Dublin ranked as second worst city in the world for traveling by car

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121627388#Comment_121627388

That’s why have the service pattern that we do, with trams in the main alternating between:

• Broombridge-Sandyford
• and
• Parnell-Brides Glen

That ensures that people can get on trams despite heavier loadings from further out.

Hence it is not “at capacity” as in the example above a tram starting at Parnell can sweep passengers up as it’s usually pretty empty behind one starting from Broombridge.

Beta Ray Bill

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121627432#Comment_121627432

I understand that, but the trade off is frequency the further out you go.

I totally get it, I get the DART every morning and if the DART is coming from Howth its not to bad, if it comes from Malahide its generally more full.

I think they will need to introduce service patterns as you suggested once the Dart is extended further North (Although that kind of exists already with the commuter service)

SharkMX

How come we never get the results of any studies about where we rank for quality public transport for the country? I wonder why alright.

I live 20 mins walk from a train station.

If im going anywhere in the train line i will always get the train. If im going anywhere within 8kms and the weather is ok, i'll cycle. Absolutely anywhere else though and I have to drive. There is a bus but unless you are going along that bus route its no good and takes ages.

The last few months when i get the train to work i cant get a seat either coming in to work or going home. Im almost at the point where im going to start driving again. Sick of standing on the train. Cant even get a seat on the bus in the rush hour but that takes nearly 2 hours to get to work by bus anyway, so i dont bother with the bus anymore.

Beta Ray Bill

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121627544#Comment_121627544

C'mere.... It's not pretty reading....

It's mostly about cost and simplicity as opposed to effectiveness and efficiency

https://www.irishtimes.com/environment/climate-crisis/2023/05/04/dublin-is-worst-capital-in-europe-for-public-transport-ticket-pricing-finds-greenpeace/

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121627477#Comment_121627477

That is how you manage the loadings. It is standard practice across public transport networks.

Hence my rebuttal of the other poster’s assertion that the Green Line is “at capacity”. It isn’t.

DART+ includes plans for services starting at different locations.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121627575#Comment_121627575

That report was very flawed.

Anyone can buy a monthly ticket from Dublin Bus head office or any railway station. They’re not restricted solely to the taxsaver scheme.

The report didn’t rate the fare capping that automatically applies using LEAP at all in coming up with the ratings, despite that being the cheapest option.

They insisted on only rating monthly ticket prices That’s bonkers.

It therefore produced totally skewed results.

bk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121628075#Comment_121628075

It was the opposite, they actually took the weekly cap rather then the monthly ticket:

Dublin has an electronic ticketing system, it acknowledges, with weekly payments recently capped at €32. Greenpeace has taken this price as the basis for the ranking, in the absence of a monthly ticket. Nevertheless, the regular price is the second-highest out of all cities analysed, it says – with €3.16 per day after the price level adjustment

So best case scenario, we were second highest. If they took the monthly ticket it would have been even worse.

Monthly multi mode ticket (without tax saver): €155

Leap Weekly multi mode capping: €32 x 4 = €128

Sure with taxsaver at the highest rate of tax, it drops to €80

But all of these are pretty poor value. By comparison others have mentioned Vienna has unlimited annual travel for just €365 or €30 per month with no messing about with taxsaver nonsense.

For most people who are just commuting into and out of work every day, the €2 90 minute ticket is the best value. But that still ends up at like €4 per day which 4 times Vienna daily price!

The €2 90 minute ticket (and €1 versions) has been a great success. But taxsaver and monthly tickets is bascially broken and badly needs to be overhauled.

Also lets be honest, anyone who has travelled around Europe will know that Dublin's public transport is far worse then most European cities. It isn't even in the same league as cities with multiple Metro lines and wide tram networks.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121628166#Comment_121628166

I think you’re not quite getting my point.

The report was rating cities on two fronts - the ease of availability of monthly tickets and then the prices.

The problem with the Dublin rating stems from the first of these.

If you go into the study, you’ll see that they applied a zero rating for the lack of a monthly ticket (which is wrong), which pushed Dublin right down the ratings, as they applied a very large score to that particular point.

But even worse was that the study didn’t accept substituting the monthly ticket with the automatic LEAP caps for rating purposes of availability of a monthly ticket option means they are very skewed results.

The LEAP caps should have meant a full score of 20 on that front but they awarded a score of zero.

bk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121628188#Comment_121628188

I'll have to dig into the report, but according to the article they did substitute the weekly capping for the monthly ticket.

Either way would it honestly made a real difference to the outcome?

The monthly tickets are terrible value for money and hard to get too, honestly I don't think having to go all the way to Dublin Bus HQ or a railway station to buy one is at all acceptable or really accessible.

Lets be honest, the monthly/annual tickets are really only for taxsaver folks, but only really worth it if you are on the higher rate of tax and many employers don't offer it.

So while you are technically correct, it is available, Greenpeace are correct that it might as well not exist.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121628287#Comment_121628287

Again the report was rating cities on two levels:

1) Availability of a monthly ticket and discounts for older people and students

2) Value for money

They combined the scores of both categories and came up with the rankings.

You are correct to say that they used the LEAP cap for the second category above, but they gave Dublin a score of zero for the non-availability of a monthly ticket in the first category instead of 60 points (the biggest element of that category - should have said 60 in my previous post). They did correctly rate the availability of discounts for older and younger people.

That meant that the overall ranking was much lower than it should be as there is a monthly multi-mode ticket available from any station or Dublin Bus, and in any case the fact of LEAP automatic capping means that there is effectively a monthly ticket available via the caps and doesn’t require you to go to a station/office to get it, as it’s automatic.

The value for money issue is a different point and was correctly assessed.

