Irish Rail's New Timetable Disaster

jaqian

Irish Rail have brought out a new timetable changing the 8.30am train to 9am without telling any of its passengers. They've also canceled breakfast which doesn't affect me but will all their Cork & Limerick passengers. The trains home in the evening have been pushed back an hour as well so the 16:15 is now 17:15 which mean I won't get home till close on 8pm! And they have the check to call this an improvement in service.

Rang customer services to see what the story was and they said that this is what was recommended by "focus groups". Screw focus groups why didn't just poll the commuters? We're the ones it's gonna affect.

Reduced service, same price ticket = RIP OFF Ireland

JackieChan

jaqian,
Have to say the timetable is better for me.
Morning train gets to Heuston quicker and with less stops.
Train home is a little earlier and so I'm home earlier.

With a change to timetables its always gone to make some people worse off.

Also,
I have seen new timetables at stations, they even have people(mainly young women) wearing TVs which detail changes to the services.Also all old timetables say that they are valid up to 10th of Decemeber. Their website was showing the new timetable for the last 2-3 weeks.So Iits not fair to say that they didn't tell anybody.

jaqian

Fair enough about the date on the timetable but I haven't seen these telly women. But who's gonna check their web-site unless they're looking for something? I would have expected IR to announce on the trains that from next week times will change etc. The train was packed at 8.30am this morning all expecting to head off at 8.30am. looks like they didn't get the msg either.

MarkoP11

Any new timetable will always effect some people and those who are unhappy make noise. There are several thousand happy people in Maynooth this morning, another 1,000 happy in Drogheda and 10% more space on Kildare line services, 30 minutes reduction in the 21:00 Dublin Cork and 25 minutes reduction in the 5:15 Cork Dublin can't fault that. I can fault the fact most journeys are slower than the same in 1987 and its getting worse year on year

The majority of the times are as before and there are many improvements but sadly nowhere near as much as possible. The biggest changes are on the Sligo line and they had posters up for ages. There are a few bad moves on the Kildare Heuston line (but new more reliable rolling stock) A move from 16:15 to 17:15 would appear good business sense to maximise time for those in Dublin, Limerick is 17:05 though as I recall

The timetable changes in December its printed on the timetables, it is on the website for 3 weeks, it was heavily carried in the press and its been on the displays for a few days. Hourly services on Cork have been in the works for years and this is stage one. Senior IE management have been on the concourse in Heuston many many times recently (last Monday for one). They take notes and do react to queries, at the end of the day no use giving out here (though I'm sure they read) As it says "Times subject to change"

If its a Heuston based issue (but not Waterford) the man you want is Steve Murphy (Manager South and West). The focus groups are actually real passengers and unless you get in touch with IE how else will they know......

On the down side IE staff appear to have been instructed not to sell the new timetable till yesterday I made at least 5 attempts at 3 stations to get a copy over the last week and got nothing until Sunday when it appeared everywhere either IE have a great logistics team or the boxes arrived last week

As always with IE they failed to get it 100% right we can have a proper timetable but IE don't seem to care and persist with the mess we have

BrianD

jaqian wrote:

Irish Rail have brought out a new timetable changing the 8.30am train to 9am without telling any of its passengers.

eh, is this not what the timetable is doing ... telling you of the new schedule?

dead air

The 22:05 train from Connolly to Drogheda has been removed from service, as far as I know without any notice.

MarkoP11

Still one at 22:27 though the 22:05 is now 20:29 since they changed the Rosslare timetable to add a extra Gorey Dublin evening service (it used to run empty in front of the 22:05)

The 22.05 used to terminate in Connolly once Rosslare services switched to railcar operation it had to get home to Drogheda so the timetable made it a service train

Moral of the story is check timetable before travel no excuses, the timetables changes second Sunday in December each year thats the same as most other european countries

parsi

FWIW they have been on RedFM regularly with ads about the new timetable and the papers at home had big spreads as well. Certainly I seem to think that this is the first year I've heard it so publicised - in fact I was beginning to get abit browned off hearing that stupid ding-dong.

enterprise

jaqian wrote:

The trains home in the evening have been pushed back an hour as well so the 16:15 is now 17:15 which mean I won't get home till close on 8pm!

Where does this train start from / go to?

jaqian

Sorry should have said I get it at Portlaoise but I think it originates in Cork.

enterprise

Well as another poster said there are winners and losers in each and every timetable change. There is a Friday and Saturday only train from Portlaoise at 16.15 (14.30 ex Cork) if thats a help?

jaqian

Yeah suppose so. Unfortunately Sat is no good as I only work mon - fri. Cheers anyway.

Branoic

I don't use the DART for any great distance, but I do use it every morning. I go from Tara Street to Grand Canal Dock circa 8:30 - 8:40. Since the new timetables I've noticed that the trains that come along are faaaaaaaaaaaaar more packed. Even more than they were before the extra carriages were added. We're talking sardines here. It doesn't bother me that much, except when I get caught in the door cos there's literally no room in the carriage.

MarkoP11

The timings of services hasn't changed through the city centre section, some trains have swaped starting places

The real reasons are
The new 7:45 Maynooth to Connolly which arrives at 8:28
The new 7:27 Drogheda to Connolly which also arrives at 8:28

Between them well over a thousand people several hundred of whom are clearly geting the DART southbound

Wednesday was a mess and the wrong train lengths where used on Monday morning

End of the day a lot lot more people are being moved. 8:30 just happens to be the most desirable arrival time in the city.