpayers expense? in fact why not privatize the whole public transport and will be interesting to see what would be left running.

ennis to athenry was set up to fail from the start, that is why the figures only now have surpassed the targets set for that line because they changed some of the timetable to able to cater for when the demand exist. however i can tell you the timetable is still crap. Look at the time tables and you will see, prime times are when people heading to work or do day shopping and coming back. Very little flexibility.

Completely false analogy. You are comparing closing an existing service (bus routes) without an alternative choice, to opting for a greenway over opening a new train route. One would leave existing customers without an alternative, the other is either providing employment, tourism and recreational opportunities at low cost or providing an expensive rail service to theoretical new customers for which there is no demonstrable demand. A greenway would be a far better use of the resource for the economy, for tourism, for recreation and health.

Lord Glentoran

Lord Glentoran wrote: »

It's official - boardsies say "On yer Bike!" to rail users

Given today alone, I will take 4 train journeys and yet am for a greenway on the Athenry to Sligo line, shows your trolling attempts to be left wanting.

Laviski

Problem with BE/IR (CIE) and routes with subventions is that no thinking of how to improve efficiency or how to deliver a service that would provide growth, part of the blame is unions for that. There is more talk of self drive cars with tesla/volvo/uber etc but trains could and should be automated which will reduce overall costs in the long term to offer very competitive pricing again't buses.
for WRC as i've said timetables doesn't give it a chance. Granted it improved but still bad in terms of choice of time.

Also don't understand peoples mentality.... why its one or the other - make provision for both, if either is implemented allows for a another phase if there is financials to support it.
this plays a big part of why we have crap infrastructure in Ireland, anything implemented is what should have up and running 10/20 years ago instead of making provision today, we should be implementing today what will be needed in 10/20 years time something 2040 will do but the west isn't getting much

Lord Glentoran

Laviski wrote: »

Problem with BE/IR (CIE) and routes with subventions is that no thinking of how to improve efficiency or how to deliver a service that would provide growth, part of the blame is unions for that. There is more talk of self drive cars with tesla/volvo/uber etc but trains could and should be automated which will reduce overall costs in the long term to offer very competitive pricing again't buses.
for WRC as i've said timetables doesn't give it a chance. Granted it improved but still bad in terms of choice of time.

Also don't understand peoples mentality.... why its one or the other - make provision for both, if either is implemented allows for a another phase if there is financials to support it.
this plays a big part of why we have crap infrastructure in Ireland, anything implemented is what should have up and running 10/20 years ago instead of making provision today what will be needed in 10/20 years time.

Fully agree. There is more to solving Galway's traffic issues than brittle zero sum games. And not everything can be solved by bicycles.

Lord Glentoran

Lord Glentoran wrote: »

Fully agree. There is more to solving Galway's traffic issues than brittle zero sum games. And not everything can be solved by bicycles.

Actually quite a bit can be. Check out the video below to see how London, one of the most congested cities in the world, are creating proper cycling infrastructure after years of poor planning, infrastructure and uptake. The result, a huge shift towards cycling, so much so in fact, that 60% of rush hour journeys are now on the bike

More info here https://ecf.com/news-and-events/news/evolution-cycle-superhighways-london

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gohSeOYheXg

Lord Glentoran

Deleted User wrote: »

Actually quite a bit can be. Check out the video below to see how London, one of the most congested cities in the world, are creating proper cycling infrastructure after years of poor planning, infrastructure and uptake. The result, a huge shift towards cycling, so much so in fact, that 60% of rush hour journeys are now on the bike

More info here https://ecf.com/news-and-events/news/evolution-cycle-superhighways-london

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gohSeOYheXg

Fab. Next time I have to bring my elderly mother to Galway I’ll tell her to get on her bike.

biko

This is not a local issue and is now past the point of pushing it to aviation.

Hot tip, once a thread about airport starts on bicycles it's kinda strayed off topic