The devil is in the detail with these things and that report isn’t a completely fair assessment.

bk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121628321#Comment_121628321

So looking at the report, it isn't that they ignored the existence of the monthly ticket. They substituted the weekly capping for it.

However their criteria says they will only award points if the monthly ticket costs €3 or less per day, otherwise they award 0 points for that category. However as the weekly capping works out at €4.57 per day, it thus got zero points in that category:

A country or a city scores full points in the “full-price long-term ticket”

category if there is a long-term ticket for all means of transport costing €1

per day or less in the case of a country, and €0.50 per day or less in the

case of a city. If the price is higher than €7 per day for a country or €3 per

day for a city, no points are awarded in this category. For amounts in

between, a linear scale is applied.

So they did account for it correctly, They just thought it was too expensive, which I'd completely agree with.

LXFlyer

Well I do still think that is misleading to give a zero score on the availability front.

I fully agree that monthly tickets should be priced to give value for money over the price of paying fares individually - what the NTA did by hiking the prices up and saying people could avail of Taxsaver was wrong.

bk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121628451#Comment_121628451

Yes, I was just looking at that and it is all correct per their criteria.

They award 20 points for having a ticket, the first column tiled "Availability of climate or network tickets". They then award 0 points in the next column called "Full-price long-term ticket"

They award 0 points in this column because the price of the monthly ticket is over €3 per day, if you take either the monthly ticket or the weekly capping:

You can see in Annex 2 that they used the €32 weekly capping. That would work out at €4.57 per day. So as per the red highlighted box above you get 0 points for this category.

So no, they didn't ignore the monthly ticket, they actually took the best case scenario by taking the weekly capping instead, which is cheaper then the monthly ticket. But they graded it as still too expensive.

bk

I think this is actually a pretty fair reflection of our ticketing. It is pretty good if you are disabled, elderly or a student. The €2 fare is pretty decent, but the monthly and annual tickets completely suck, aren't fit for purpose and should be scrapped and redone. And they should be available in the Leap app and not having to go all the way to DB HQ, etc.

bk

BTW with regards to Luas, the numbers release today show that in 2023, passenger numbers have returned to the 2019 level or even slightly more.

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121627388#Comment_121627388

It is true to say that there have been planning measures for a good few years now to discourage excessive car use, with good reasons too. Less parking means more housing.

https://www.austinchronicle.com/news/2023-11-10/council-slashes-parking-requirements-ushering-in-new-era-of-development-rules/#:~:text=By%20Austin%20Sanders%2C%20Fri.%2C%20Nov.%2010%2C%202023&text=As%20we%20reported%20last%20week,2%20to%20eliminate%20parking%20mandates

Cycle lanes were only provided where space didn't take anything away from vehicular traffic up to about five years ago. So basically, they provided cycle lanes where they weren't needed, and didn't provide them where they were needed.

Podge_irl

A ranking of public transport that focuses almost exclusively on price is utterly stupid anyway. It is an embarrassment of a report.

bk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121630478#Comment_121630478

Sure, it is just one element of public transport, though an important one. But lets be honest, it isn't like Dublin would do well on any other criteria either, the result would be the same. No Metro lines, small tram network, over reliance on buses, only a couple of 24/7 routes, only starting to get EV buses now, no tap to pay. We are WAY behind the rest of Europe.

If anything, the free travel pass is pretty much the only item that we might beat other cities on.

SharkMX

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121628763#Comment_121628763

Quick, better increase the price to decrease demand so they dont have to worry about increasing capacity :)

BlueSkyDreams

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121627406#Comment_121627406

Schools accepting from a catchment area only works when there are enough schools in each catchment area.

BlueSkyDreams

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121631609#Comment_121631609

What is the free travel pass?

For over 65's?

I think most countries have that in place already.

bk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121643779#Comment_121643779

Over 65’s, but also other folk, like those with disabilities, carers, etc.

And no it isn’t common at all. Across mainland Europe, it is more common to give a reduced fare, but not a free fare. For instance in Paris I think it is 50% off, but not free.

Lofidelity

In the last year or two the corporation has narrowed junctions along the grand canal with extended footpaths, such as at Dolphins Barn and Clogher road. Where traffic could pass on the inside, now has to wait behind a car turning across the oncoming traffic. The only possible reason is to frustrate traffic in the hope of discouraging people from driving.

noelfirl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121653395#Comment_121653395

Or you know, it could have been done to improve the safety of other active travel users both on and off the road.

magicbastarder

when you're used to privilege, equality feels like oppression...

Lofidelity

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121653460#Comment_121653460

Adding another metre of concrete to a pavement is not going to make it safer than it already was. There are few pedestrians along this route. These junctions already had pedestrian lights.

For what its worth im a cyclist and free flowing traffic suits me. Im making an observation.

noelfirl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121653614#Comment_121653614

Yeah, and I'm just providing a counter-argument. By Dolphin's Barn, I'm guessing you probably meant Herberton Road in terms of recent foothpath build out (I don't think there's been any activity at Crumlin Road in the past year or two)? That junction didn't have any pedestrian lights until recently. It also had overly wide radii on the turns, encouraging drivers to cut in in front of cyclists and take the turns at speed. Clogher Road only had pedestrian lights on one arm of the junction. Again, as is often the case, pedestrians came second class and were expected to make multi-stage crossings or dart across from one bit to another in between light changes. I've seen plenty of pedestrians at both those junctions, school-going parents and children in particular at Clogher Road.

Not all cyclists have equal levels of high confidence in terms of mixing with free flowing and turning traffic. The structure of our road network should be based on providing for all, not just those happy with the status quo.

Ten of Swords

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