BusConnects Dublin - Bus Network Changes Discussion

I'm reading the official booklet from the website at the moment. I am with most of the information about the new routes.

However I see there on the S8 route map where it's supposed to do the right hand turn at Temple Hill/Monkstown Road; it has a school there listed on the map as 'Blackrock College' even though that school is located in Booterstown which is very odd. The route map for the L25 has Dundrum Town Centre located left hand side of Dundrum Luas Station even though it is actually within the looped route of the L25 between the Dundrum bypass and the Main Street.

The good thing about living on these 2 new routes for myself and my mum is that we will save a lot of money on taxi's going between the house and St Michael's Hospital. We are both on the free travel pass as we are on Disability allowance. If we took a taxi out there at the moment; it will cost us about €15 to €20 each way on each trip. It will save us a lot of time and stress if we wanted to do shopping in Dún Laoghaire, Stillorgan or Dundrum as well.

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But why couldn't that have been done already. It's not rocket science.

The L89 was changed to go to Broombridge now but the last map on BusConnects site still has it stopping at Finglas village.

I'm assuming it will go straight down the N2 and right up Ballyboggan Rd to Broombridge but does anyone know the updated route?

Exciting! Cheers.

Haha. I don't think it would benefit me personally, but I like the idea of Broombridge becoming more of a transport hub.

The media launch for Busconnects Phase 5b by the NTA will take place on Friday the 24th of November.

There is an article from the Irish Independent to explain the new routes to be rolled out on the 26th of November.

5a was the W4 and W6 (W61 & 62 for the time being). They were all meant to be the same phase, but were split up due to lack of drivers.

The residents of Ticknock in Ballinteer had put up a petition on change.org a few weeks ago to fix the timetable on the 114 to Blackrock Station.

They made a request to increase the frequency of the route to every 30 minutes. The petition says that it will help the residents of Ticknock to get to work/school on time during the weekdays.

The petition was obviously published a few weeks before the Phase 5b announcement for BusConnects.

The S8 would serve it's route on the R112 alongside the M50 at Ticknock. It also offers a 15 minute frequency during the peak hours on weekdays. It will be a vastly superior route as to what the 114 provides in it's timetable even though the S8 goes out to Dún Laoghaire.

Do you think the residents in Ticknock would have a case here?

I think the S8 going past Ticknock near the M50 would be an adequate addition to their commute. I have no idea though about where most of these residents would go afterwards when they get off the 114 bus route. If they travel onto the City Centre using the Dart at Blackrock. That would be a very good argument to improve the 114 to a 30 minutes frequency at weekdays. Although if the commuters from Ticknock go out through Dún Laoghaire on their commute; having the S8 every 15 minutes at peak times is a perfect alternative for them.

Correct the S8 will be operating along the M50 slip road. The 114 is due to be replaced by the 86 in Ticknock which will be half hourly. Can't see any frequency improvements on the 114 until then.

That's what I was thinking as well, but there's only Pedestrian access on the southbound slip however. Also there would need to be a lift/ramp to make the stops accessible realistically, which would add to the cost.

Steep is good - that's what stairs are invented for! Plenty of steep stairs in Italy, Spain, Portugal... Why don't we have a better access from residential and industrial estates to the main roads? Walking around or taking a bus around is a bit inefficient and there's plenty of examples, at least in Dublin.

Yeah, connectivity idea is good.

A concern I have is with how much the area around Lambs Cross has grown since these plans were drawn up vs. the bus service available. Anyone familiar with the area will be aware of the level of construction happening. The route from Ticknock at Lamb’s Cross has had a big boom in new homes with a new road layout. There has been similar growth further up Enniskerry Road at Aikens Village where multiple developments have shot up in the last year. Amazingly not one extra bus has been added to the area. The last 114 from Ticknock is at 8.30pm Mon to Sat and at 7.25pm on Sundays. Aside from the hourly 47 which dips into Belarmine, there is no service on the section of Enniskerry Road where new housing developments have launched.

Realistically nothing will be done until some time in late 2025 when they introduce routes 86, 87 and 88 to the area. The worrying thing is that anybody moving in there will probably have chosen to drive by then due to lack of public transport. 

The S8 could have potentially been routed via lambs cross (at least until the 86, 87 & 88 start). See the red route below:

This would add ~8-10 minutes in ideal conditions, but would probably be prone to traffic issues so realistically would take longer. It would also miss out on 3 stops along Brehon Field road, but these aren't currently served by the 175 as it is, and would still be served by the 74 (and eventually the 80).

It could be said that the S8 - even with the use of the sliproads beside the M50 - is already a longer commute between Dun Laoghaire -> Tallaght as it is compared to the 75 (when comparing the timetables), so maybe they're trying not to get it to do too much?

That is true about the loss of connection with the 75 as well, I hadnt thought of that!

For the timetable, I was basing my calculations off the 8:45 S8 which gets to Tallaght LUAS at 10:10, whereas the 8:55 75 gets you to Tallaght LUAS for 10:12. After double checking, I do see times later on that are a bit quicker