2023 Proposed Timetable Changes Irish Rail

Either no train or no drivers available to do it I would imagine.

They are constrained by the rolling stock at the moment in the evening or morning. The extra intermediate cars won't enter service until sometime later next year. We will have to wait to see what they facilitate.

The extra Carlow service fills a gap in the daytime service on the line, when they are likely to have some spare stock, and clearly now they have enough drivers to do it.

They have been training new drivers all the time since Covid restrictions were lifted, but, as I’ve said before, most of the intake since then have been replacing leavers and retirees.

But having said that, with each timetable change they have been increasing the services where resources allow it. It depends on the depot.

How is the 06:00 to Cork going to get back to Dublin

Some extra change include:

A Limerick connection to/from the 06:00 Cork will be introduce in the first half of 2024.

05:40 Cork-Heuston now mark IV.

06:15 Cork-Heuston express journey time of 2h 14min.

Less Sunday intercity services will call at suburban stations such as Newbridge, Kildare etc due to expansion of Portlaiose commuter services.

16:10 Heuston-Waterford (Fri) journey time of 1h 40min.

“Customers travelling from Mallow to Cork can now avail of a circa every 20-minute service frequency between 07:29 hrs and 09:08 hrs.”

The additional summer Enterprise services will continue at weekends, with 10 departures each way on Saturdays.

Weekend DART services have been “revised completely.”

Future pattern-based timetable: “As we make step changes to our services and increase service levels this approach will be applied to future timetable proposals. It is intended to transition our services to a more regular pattern towards the end of 2024.”

Still using DMUs on Cork Dublin, still no 20:00 to cork. As a long time user of the 0700 to Cork, adding the 0600 is nice but most people I know don't care really, 0930 is arr is OK cos you can work for most of the way down anyway (instead get some decent 4g reception for the last 20 miles ) . That 0600 is only so they can pull a set off the charleville commuter . Where is the spare MK4 set that is sitting around . Service is specced to run entirely Mk4 and that would free up the DMUs for elsewhere - badly needed.

Not extending that Carlow down to Kilkenny or Waterford is ridiculous.

The lack of an 06:00 Dublin-Cork was one of the top 20 issues if you go back to the consultation results last year, while the lack of a 20:00 didn’t feature in the top 30? So maybe not as big an issue as you think?

https://www.irishrail.ie/en-ie/news/proposed-timetable-changes-from-11th-december-2022

I'd agree with you - the 06:00 will now offer the possibility of connecting into the 09:30 237 bus to Skibbereen and reaching the far end of West Cork before noon on public transport from Dublin at long last.

I'd also concur on your second point - the missing link on the Waterford line is an 09:xx service out of Waterford (that could also do a commuter service into Waterford from Clonmel beforehand), and a later evening service down from Dublin as you suggest.

The Limerick connecting service promised for H1 2024 will hopefully be a nice additional nudge. Wonder how many people the 0505 Ballina-Manulla and 0708 Athlone-Westport will end up carrying.

Does anyone know when trains from cork to Dublin on Dec 10th will show up online to book?

That 'late' Saturday Carlow service added in the further revision is going to be fairly popular with people I know in Carlow and Athy.

A copy and paste job to nearly every request

Up on the ticket page too but no tickets available yet.

How have things been going since the timetable change? I’m specifically interested in how busy the 0600 Dublin-Cork and the connecting Limerick service have been.